FixMyStreet poster

FixMyStreet gets your street fixed.

Enter your postcode, stick a pin in the map, type in your problem and zoom!… off it goes to the council. It’s so simple that getting on for 25,000 problems have been reported through it so far.

FixMyStreet has a whole lot more than this though.

It lets you browse the problems currently reported in your area.

It lets you set up email or RSS alerts to be told when problems get reported within a radius of your house or workplace, or within your ward or council.

It provides posters and flyers (made by one of our volunteers, Ayesha) that you can use to tell people about the service, and encourage them to ger their streets fixed.

It is built on open source code, for people who want to hack versions in other countries, and we can build bespoke, rebranded versions for councils and charities who want it here in the UK.

It was built mainly by Matthew Somerville who rocks, and partly by Chris Lightfoot, who did.

And most important of all, it works.

Last week at the SustainIT eWell-Being Awards, we picked up an award for FixMyStreet. The judges said it was “[a]n excellent example of an independent website which empowers the general public in their dealings with their local council. It is a relatively simple application, yet highly effective and replicable.” One example the accompanying Independent supplement mentioned was “a community in Great Yarmouth which joined forces through FixMyStreet to clear their local unused railway track. The site made possible a dialogue between community members and the council’s community development worker, who organised a “clear up” day where locals could get involved with rectifying the situation, with tools, insurance and even a barbeque provided.” It’s great to see that sort of thing happening on the site, and also great to be recognised in this way.

In a spirit of celebration (though more to celebrate the endorsements the campaign has received), TheyWorkForYou now covers the Scottish Parliament - see the TheyWorkForYou news for more information.

Residents turn to web in lane fight describes a set of problems reported on FixMyStreet.

A NARROW mountain lane has been damaged and turned into an “international playground” for 4×4s and satnav-guided lorries, angry villagers claimed yesterday.

The interesting thing is the claim that making the reports public really helped pressurise the authority into fixing them

one [resident] claimed the local authority had now been “embarrassed” into action by the complaints on fixmystreet.com