Through her startup, The Street Company PBC, Karina Burns wants to leverage her experience as a traffic engineer to speed the process of designing work zones, make the industry more inclusive, and support more good in the world
“I want to help traffic engineers do their work more accurately and faster, giving them more time to spend with their families, while creating an evergreen source of capital to address our community’s most vexing problems, like hunger, homelessness, and lack of transportation,” said Burns, technical co-founder of The Street Company, a public benefit company.
Burns was one of 12 founders to participate in the 2024 Capital One Accelerator, a 12-week mobility-focused program that helps startups develop business plans, become capital-ready, build connections, and fine-tune their pitches. She received an award as one of two “Most Engaged Founders,” winning $3,000 and getting high marks for her contributions to the cohort.
She was enthusiastic about how that participation has helped her in her business.
“The Accelerator has teamed me with entrepreneurial experts and given me the tools to get ready for investment,” Burns said. “The diverse viewpoints and incredible cadré of entrepreneurs have been so valuable.”
She said she plans to use her winnings to help the company expand its outreach via tradeshows so hundreds of traffic engineers can engage with the budding product.
Faster, better, safer
Bringing a strong technical foundation to the startup, Burns works as a traffic planning and analytics engineer for the Oklahoma Department of Transportation
Her Oklahoma City-based company designs modern traffic engineering software, dubbed Streetworks, that guides users through designing work zones, complete with signage and barrier placement suggestions, to produce plans that comply with standards from the traffic engineers’ bible: the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD).
On LinkedIn, the company posted right after the most recent edition dropped: “MUTCD is here! We’re here to help. Our unique software guides you through your work zone’s signing and marking design, producing beautiful, MUTCD-compliant TTC (temporary traffic control) plans in no time flat, all with no drafting.”
Streetworks “renders beautiful plan sheets with automatic quantity calculations on the design side, phase-level pick lists for the shop, and georeferenced device layout assistance on the field side,” per LinkedIn.
Earlier this summer, The Street Company posted a video sneak peek of the software in action designing a work zone in downtown Oklahoma City, showing how easy it is to adjust plans and how the program notes optimal locations for barriers and signs.
The goal is an easier route to a work zone design that enhances both safety and traffic flow.
‘Go change the world today’
The Street Company’s mission also reflects the company’s commitment to inclusivity and technological advancement in traffic management. The startup is dedicated to making traffic engineering accessible to everyone by developing user-friendly software, the co-founder recently wrote on LinkedIn. Streetworks is a “revolutionary” Temporary Traffic Control (TCP) assistance tool designed to be compatible with various assistive technologies, ensuring usability for all users, she noted.
Burns’ post went on to say that she is working to make the software usable by those who are visually impaired, using web standards to model spatial concepts to bring the world of traffic engineering design to everyone.
The Street Company takes both traffic design and the PBC (Public Benefit Company) missions to heart. The company promises to cut design time in half while giving half its profits to those in need in their community.
As Burns’ technical co-founder puts it on LinkedIn, “Go change the world today.”
For more details on the 2024 Capital One Accelerator Program Pitch and its five finalists, read the full story here.
Capital One is a Dallas Innovates Platinum partner. “ An Easier Route: The Street Company is Working to Make Better Work Zone Designs in Less Time and Improve Communities” was written and edited by Dallas Innovates’ brand studio.
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