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Rentify 

Chinatown

For community organizations serving the Chinese and Chinese American neighborhoods in American cities, we are an initiative leveraging the power of digital tools and spatial data analytics to help them document place identity, visualize housing challenges and opportunities, and incubate a sense of local belonging.

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Work

Building tools

"the G Suite for community organizations"

Chinatown
Historical Trail
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EXPERIENCE
After collecting historically significant spots in Chinatown from multiple data sources, we create the Historical Trail, which features the immigrant history and the development of Chinatown.
Chinatown
Data Portal
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Fed with data from BPDA, MassBuild, BidUp, and AirDNA, the Data Portal visualizes housing challenges and opportunities in Chinatown, while providing online analytical functions.
BIG DATA
WOW Chinatown
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Under the pandemic of COVID-19, we are distanced from the places we love and we go to normally. WOW Chinatown, a mini-program embedded in WeChat, allows people to input the places in Boston Chinatown they would love to go after the pandemic. This would help us better understand the social meanings of the places.
ENGAGEMENT
Take a look at our prototype!
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Interview
Data Collector
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MICRO DATA
Built with Google Forms' engine, this Data Collector saves a huge amount of time of interviewers by digitalizing the paper and pen process. This tool is compatible with mobile phones, pads, and laptops.
Where
We Visit
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Supported by a big data company, we identify and protect popular local businesses in Chinatown by capturing the spatial-temporal patterns of mobile phone data.
BIG DATA
Where We Visit
COMING SOON!
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CoMap
Chinatown
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Working with Sasaki Strategy, we build a collaborative mapping program that generates a spatial visualization of how people experience Chinatown.
ENGAGEMENT
Building Permit Identifier
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To identify illegal or non-standard short-term rental units, the Identifier will automatically access the ISD database and compare the permitted usage and actual uses by optical character recognition powered by Google Cloud.
BIG DATA
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Building Permit Identifier
COMING SOON!
Team

Our Team

who really care

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We are a group of passionate researchers and designers from MIT and Harvard University. 

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We work with local community partners, such as Chinatown Progressive Association and the Community Land Trust, and build tools to engage lower-income and aging communities in the urban planning process using digital platforms, which better collects inputs from local residents and visualize challenges and opportunities.

Partners
Contact Us
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