Western New Yorkers will be able to turn to their smartphones for information on child care, Thruway conditions, rental properties, landlords and other topics, thanks to creativity and innovation that emerged from the 2014 AT&T Western New York Civic App Challenge.
The winners of the two-month “virtual hackathon” were announced Dec. 4 by AT&T, along with community partners including the University at Buffalo, State University of New York at Fredonia, Z80 Labs Technology Incubator, InfoTech Niagara, Launch NY, United Way of Buffalo & Erie County, d!g Buffalo and Hack Upstate.
The contest challenged local developers, entrepreneurs, designers and technologists to leverage open data to build smartphone apps that serve community needs. The competition aimed to connect and engage citizens with government and demonstrate how mobile technologies can lead to the next generation of tech jobs and investment.