Vancouver Transit Camp - collaborative conversations about public transit

It's been a while since I've touched bases with the ChangeEverything community, but I realized today that what I've been busy with is exactly what this community is for, and I feel silly for not coming back here earlier.

I've spent the last almost 3 weeks putting together an event called Vancouver Transit Camp. It's based off a tech event called BarCamp, and it's an all-day event to gather citizens from all walks of life, to sit down with staff from TransLink to have collaborative, creative conversations about how we can improve public transit in Metro Vancouver. It's taking place on Saturday, December 8th, at WorkSpace in Gastown (21 Waster St, suite 400) from 9:30 to 4:30.

Participation, respect and positivity are the key foci for the event. We're not going to pay for a keynote speaker to come lecture to the attendees - instead, we think everyone who comes to this is an expert at something, and that everyone deserves the chance to speak and be heard. We want to hear what the community wants to get passionate and excited about, so the participants are going to create the schedule for the event using open space method. It's not as easy as just showing up, but it's actually great fun once we get into it.

Above all, this event is a celebration, not for airing out complaints. Our city is full of amazing, creative, imaginative people doing cool things to get around, to help others get around, and to make that experience quirky or interesting. We want to help others to recognize how much awesome stuff is happening in our own backyard.

Organizing this event has been a real trip thus far. I'm looking for better ways to put my intention out there and to have people who understand this to sign up to come to the event. I've run into a roadblock or two which I've blogged about, having to do with the fact that transit is a politically polarized and important topic in this city at the moment. But I've realized that I'm serving a community that doesn't necessarily speak to me as a single cohesive voice, but is definitely there: people that are looking to converse about transit outside the language of board meetings, news releases, or transit advocacy, who want to be able to relate their personal or career experiences with what they see in our public transit system, and who would like to be able to interact with TransLink staff members outside that of the service provider-customer space.

The big struggle right now is that we're still looking for sponsorship, and I'm utterly new at this and trying to email whoever I can think of and to learn how to ask, which I've never actually done before.

Please take a look at the Vancouver Transit Camp wiki and see if this event sounds like your cup of tea. We'd love to have you.