Main Street Twitters Over Streetscape Project

Columbia's Civic Progress Committee has set up a up a feed on Twitter.com to keep members of the community abreast of progress in planning, funding, constructing and promoting the Main Street streetscape project. This electronic "bulletin board"--the first of its kind in the nation for a streetscape project--is part of a larger outreach effort that is launching this month.

Twitter is a website where a sender can broadcast very short messages--140 characters, maximum--to anyone who’s signed up to receive them. It’s like a cross between a blog and a chat room. Twitter feeds can be accessed from a variety of platforms--in other words, followers can receive its short messages from a website, via email, even over their cell phone or Blackberry device. Local governments across the country are experimenting with Twitter as a means to inform the public about hearings, impending legislation, events, and other public doings. This is the first time that any group has deployed Twitter for informing followers about a streetscape project--what the feed refers to (in Twittereze) as "tweets from the street".

Public outreach on the project will continue to rely on existing venues like the City's website and traffic from a recently-launched Facebook page, as well as more traditional activities like door-to-door canvassing of business and property owners along Main Street. The Columbia Chamber will host an informational briefing about the project at their luncheon next Wednesday, March 18th, at Bully's Smokehouse.