It’s almost time to celebrate the New Year with fireworks. But every year, there are more and more complaints about the nuisance caused by fireworks – ranging from accidents to fires, crashes and anxiety. In the Netherlands, last year alone, the central hotline for firework-related incidents was flooded with more than 48,000 reports received.
In the year 2011, GroenLinks* they launched an initiative that allow citizens to report fireworks nuisance at ‘Meldpunt Vuurwerkoverlast’. While this hotline has been the single point of contact for complaints, they have been working towards empowering municipalities to deal with these problems at a local level. Their goal has finally been achieved, and the municipalities now are forerunners in dealing with fireworks nuisance in their respective jurisdictions.
In the Netherlands, fireworks are only allowed from 31 December, 18:00 until 1 January, 02:00 but not everywhere.
Given the wide use of fireworks, the municipalities rely profoundly on citizens to report incidents. So how can municipalities get citizens to report accurately without feeling unsafe or exposed?
IMAGEM has created the ‘fireworks reporting app’ that is free for citizens to download and use on their, while the reporting is anonymous (GDPR complaint) and safeguards privacy. This simple app is cloud-based, and citizens can tag the location, select a category and attached a photo to create a wholesome report. Creating a report is just 4 buttons away.
For the municipalities too, the solution is just as simple. A low cost and plug-and-play solution, it can be customised to create categories and buttons required by the municipality. The reporting is done on a map-based dashboard, where multi-sources data (historic data and current data), can be viewed. The app solution is scalable and provides options for as many modifications needed by each municipality.
Note: for emergencies, citizens are still required to contact 112. * GroenLinks is a political party in the Netherlands who focus on green initiatives and work towards a sustainable future.
Author: Yashita Arora, Marketing Director at IMAGEM.