ICT FOR URBAN PLANNING IN THE CITY OF

MASSA

Council of Europe Forum for the Future of DemocracyMadrid, 16th October 2008

Dott. Francesco Molinari, fmol@altec.gr

TABLE OF CONTENTS Lessons learnt from this Case Study

Participatory Urban Planning Scenario Issues in ICT & Urban Planning Degrees of Innovation of this trial

Case Study Description Location of the City of Massa Role of the Municipality The Massa Structural Plan

A tribute to the LexiPation Project Fact Sheet Technology Platform Trials Location Methodology for Consensus Making The Living Labs Concept

Facts & figures from Massa “Living Lab” Configuration and Deployment Results A few screenshots

Conclusions and …

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PARTICIPATORY URBAN PLANNING

Not a novel idea … Pioneering implementations span from Finland (City of

Hämeenlinna, Helsinki/Arabianranta, City of Tampere) to Kenya (Town of Kitale), from Brazil (Porto Alegre) to Germany (Berlin’s Citizen Juries, Frankfurt and Hamburg spatial discourses), from Iceland (Garðabær/Reykjavik) to (a great deal of cases in) the US …

Basic concept: to engage citizens and stakeholders in a socially constructed and mutually agreed model of urban planning / design / improvement

Open aim: harnessing collective intelligence and local knowledge to improve the quality of policy making

“Hidden aim”: to ensure better acceptance of the final planning decisions

Quite often, legislation supports the development of these experiments (“mandatory concertation”)

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ICT & URBAN PLANNING

Born “offline”, Participatory Urban Planning has migrated and gained momentum from ICT implementations

A few examples: Participatory GIS Online Debates “Crowdsourcing” (Jeff Howe, 2006)

Main issues:1. Digital divide and Social exclusion2. Involvement of participants (experts / non expert)3. Handling the “Time Factor”4. Preference Aggregation5. Commitment of policy makers

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(1/5) DIGITAL DIVIDE & SOCIAL EXCLUSION Problems:

Lack of access Low-speed access Internet illiteracy Some people’s voices are low, but “have to” be listened

to Some contents are hard to understand for normal people People tend to make “easy” proposals, inspiring though

badly “dressed”

Solutions (from the Massa case): Alternate “offline” and “online” participatory sessions Talk, explain, communicate… Make it as easy as possible Listen, listen, listen…

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(2/5) PARTICIPANTS INVOLVEMENT

Problems: People are busy during working time, tired afterwards! They may not know about it… They may not care about it… They might be scared… They would like to be asked… They would like to be sure…

Solutions (from the Massa case): Allow sufficient time to the preparation of trials (months

rather than days) Use a “multi-media” communication strategy Rely on word-of-mouth Preserve anonymity of participants Keep people’s attention high during the trials 6

(3/5) HANDLING THE “TIME FACTOR” Problems:

In a public debate, there is not time enough to let everyone have their say

A long lasting discussion usually doesn’t affect the conclusions that much

The more noise, the more room for the “tyranny” of chairperson’s decisions

Solutions (from the Massa case): Don’t start with a predefined policy agenda Collect citizens’ opinions as inputs for future policy

drafting Give a second chance for advice 7

(4/5) PREFERENCE AGGREGATION

Problems: In a public debate, it’s usually hard to reach a

common “platform” of consensus Participants are never representative of the underlying

population Voting mechanisms may not be fair to minority

opinions Time changes people’s opinions quite often Noise is always there

Solutions (from the Massa case): Don’t look for “representative” advice Profile your users during (anonymous) registration A particular mechanism for preference aggregation

known as “the DEMOS™ process”8

(5/5) COMMITMENT OF POLICY MAKERS Problems:

The known dilemma between deliberation and representation

The “vicious circle” of reciprocal mistrust (between citizens and governments)

Risk of “second thoughts” from policy makers Strong dependence of political commitment on first

feedback received Ineffectiveness of bottom-up initiatives

Solutions (from the Massa case): “Tie your hands” from the start with the full process

explanation Don’t ask too much, be clear with objectives Integrate the trial in the administrative process

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THE MUNICIPALITY OF MASSALOCATION

Massa is situated in the northernmost part of the Tuscany Region, in a zone where sea and land come together in a spectacular contrast created by nature.

Population is approximately 70,000 inhabitants and is distributed over 5 boroughs.

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OVERVIEW OF THE CITY LANDSCAPE

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ROLE OF MUNICIPALITIES IN ITALY

According to the Italian laws, Municipalities provide some basic services to the population of households and enterprises that fall under their territorial jurisdiction.

A few examples: social care, primary education, building permits, public housing, streets cleaning and maintenance, urban and land use planning.

This also gives life to a plethora of specific rules and regulations issued by the Municipalities under their constitutional autonomy.

Municipal rules and regulations must comply with the “upper-level” (Regional and State) norms and legal/administrative provisions. 12

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MASSA STRUCTURAL PLAN

Long expected (> 30 years) According to Regional Law No. 1/2005:

The Structural Plan is not just for (re)designing the landscape and framing land use, but is “the” tool for sustainable development of a given area

The Structural Plan lies under the competence of the Municipality, in accordance with “upper-level” Plans issued by the Province and the Region

The Municipality is “forced” to involve all the relevant stakeholders in the evaluation of the new Draft Plan

The idea has been to do this *before* and not *after* the preparation of a formal draft

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Regional Regional LegislationLegislation

andand

General Urbanistic General Urbanistic LawsLaws

Drafting of the Drafting of the Structural Plan by Structural Plan by the Cabinetthe Cabinet

First adoption by First adoption by the City Councilthe City Council

(+observations)(+observations) Interaction with Interaction with local stakeholderslocal stakeholders

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PRECONDITIONS FOR THE MASSA TRIAL

Scope for ICT based

trials

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LEXIPATION PROJECT’S FACT SHEET One of the six Pilot Actions on eParticipation funded in 2006

by the European Commission Objectives:

to integrate the Living Labs methodology set forth in the context of User led Innovation Theory with an existing technology platform (DEMOS™) allowing to conduct moderated online discourses within “small communities” of people (a sort of online focus groups or “forums”)

to define an ideal workflow for citizens’ involvement at the different stages of the legislative process

to conduct four (participatory) trials at the different “tiers” of EU institutional setup, namely:

the City State/Regional tier (Hamburg, Germany), the Prefectural/Provincial tier (Thessaloniki, Greece), the Municipality tier (Massa, Italy), the small Community tier (Alston Moor, UK) 15

THE FOUR LEXIPATION TRIALS

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DEMOS™ TECHNOLOGY PLATFORM

A server based web application Scripting language: PHP, Optimised for MySql, Supporting

additional standards like XML, SQL, RSS syndication and SOAP

A “classical” 3-tier architecture All HTML and Layout is stored in separated XML-Files,

which can be pre-produced and edited manually or generated with external content management systems.

The presentation layer can produce a large variety of formats for web browsers and other devices like mobile phones: HTML, XML, E-Mail (rich content and MIME enabled),

Microsoft-Office-Formats, PDF, WAP, RSS as well as all kinds of ASCII- and Unicode-Text files

A completely customisable layout Additional software modules offer a variety of

functions such as: automated keyword index generation, web-GIS client,

integrated web mail and other community features

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CONTENT OF THE TRIALS

Legislation Process Stage

Hamburg Massa Alston Thessaloniki

Formation of Decisions

(Agenda Setting, Prior Analysis)

√ √ √ √

Legislation Drafting

(Discussion of Draft Laws / Regulations)

√ √

Implementation

(of Laws / Regulations)√ √

Amendments

& Follow Up√ √

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TRIALS FACTS & FIGURES

Hamburg: May/June 2007 (17 days) urban planning 285 registered users, 968 contributions, 16.000 unique

visitors, 36.000 page hits Thessaloniki: September/October 2007 (78 days)

environmental decision making 62 registered users, 35 contributions, 12.000 unique

visitors, 10.941 page hits Massa: November/December 2007 (45 days)

urban planning 93 registered users, 202 contributions, 1.800

unique visitors, 21.000 page hits Alston Moor: December 2007/January 2008 (36

days) local legislation review and amendment 273 registered users, 52 contributions, 464 unique

visitors, 7.106 page hits19

THE LIVING LABS CONCEPT

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Source: Niitamo & Kulki (2005)

LIVING LAB CONFIGURATION WORKFLOW

1. Contextualisation: meaning all the preparatory actions involved in the trial, from the collection of background material to its publication on the public administration’s web site

2. Selection and motivation of participants: meaning the activities aimed to restrict / widen the panel of citizens and/or stakeholders representatives that will be involved in the trial

3. Concretisation: meaning the actual trial setup, measurement of participants characteristics, description of the thematic focus, statement of objectives from the Administration and supply of pieces of draft/approved legislation (if existing) and other background material to support an informed judgement

4. Running of the trial: use of the DEMOS™ system made available within LexiPation to reach an agreement with participants (if possible) or to collect and cluster the public opinion through moderated online discourses

5. Feedback from results: the internal, and usually partly undisclosed, activities leading to harmonisation of law-making activities with the trial outcomes

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Source: Pierson & Lievens (2005)

TRIALS DEPLOYMENT

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MASSA TRIAL CONFIGURATION

ContextualisationContextualisation ““Avvio del procedimento” available on line Avvio del procedimento” available on line since December 2006. On 29th June 2007 since December 2006. On 29th June 2007 the Municipality presented the results of a the Municipality presented the results of a socio-economic foresight by an external socio-economic foresight by an external entityentity

Selection and Selection and MotivationMotivation

The site was kept open to all citizens The site was kept open to all citizens (anonymously registered). Several “offline” (anonymously registered). Several “offline” meetings with local stakeholders (trade meetings with local stakeholders (trade unions, business associations, the 5 unions, business associations, the 5 borough councils) prepared the debatesborough councils) prepared the debates

ConcretisationConcretisation September 2007: publication of background September 2007: publication of background information on the site. Start of a information on the site. Start of a multimedia dissemination campaign.multimedia dissemination campaign.

ImplementationImplementation October/November: several thematic foci + October/November: several thematic foci + one general forum. Moderators to drive the one general forum. Moderators to drive the discussions.discussions.

Expected FeedbackExpected Feedback Improvements to the draft Structural Plan Improvements to the draft Structural Plan before its formal submission to the Councilbefore its formal submission to the Council

SCREENSHOTS FROM MASSA SITE

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http://pianostrutturale.comune.massa.ms.it

ONLINE DEBATES ORGANISATION

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EXAMPLES OF DISCUSSION TOPICS How to increase the ratio between number of

private parking sites and number of homes (cars)

Up to which extent the availability of parks and green areas should be extended (beyond a given minimum standard)

How to cope with the social needs of some intensively populated areas of the city

Which incentives might well increase the use of public transport by the citizens

How the outlook and use of existing cycling lanes can be improved

How to reduce the negative impact of noise, traffic etc. on the coast “belt”

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“THE DEMOS PROCESS”http://www.demos-project.org

Three discussion phases:

1. Broadening Initiate the forum, facilitate and broaden the debate;

identify the most important aspects or subtopics of the chosen subject matter, also by conducting polls or surveys within the participants.

2. Deepening Initiate a (limited) number of sub-forums e.g. on the basis

of the poll or survey results; this leads to intense discussions on specific aspects in smaller groups of interested participants, while the main forum is still there to “catch” those participants who want to enter the discussion or keep it on a more general level.

3. Consolidating Close the sub-forums and transfer the summaries and

related survey results into the (still existing) main forum, to see the particular subtopic as part of the ‘big picture’ that will finally emerge. 27

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EXAMPLES OF INPUTS RECEIVED

Create speedy road deviations avoiding traffic congestion for those who simply need to go across the City centre

Increase the number of public places and central streets totally closed to the traffic

More (free of charge) parking areas surrounding the City centre

A number of public buildings should be restored and recreated for public use

Services and functions locations should be moved away from the City centre, to reduce traffic congestion

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CONCLUSIONS

The LexiPation project successfully tested the integration of an existing ICT platform (and process) for moderated discourse making within an innovative participatory urban planning (and more generally: policy design) workflow

“Living Labs” has proven especially helpful in ensuring a timely and appropriate deployment of ICT in the context of eLegislation, in terms of integration of relevant stakeholders, uninterrupted support by politicians, dissemination and marketing activities to arouse the public’s

attention and involvement. Results seem to be less dependent on the institutional “tiers”

of Public Administration involved, more on local (pre)-conditions such as: the topic of discussion (idea generation better suited) familiarity with Internet debates of the local population potential for reuse in the legislative process a careful configuration of the “Living Lab” trial

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THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON…

Organisational Impact Time is needed to properly customise the platform from scratch

(probably saved in next experiments) A strong commitment from IT staff (monitored by the political side) is

also needed

Socio-Economic Impact What happened next? The “electoral cycle” killed the experiment…

The sustainability issue That was a “stone in the pond” How to ensure replication etc.?

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THANKS FOR YOUR ATTENTION

Q&A

Contact: fmol@altec.gr

Project Website: http://www.lexipation.eu

Trial Website: http://pianostrutturale.comune.massa.ms.it

Disclaimer: The present research was part funded by the European Commission under the 2006/1 Call for Pilot Actions in the topic of eParticipation. However, the opinions expressed here are solely of the Author and do not necessarily reflect the official views of any European Communities Institution. 31

REFERENCES

Daren C Brabham (2007), “Crowdsourcing the Citizen Participation Process for Public Planning Projects”, http://ssrn.com/abstract=1123325.

Paul Chege (2006), “Participatory Urban Planning and Partnerships Building: Supporting Provision of Access to Basic Services for the Urban Poor”, Proceedings of the 5th FIG Regional Conference, Accra, Ghana.

Jeff Howe (2006), “The rise of Crowdsourcing”. Wired, 14, 6 (June): http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.06/crowds.html.

INTELCITIES Project (2006), Electronic and Mobile Participation in City Planning and Management.

Akito Murayama (2005), “Governance for Sustainable Urban Regeneration”, Proceedings of the IFHP Spring Conference.

Veli-Pekka Nitamo & Seija Kulkki (2005), “State-of-the-art in utilizing Living Labs approach to user centric ICT innovation – a European approach”, http://www.cdt.ltu.se/main.php/SOA_LivingLabs.pdf?fileitem=2402350.

OECD/World Bank Institute (2007), Beyond Public Scrutiny: Stocktaking of Social Accountability in OECD Countries.

Jo Pierson & Bram Lievens (2005), “Configuring Living Labs for a ‘thick’ Understanding of Innovation”, Proceedings of the EPIC Conference, pp. 114-127.

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