Policy Clean Up, Structuring, and Organizing to Create a Research Database

delivery platforms to share data with restaurants78. Additionally we also examined Article 31 of the European Union’s Digital Services Act, a supra-national level policy that would require significant reforms to platform data governance within the EU, including vastly expanded local government access to certain urban platform data79. Finally, case studies covering Barcelona’s Smart City Vision Plan and accompanying policies were also examined, as Barcelona and its “City Data Commons” initiative was often cited in the literature as a leading model for public agency access to private sector data.

While these policies informed our thinking, many differed in important ways from the body of policies this research is primarily focused on or were otherwise not easily available in English. Ultimately all but LADOT’s personal delivery permit—which is closely related to its micromobility permit—were left out of the core research database and quantitative analysis.

For each policy gathered, we downloaded the policy as provided on the official government hosted website and also utilized optical character recognition (OCR) tools to create a “text searchable” version where needed.

78 “The New York City Council - File #: Int 2311-2021,” accessed April 27, 2022, https://legistar. council.nyc.gov/LegislationDetail.aspx?ID=4951001&GUID=4CB11989-5925-418B-9627B2AED230D67F&Options=&Search=.

79 “Proposal for a REGULATION OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL on a Single Market For Digital Services (Digital Services Act) and Amending Directive 2000/31/EC” (2020), https:// eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/en/TXT/?qid=1608117147218&uri=COM%3A2020%3A825%3AFIN.

We then organized the policies in a database using the following standard metadata fields:

Table 4 Platform Urbanism Data Sharing Policy Database – Metadata Fields (Required)

Metadata Field Definition

“Jurisdiction”

“Policy Type”

“Policy Link”

“Policy Date”

“Associated Website Link” Where geographically and politically the policy has been adopted or where it applies.

Whether the policy document is a law/ordinance, an administrative regulation, a permit or license application requirement, or some other policy instrument.

A direct URL link to the original policy file as provided by the relevant government agency.

The date a policy was adopted or went into effect.

A direct link to a relevant government website explaining the policy or program or otherwise providing additional context.

“Originating Body” The department or agency that enacted the policy, for example “Oakland Department of Transportation” or “Boston City Council”

“Originating Body Type” The standardized category for the department or agency that enacted the policy, for example “Department of Transportation” or “Council / Legislature”

“Full Text” The raw text of the policy.

While not completed for every policy, additional/optional fields also included:

Table 5 Platform Urbanism Data Sharing Policy Database – Metadata Fields (Optional)

Metadata Field Definition

“Media Coverage”

“Lawsuit”

“Notes” Links to journalistic articles covering the policy or program.

Whether the policy was the subject of a lawsuit from a platform company or companies.

Additional researcher notes about the policy.

Finally, we read these polies and later, after adopting a best practice framework, provided some additional, content-based metadata tags:

Table 6 Platform Urbanism Data Sharing Policy Database – Metadata Fields (Best Practice “Tags”)

Metadata Field / “Tag” Definition

“Stated Purpose / Use Case” Does the policy state specific government goals and data needs to justify collection of platform data?

“Data Minimization” Does the policy limit the scope of data collection based on collecting the least invasive amount of data needed?

“Privacy Protections” Does the policy make commitments to protecting data privacy?

“Definitions for Sensitive Information” Does the policy include definitions or provisions for classifying Personally Identifiable Information (PII), sensitive information etc.?

“Program Transparency” Does the policy commit to program transparency by including provisions for summary reporting or open data publication, etc.?

“Defined Roles and Enforcement Entity”

“Firewalled from Law Enforcement” Does the policy make clear what agency or individuals are responsible for program administration and data collection, including who might have access to data?

Does the policy include provisions to explicitly prevent the sharing of platform data with police departments?