CHATBOTS are on their way to Callington as part of a project to encourage young people to share their views on the town centre and how it could be improved.

Spearheaded by the Town Team, a working party of the town council, the project is being piloted in the town with funding from Cornwall Council’s Town Vitality Fund.

The chatbot itself is being developed by University of Plymouth researcher Marcin Roszkowski. Callington is the first town to trial the software, which people access by scanning QR codes around the town with their smartphone.

They will then be invited to share their views on what they see around them, either through a text interaction on their phone or through voice recognition.

Sam Jackman, who organised the funding bid with Town Team, explained that Callington Town Council had wanted to get involved in the project as a way of reaching young people and obtaining their views.

With the software still in development, they are aiming to stage the consultation in Callington later in the spring. The responses will be fed back to Callington Town Council to act upon.

‘I’m really really excited,’ she said. ‘It is part of a University of Plymouth project called Plan Your Street being run by Marcin. Marcin is a masters student at the university and he has been working on the technology as part of his studies. He has developed the chatbot as a way to engage with people to get their views.’

She explained that the idea of doing a survey within the town was to get the views of people from surrounding villages who come into town to shop and use services, as well as those who actually live in the town.

They particularly want to reach young people aged 18 to 35, who typically do not respond to council surveys.

‘What we have been working on is a way to ask people about the high street while they are actually using the high street. We did a pilot day in Callington before Christmas where we put up signage with QR codes to see if people beeped them. This took them to a survey.

‘We found by doing this that we did manage to reach the 18-35 year olds.’

She added: ‘Much decision making in town planning happens without asking wider groups of town centre users what their needs might be. I am thrilled to be involved in such an exciting project.’

The QR codes for people to scan will be situated around the town centre. Scanning them starts up a conversaion with a chatbot.

Sam said the chatbot’s interaction with users would be quick, so as not to ‘keep you standing in the rain for too long’.  ‘It is a way of getting a snapshot, a way of getting data in a different way.’

Callington Town Team chair, town councillor Mike Moore said: ‘We are delighted that Callington is able to host this pilot project. We look forward to reviewing the results of the chatbot consultations alongside our other outreach activities, and utilising this to deliver town centre improvements that meet the needs of our community.’

The Town Team project will also involve talking to town centre businesses,’ said Sam ‘We will be asking them what might make their lives easier and what we can support them with.’