Participation in urban and landscape development

Summary

Citizen and stakeholder participation has become an indispensable part of urban development and transformation processes. The course provides an insight into common participation methods, reflects on them critically and enables to develop own participation strategies for specific purposes.

Content

Keywords

Citizen participation, Collaborative planning, Gamification, Moderation, Mediation, Urban planning, Transformation processes

Learning Outcomes

By the end of the course, the student must be able to:

• Recognize the role and potential of public participation in architectural, urban and landscape planning;
• Describe the various theoretical postulates on which collaborative architecture and planning are based;
• Discuss the positive and negative sides of the collaborative planning process through examples of global and domestic Swiss practice;
• Identify all interested stakeholders groups and skilfully analyse their contributions;
• Propose collaborative planning tools and with their help involve interest groups in the selected project
• Design , organize and implement a collaborative participatory planning project or intervention on his/her own.

Transversal skills

• Plan and carry out activities in a way which makes optimal use of available time and other resources.
• Set objectives and design an action plan to reach those objectives.
• Chair a meeting to achieve a particular agenda, maximising participation.
• Communicate effectively, being understood, including across different languages and cultures.
• Give feedback (critique) in an appropriate fashion.
• Resolve conflicts in ways that are productive for the task and the people concerned.
• Take account of the social and human dimensions of the engineering profession.
• Demonstrate the capacity for critical thinking

Teaching methods

Theoretical part: methods and tools for consultation and involvement of different interested parties, methods for analysing and synthesising participants' contributions in the process of collaborative design, critical analysis with examples and case studies of good international and national practice.

Practical part: discussions, exercises - practical tasks, case clinic, critical reflection on case studies, compulsory preparation of an own practical contribution.

Expected student activities

Students are expected to regularly attend the lectures and exercises offered, to actively participate in the discussions and to organize and chair own simulation games. At the end of the course they are expected to design the frame for a collaborative participatory planning project on their own, laid down in a short written report.

Assessment methods

The assessment is based on active and continuous participation in the course discussions, exercises and role plays (30%), the analysis of a case study and the development of an own participation strategy for it, which is shown in a final presentation (30%) and described in a short report (40%).

Resources

Bibliography

Abendorth, L., & Bell, B. (eds., 2016). Public Interest Design Practice Guidebook. London: Routledge.

Brkovic Dodig, M. & Groat, N. L. (eds., 2009). The Routledge Companion to Games in Architecture and Urban Planning. London: Routledge.

Simonsen, J. & Robertson, T. (2013): Routledge International Handbook of Participatory Design. New York: Routledge.

Slocum, N. (2003). Participatory Methods Toolkit. A Practitioner's Manual (available online)

Moodle Link

• https://go.epfl.ch/AR-475