How Might We Inform the Design of a Seamless, Sustainable Communication Loop so that All Residents Receive Critical Information in Real-Time?
Client: Orange Water And Sewer Authority (OWASA)
The Challenge
The Orange Water And Sewer Authority (OWASA) faced a critical public safety challenge regarding how they communicated with their community, including in emergency situations. Specifically, reaching residents living in multi-family properties proved incredibly difficult, as the existing system relied heavily on property managers acting as unpredictable gatekeepers for vital information. This structural bottleneck meant that notifications (even potentially life-saving ones) were frequently delayed or failed to reach the end-users entirely. The utility provider needed to urgently design a seamless, resilient communication loop that could bypass these intermediaries. They aimed to guarantee that every resident received accurate, real-time alerts directly during crisis situations.
The Outcome
The research yielded a clear, actionable map of the existing communication barriers and provided strategic pathways to overcome them. Working alongside the stakeholders, we successfully co-created modern, resilient strategies for an upgraded alert and notification system tailored specifically for multi-family environments. These recommendations focused on implementing direct-to-resident digital communication channels and removing the reliance on property management intervention during time-sensitive emergencies.
Ultimately, the project equipped OWASA with the strategic framework necessary to deploy a more equitable, reliable, and instantaneous notification network for their entire service area.
The Approach
To solve this complex logistical issue, noodle facilitated a highly collaborative research engagement that brought together diverse community perspectives. We conducted detailed interviews with internal OWASA stakeholders to fully understand the technical and regulatory constraints of their existing notification infrastructure. Concurrently, we hosted targeted focus groups with property managers across Chapel Hill and Carrboro, North Carolina, to deeply explore their daily operational realities and understand exactly why the current information handoff was failing. By directly engaging both the utility providers and the structural gatekeepers, we were able to accurately map the specific friction points causing the communication breakdowns. This dual-pronged approach revealed vast differences between intended protocols and practical execution.
