The 2022 National ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture and EXPO drew more than 6,000 attendees and 350 exhibitors on November 11-14.

Motionworks’ Vice President of Planning, Cynthia Albright, FAICP CUD, GISP joined Emily McCoy, PLA ASLA, SITES AP, Principal at Design Workshop to present a 90-minute Digital Technology education session, “Big Data Drives Bigger Impact: Data and Tools for Equity in Design.” Cynthia discussed the definition, types, scales, sources, application, visualization techniques, and questions to be asked when acquiring location-based services data. She covered the value of a synthetic population over a geofenced approach to inspire decision makers to action in order to build more equitably sustainable communities. She also presented Motionworks’ data before, during, and after Hurricane Ian to reveal the travel patterns of the most at-risk Hendry County residents (high poverty rate, high number of children and seniors) from those counties directly in the eye of the Hurricane. Emily demonstrated relevant application in existing conditions analysis, user behavior and sentiment, mode usage in parks, and prioritization of park amenities and projects.

Key takeaways: A synthetic or digital population provides a virtual representation of a true actual population from 300+ million people; population intelligence provides new design opportunities for equitable access to infrastructure and services, site selection, market and gap analysis, redevelopment planning, mobile trade areas, scenario planning, and predictive modeling.