Want to find out what’s happening with crime in Alexandria? A new app created by a lifelong city resident does just that.
Last year, freelance app developer Trevor Weir launched AVAware on the iOS App Store. After a free week-long trial, a $3.99 monthly fee kicks in, giving users an ad-free opportunity to explore publicly available information on all manner of Part 1 crime events occurring in the city.
“I don’t have a free with ads version right now, as I wanted to emphasize privacy and anonymity for the users, so there is no data collection involved,” Weir told ALXnow. “The app downloads the (Alexandria Police Department’s) report data from my server database and creates a small database within the app, so when you are doing street searches and filtering for different report data, it is all done locally within the iPhone device as opposed to connecting to the internet for every query.”
Weir has been working with and learning web and software development for more than seven years. In 2020, he completed an application programming course at Northern Virginia Community College’s Alexandria campus. He was inspired in 2023 to launch the app after noticing an uptick in vehicle thefts around the city.
“Alexandria is a safe city,” Weir said. “But I like to walk around at night. I feel safe pretty much any time, but it just started getting to the point where it didn’t feel as safe.”
AVAware filters crime incidents by zip code, street name, date, and classification, and users can view summarized statistics, reports, and maps. Incidents documented in the app also include links to police scanner traffic, via openmhz.com. All the automated data in the app is collected daily from the City’s crime database.
