Why Pittsburgh’s Innovation and Performance team takes an open-source approach to open data; Technical.ly, August 1, 2018

Tara Matthews, Technical.ly; Why Pittsburgh’s Innovation and Performance team takes an open-source approach to open data

"This is a guest post by Tara Matthews, the senior digital services analyst at the City of Pittsburgh's Department of Innovation and Performance.

Picture it: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. October 2015.

It was the birth of what would be named the Western Pennsylvania Regional Data Center (also known as the WPRDC, also known as “Whopper Duck”), an all-star collaboration between the City of Pittsburgh, Allegheny County and the University of Pittsburgh.

This put us in the unique position of hosting not just city and county data, but data from non-governmental organizations such as the Carnegie Library and Bike PGH, as well as other local service providers such as the Port Authority of Allegheny County. This required a specialized set-up, which is why WPRDC is based in CKAN, an open-source data management system that allowed for a completely custom configuration.

The Data Center launch coincided with the kickoff of the city’s Open Data program, managed by the city’s Department of Innovation and Performance."