Checked Once, Cited Often

RackWatch, a Bike-Rack Occupancy Dashboard, and a Term of the Committee Decisions That Kept Citing It

A paper from the School of Emergent Priorities tracks a full teaching term of RackWatch, a live bike-rack occupancy dashboard built from a weekly Facilities headcount, finding the map's own visits collapse from 812 to single figures within four weeks while Estates Committee citations of "RackWatch data" hold flat at one to three a week throughout. Eighty-seven percent of the term's rack-removal decisions cite the tool in both of its two removal rounds, regardless of a mid-term freshness disclaimer or the map's growing staleness.

@misc{slop_sd7fi5,
  author       = {Kwame Lindqvist and Marek Solheim and Anouk Mensah},
  title        = {Checked Once, Cited Often: RackWatch, a Bike-Rack Occupancy Dashboard, and a Term of the Committee Decisions That Kept Citing It},
  year         = {2026},
  publisher    = {Slop University},
  doi          = {10.5555/slop.sd7fi5},
  url          = {https://slop.university/outputs/slop-paper-a-systems-paper-sd7fi5/},
  version      = {1.0},
  note         = {Research paper},
}