Customer story · Buffalo, NY
How Buffalo turned data into a campaign promise kept.
Mayor Sean Ryan campaigned on fixing Buffalo's streets. CYVL gave his team the citywide ground truth to turn the “Pave It!” initiative into a data-backed paving plan.
Challenge
A paving promise with no reliable map underneath it.
Mayor Sean Ryan campaigned on fixing Buffalo's streets with the “Pave It!” initiative — but the city was working from sampled, outdated pavement records that couldn't tell crews where the worst roads actually were.
Without a current, citywide view of condition, prioritizing repairs meant guesswork, and defending the spend to council and residents meant relying on anecdote instead of evidence.
Solution
A continuously refreshed view of every street.
CYVL captured Buffalo's entire street network with survey-grade LiDAR and 360° imagery, then scored every segment automatically — giving the DPW a continuously refreshed, citywide view of condition and assets.
The impact
Every street accounted for
No more sampling. The full network is scored, so the worst roads surface on their own.
Repairs prioritized by real condition
Crews are sent where the data says the need is greatest, not where the last complaint came from.
Spending the city can defend
A data-backed paving plan the DPW can put in front of council and residents.
A promise turned into a program
“Pave It!” became an executable, repeatable capital plan rather than a one-time push.
A campaign promise, made operational.
Buffalo turned a campaign promise into a data-backed paving plan: every street accounted for, repairs prioritized by real condition, and spending the city can defend to its council and residents.
“CYVL gave us a citywide picture of our streets we'd never had before — so we could put our paving dollars exactly where they'd do the most good.”