Category Archives: Raleigh

And the Fall 2012 race season has begun

3 Replies

The Fall race season kicked off this weekend with the City of Oaks Marathon. I ran my 15th half marathon, The Rex Healthcare half marathon.

This race is always interesting because of daylight savings—usually plenty of rest! But daylight savings seems pretty pointless in the 21st century, but regardless, we still have to deal with the false sense of time change. (That’s for you Damon!)

Caitlyn's first half marathon

Caitlyn’s first half marathon

At about 5:00am in the morning, the sound of thunder woke us up. Who ordered the race day thunderstorm in the early morning? The rain kept the temperatures up. The predicted 38Âş ended up being 42Âş – which was fine by me.

Mom, MB, and Caitlyn were on-hand to watch the race. They saw me start under the NC State Belltower, then were at the 10k finish line (6.2 miles) to send me off for the remainder of the half marathon. Continue reading →

A Partial Solution to the Wake County Bus Problem

6 Replies

Dear Superintendent Tata,

The school bus my child rides, route 7, has been late three out of four days this week. The first day of school was a nightmare. I freaked out and drove my child to Dillard Drive so they wouldn’t be late on the first day. The greeters at the school were very nonchalant about the whole thing. “Oh, it’s just the first day of school, the buses are always late.” What?!?

Today, we waited over 30 minutes for the bus. It didn’t arrive until after 9:00am and school starts at 9:15am. Which is kind of late if you ask me. I could have driven my child to school and been back home in less time. It caused me to be late for my first meeting of the day. We need a solution. The tardiness doesn’t just impact the kids, it impacts the parents as well. And while I don’t understand the entire problem, I have a partial solution that can help parents save time and be more efficient. Continue reading →

City Council Has Perfect Attendance at CityCamp Raleigh

Leave a reply

Originally posted on opensource.com and licensed under Creative Commons BY-SA.

What started with a unanimous vote to adopt an open source resolution eventually became a long-term commitment to the open source way. How many of you have had an elected official attend a citizen-lead event? Probably some of you. But how many of you have had your entire city or town council attend an unconference?

At a recent open government unconference, all city council members—including the mayor of Raleigh, North Carolina—attended some or all of the event. Their attendance wasn’t a requirement—and it wasn’t a political drive-by. It was genuine, natural. And some of them got knee-deep in the “code,” competing in the civic hackathon. Continue reading →

Ten Teams Compete for CityCamp Raleigh $5000 Prize

Leave a reply

The unconference at CityCamp Raleigh on June 2 was amazing. The ideas. The passion. The people. For those of you unfamiliar with the unconference format, we gathered at 9:00 am  on Saturday. The coffee was a little late, so we didn’t start until 9:15 am. We explained the process for the day…which went something like this: Continue reading →

A Preview of the CityCamp Raleigh Agenda

Leave a reply

Here’s a peak at the agenda for Friday, June 1. Lunch will be provided from 12-1pm. There will also be a chance to network during this time. You should register so we know you’re coming.

On Saturday, June 2, we will kick off our unconference at 9am–where the agenda will be determined by those in attendance. Folks will pitch ideas to start off the morning, several workshops will be hosted, and teams will start to form around ideas on how to improve civic engagement or other civic-minded needs in the City of Raleigh.

On Sunday, June 3, starting at 9am, teams will collaborate on solving a civic issue that can improve the quality of life in Raleigh. Simultaneously, CityCamp Raleigh will host a Triangle Wiki content sprint to add pages, images, and ideas to trianglewiki.org. At 3pm, teams will present and CityCamp Raleigh will award one winning team with a cash reward at 4pm. Continue reading →

How SPARKcon uses open source

Leave a reply

Originally posted on opensource.com and licensed under Creative Commons BY-SA.

Image credits: h0tgrits, opensource.com - Licensed CC-BY-SA

Process over content. Aly Khalifa from Gamil Design and Designbox used this mantra to instill open source roots at SPARKcon—an annual event that showcases, celebrates, and influences the creative momentum naturally found in North Carolina’s Triangle region.

“I think at first it was hard for people to understand—it was hard for us to describe. Sometimes it was embarrassing—this commitment to process over content,” Continue reading →

Triangle Wiki Day a Huge Success for Open Source in Raleigh

Leave a reply
Image credits: Laura Barnes Hamlyn

Image credits: Laura Barnes Hamlyn

Almost 50 people collaborated on February 25 at Red Hat headquarters, currently located on Centennial Campus in Raleigh, NC, to participate in Triangle Wiki Day. The event was a soft launch of trianglewiki.org, an effort to document the Triangle region and increase collaboration and knowledge sharing across the area. The wiki uses open source software, local wiki, as a content management platform that includes wiki pages, images, and mapping.

The day started off with a brief presentation [PDF] by Jason Hibbets on how the Triangle Wiki project fits in with the CityCamp Raleigh movement, as well as the larger open government picture and civic innovation week, Code Across America, by Code for America. Continue reading →

A Sneak Peak at Pullen Park

Leave a reply

On November 17, 2011, I joined other community members to explore the recently rennovated Pullen Park in Southwest Raleigh, NC. The instant you walk through the gate, you realize that this is a special place for Raleigh. I was immediately impressed. The park staff has many reasons to smile, because Pullen Park is going to attract park-goers from all over North Carolina and beyond.

I invited my southwestraleigh.com blogger, Kris, to attend the VIP-only event. We explored the Continue reading →