Prison Rides Project

Gabe was one of the first volunteers for the Beacon Prison Rides Project, and also developed the project’s logo.

Annmarie is also a project volunteer, and in 2021, built out a site and custom ticketing system for the project. Before the build, a single volunteer dispatcher kept track of each and every incoming request, along with the assigned volunteer driver, in a notebook.

To facilitate easier tracking (and to provide each volunteer with an easily accessible list of their own upcoming rides, as well as rides still needing fulfillment), there was a need for a more robust system. Fellow project volunteer Justice McCray contributed the visual design direction for the site, and Annmarie built it out, along with creating a system to manage:

• Incoming ride requests
• Distribution of requests to the volunteer drivers
• Claiming and reassigning rides
• Custom profiles for each driver with the details of their upcoming rides
• Volunteer applications and documentation
• And also built capacity for riders to request rides directly instead of going through a dispatcher (still in beta)

This was intentionally launched as an MVP, with the idea that it would evolve and be iterated upon as needs arose. Streamlining the system has allowed the dispatching team to expand: the burden no longer falls upon one single volunteer, but instead rotates through a group, thanks to the contributions of fellow volunteer (and truly amazing developer) Michal Mart. Michal and Annmarie have worked together on some updates to the setup and have ideas for ways to improve and extend the underlying system in the future.