Dromore arearesidents can now use street-fault reporting site

The site now covers all 26 of Northern Ireland’s district council areas and DRD Roads Service.

A spokesperson said it worked equally well on a mobile browser or desktop.

“The website, launched in 2007,” she said, “has become something of an institution across the rest of the United Kingdom. As well as sending reports to the local council, the site also publishes them online, for others to browse and comment on.

“FixMyStreet’s success lies in its extremely simple interface. The user need not know which council is responsible for their issue, nor do they even need the name of the street where they are making their report; the site can automatically geolocate them.

“Behind that interface, however, is a complex database, routing individual problems to the correct council department.”

Matthew Somerville, Lead Developer of FixMyStreet, explained that the site’s funding was initially for a version that covered Great Britain.

“mySociety had long wished to extend to Northern Ireland,” he said, “but restrictions on time and resources meant that other projects were prioritised.

“Finally, a UK-wide project mySociety built for Channel 4 provided an opportunity; the codebase was similar, and with only a few changes, it could be repurposed for FixMyStreet.

“As it was only incorporated onto the site in the last few days, Northern Ireland comes across as eerily free from problems but mySociety is confident that local residents will soon get reporting.

“To get started, go to the FixMyStreet.com homepage and input a postcode or click on ‘locate me automatically’. Those who wish to keep track of problems in their own area may also be interested to know that users can subscribe by RSS feed via the site’s Local Alerts page.

FixMyStreet.com was built and is maintained by mySociety, a not-for-profit organisation which builds online tools to help people access their civic and democratic rights.