Virtual Public Meetings

Description

Virtual public meetings (VPMs) are an online version of traditional in-person public meetings or open houses. VPMs complement traditional meetings by providing the same information online, in real time, as would be available at traditional meetings. VPMs encourage public participation and feedback on transportation projects using real-time web and chat services. They also allow the public to provide comments and engage in live chat sessions with project or agency representatives.

Technology has expanded communication between government agencies and citizenry. Digitally based approaches to public meetings lead to greater knowledge, commitment, and satisfaction than traditional meetings.¹ As more adults use the Internet, civic engagement is increasingly online. As of January 2014:

• 87 percent of American adults use the Internet.
• 39 percent of American adults have recently contacted a government official or spoken out in a public forum via online methods.²

Online political engagement is especially common among the youngest Americans, who are less likely to engage in civic activities otherwise.³

Virtual Public Meetings on the Spectrum of Public Engagement

Based on the spectrum for public participation by the International Association for Public Participation, VPMs cover two elements of the spectrum of public participation methods. VPMs allow agencies to consult with and involve the public in the transportation planning process.

Target Audience

One primary advantage of VPMs is that they allow citizens to participate based on their schedule.⁴ VPMs provide the flexibility to participate from home or perhaps during a lunch break. This flexibility increases participation from those who may not be able to attend in-person public meetings due to conflicts. In addition, VPMs increase participation by those who cite traffic and parking as inconveniences that deter attending in-person public meetings.⁸

VPMs should be used along with in-person public meetings because some people prefer the in-person experience. Providing both types of meetings increases input from a larger and more representative segment of the population.

How Will This Help?

• Allows many individuals to participate at the same time. Technology provides real-time interaction over the Internet with an unlimited number of people, as opposed to traditional meetings that are limited by space.
• Increases the number of citizens who are engaged in the transportation planning process because VPMs allow citizens to participate on their own schedule.
• Allows citizens to individually participate in the decision-making process, including those not interested in speaking in public.

Public involvement processes characterized by two-way communication, access, and inclusion lead to more meaningful, deliberative public involvement, which increases public support for the final decisions.¹ New technologies allow state transportation policy and decision makers to find new and innovative ways to increase public participation in planning.

Implementation Examples

State Department of Transportation Initiatives

Missouri: The Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) is one of the first public agencies to successfully host VPMs. MoDOT supplements regular public meetings with the virtual form to engage a larger audience and provide an opportunity for public comments. MoDOT’s VPMs were an instant success; when the first VPMs were introduced, the number of customers who attended transportation-related meetings jumped from 10,983 in the fourth quarter of 2008 to over 15,000 in the first quarter of 2009.⁵ As a result of MoDOT’s public outreach efforts, 92 percent of Missourians feel that MoDOT provides timely, accurate, and understandable information.⁶

Nevada and Arizona: The Nevada and Arizona departments of transportation hosted a joint VPM on the IH 11 and Intermountain West Corridor Study in 2014. The study included planning for a new interstate highway connecting Las Vegas and Phoenix, with the potential to eventually extend to Canada and Mexico. Citizens were invited to provide feedback in questionnaires and view presentations and technical memoranda regarding the corridor. Online questionnaires were available from February 10 through March 11, 2014. Over 2,028 individuals participated, providing nearly 2,500 comments.⁷ Feedback was reviewed and incorporated into the final study report.

Project-Specific Initiatives

Oak Hill Parkway Project in Austin, Texas: The Oak Hill Parkway Project in Austin, Texas, had one of the first VPMs that included a real-time chat session with project representatives.⁸ The project team, under the leadership of the Central Texas Mobility Authority (CTMA) and Texas Department of Transportation, used a virtual open house to increase public engagement in the environmental review process for proposed improvements. The virtual open house provided an online, interactive experience designed to mimic the project’s traditional open houses. It featured two real-time chat sessions with project representatives, while the website featured a landing page, registration page, project materials, and an exit survey. The project website attracted 659 unique visitors, of whom 126 users registered to participate in the virtual open house.⁸ By comparison, 81 people attended the traditional open house held concurrently on May 23, 2013.⁸ After the demonstrated success of this pilot project, CTMA continues to use VPMs for other mobility projects.

Lone Star Rail District in Texas: In early 2015, the Lone Star Rail District in Central Texas used a virtual open house in its public involvement plan in the federal environmental review process.⁹ In addition to traditional in-person public meetings, the project team created a fully functional public involvement module on its website. The virtual open house allowed individuals who did not attend in person to provide feedback and view presentation materials.

Application Techniques and Principles

VPMs should display project information in a meaningful way on an easy-to-navigate website. This format allows as much or as little participation as desired. Agency or project leaders should determine what level of participation the agency needs from participants to determine what features to include on the VPM website.

Implementation Issues

Project staff must closely monitor VPMs to ensure that comments received are of real value and that questions are answered quickly. This ensures participants feel their comments are valid and will be heard. Also, current administrative procedures may limit the recording of comments received through a website or VPM.

One measure of how well the VPM performs is whether the participants represent the broader population. Participation from a representative sample of the public helps avoid overweighting individual or special interests. An ongoing challenge in public engagement is self-selection bias and representation—citizens with the highest personal stake in a particular issue are the most willing to participate.

Another implementation issue is overcoming the digital divide—the gap between the 87 percent of Americans adults who are online and the remaining 13 percent who are not. ¹⁰

In order to avoid self-selection bias, representativeness, and the digital divide, the best practice is a complete public engagement package that simultaneously uses both online and traditional public engagement tools.

Who Is Responsible?

Typically, the lead agency for public engagement is responsible for organizing and running the VPM.

Project Time Frame

The VPM implementation time frame is relatively long. The steps to implementation are:

• Design the project website.
• Research appropriate hardware/software application systems.
• Preparing the command center for real-time chat sessions (if using them).

Once the platform and framework for hosting VPMs is set up, VPMs for future projects are easier and faster to deploy.⁸ Many transportation projects will already have a project website, making the VPM easier to implement.

Cost

The cost to implement a VPM is relatively moderate when compared to other engagement methods. A VPM can be as simple as a static webpage or as complex as real-time chat sessions. At a minimum, a VPM webpage displays project information and allows for comments. Depending on the scale and format of the VPM, the costs might include:

• Hardware and software costs for setting up the VPM online platform.
• Personnel and staff costs and time for developing and running the VPM.
• Specialized web development for features such as live chat.

Data Needs

Similar to a traditional public meeting, data collected during the VPM inform the decision-making process or become part of the public input record in the federal environmental review process.

Additionally, data collected during the VPM can be used to evaluate its success. The data needed to evaluate the benefits and costs of VPMs include:

• Attendance data, measured by the registration page or comments received.
• Demographic data, collected by an exit survey.
• User satisfaction, collected by an exit survey.
• User traffic and participation, retrieved from services such as Google Analytics.

If additional performance measures are desired, the web platform can be programmed to measure those indicators.

Virtual Public Meetings Best Practices [call out box]

Type of location: Local or regional transportation agencies or projects.

Agency practices: Make the information provided in a VPM consistent with information provided at a regular public meeting. Determine what level of public participation is needed; this determines the features to include in the VPM. Conduct outreach to get citizen participation.

Frequency of reanalysis: Project based.

Supporting policies or actions needed: Pilot studies to evaluate the effectiveness of VPMs. VPMs complement, rather than replace, traditional public engagement methods.

Complementary strategies: Electronic updates, project websites, public hearings and meetings, social media, and traditional public meetings.

For More Information

Texas A&M Transportation Institute. Exploring New Technology: Results of the Oak Hill Parkway Virtual Open House Pilot. http://d2dtl5nnlpfr0r.cloudfront.net/tti.tamu.edu/documents/TTI-2013-9.pdf.

I-11 and Intermountain West Corridor Study. Virtual Public Meeting Summary Report. http://i11study.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/I-11-Public-Meeting-3-Summary-Report-031714-v2.pdf.

References

1. Conroy, M.M., and S.I. Gordon. Utility of Interactive Computer-Based Materials for Enhancing Public Participation. Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, Vol. 47, No. 1, Jan. 2004, pp. 19–33.
2. Pew Research Center. Internet User Demographics. http://www.pewinternet.org/data-trend/internet-use/latest-stats/. Accessed November 20, 2014.
3. Pew Research Center. Civic Engagement in the Digital Age. 2013.
4. Weber, L. M., A. Loumakis, and J. Bergman. Who Participates and Why?: An Analysis of Citizens on the Internet and the Mass Public. Social Science Computer Review, Vol. 21, No. 1, February 2003, pp. 26–42.
5. Missouri Department of Transportation. Customer Involvement in Transportation Decision-Making. 2009. http://www.missouriruralpublictransportation.org/about/tracker_archive/documents/Tracker_PDF_April09/Tracker_April09_Chapter_13.pdf. Accessed March 16, 2015.
6. Missouri Department of Transportation. January 2015 Tracker: Measures of Departmental Performance. http://www.modot.org/about/documents/Jan2015TrackerReduced.pdf. Accessed March 16, 2015.
7. I-11 and Intermountain West Corridor Study. Virtual Public Meeting Summary Report. February 2014. http://i11study.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/I-11-Public-Meeting-3-Summary-Report-031714-v2.pdf. Accessed March 16, 2015.
8. Ettelman, B., S. Bricka, K.C. Choi, T. Geiselbrecht, K. Miller, K. Joh, and J. Wagner. Exploring New Technology: Results of the Oak Hill Parkway Virtual Open House Pilot. Presented to the Texas Transportation Commission and 83rd Texas Legislature, Austin, Texas, 2014.
9. Lone Star Regional Rail. Environmental Impact Statement. http://eis.lonestarrail.com/. Accessed March 10, 2015.
10. Pew Research Center. Offline Adults. Pew Research Center’s Internet Project Survey July–September 2013. http://www.pewinternet.org/data-trend/internet-use/offline-adults/. Accessed Nov. 20, 2014.