Planning support systems and interdisciplinary learning

Boer

2017

IJGI

Abstract:The implementation of renewable energy policies is lagging behind in The Netherlands. While several Dutch cities have ambitious goals for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the implementation of renewable energy projects has been rather slow. The main reasons for this are the limited institutional capacities of local decision-makers, low levels of social acceptance of renewable-energy technologies, and limited opportunities for engagement of communities in decision-making processes. In order to address these issues we have developed an interactive planning support tool named COLLAGE for stakeholder participation in local renewable-energy planning. The goal of this paper is to analyze whether the COLLAGE tool helps to increase community engagement in renewable-energy projects and planning by increasing awareness and addressing social learning issues related to renewable-energy options. We tested the tool in a series of workshops with stakeholders and citizens from the city of Enschede, The Netherlands. The workshop results show that the tool helped involve stakeholders and communities in deciding where to locate renewable-energy facilities. It increased community members' awareness of the benefits of and requirements for renewable energy by disclosing the spatial consequences of overall municipal goals. We conclude that the COLLAGE tool can be an important building block towards new local energy governance.

Section: The Collage Toolmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Interactive Planning Support Tool for Addressing Social Acceptance of Renewable Energy Projects in The Netherlands

Boer

2017

IJGI

“…Three participants referred to spatial visualization of indicators as particularly relevant to see the connection between the places they know and the respective spatial information as well as to visualize various driving factors together. In doing so, information and knowledge are communicated in an interactive and dynamic way, the dialogue becomes energetic, and content in the form of map layers and stakeholders' knowledge is shared easily, as observed also by Pelzer et al [77]. The screen capture showed that user-friendly interfaces together with the possibility to zoom in, pan and overlay different layers supported the participants to explore the environmental and social indicators together in multiple combinations instantly.…”

Section: Workhop Process: Enabling Active Stakeholder Participationmentioning

confidence: 85%

Interactive Knowledge Co-Production and Integration for Healthy Urban Development

Shrestha

Köckler²,

et al. 2017

Sustainability

Abstract:The transformation of cities towards healthy urban living environments for all is a challenge that needs to be addressed through collaboration of all relevant sectors in a transdisciplinary research processes. This paper reports on the design and showcase implementation of a methodological approach, named Interactive Spatial Understanding Support System (ISUSS), that is intended to support interactive knowledge co-production and integration among practitioners and researcher in a specific local context. The approach involves the combined use of interactive maps on a MapTable and a rich picture. The goal is to stimulate, articulate and map stakeholders' knowledge on environmental health issues to come to a shared problem understanding. Drawing on the rich seam of data gathered over the reflexive engagement with the participants in Dortmund, Germany, we explored incidences of a transdisciplinary process. Findings suggest that the approach has the potential to encourage communication and social learning geared towards a shared understanding of the holistic problem situation. Whilst locally embedded spatial knowledge was shared using interactive maps on the MapTable, the rich picture elicited issues linked to wider geographical scale as well as non-spatial drivers. The paper concludes discussing research needs to further explore the approach among various other groups, including citizens.

“…Perhaps such a workshop setting may produce different results from those where the PSS is chauffeured or fully mediated, or even in cases where each individual may be allowed to run the PSS outside a workshop set-up. Facilitation plays the role of maximizing the relevant goals of a specific meeting and involves general behaviours, specific interventions, and roles that together seek to maximize process gains and minimize process losses [44,45]. This study focused more on PSS use amongst different users.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public Participation Using 3D Web-Based City Models: Opportunities for E-Participation in Kisumu, Kenya

Onyimbi

Koeva

2018

IJGI

Public participation is significant for the success of any urban planning project. However, most members of the general public are not planning professionals and may not understand the technical details of a 2D paper-based plan, which might hamper their participation. One way to expand the participation of citizens is to present plans in well-designed, user-friendly and interactive platforms that allow participation regardless of the technical skills of the participants. This paper investigates the impacts of the combined use of 3D visualization and e-participation on public participation in Kisumu, Kenya. A 3D city model, created with CityEngine2016, was exported into a web-based geoportal and used as a Planning Support System in two stakeholder workshops in order to evaluate its usability. In order to assess the workshops 300 questionnaires were given out to planning practitioners and interview were done with key informants. Five indicators were developed for evaluating the usability of the 3D model while the usability of e-participation was evaluated using communication, collaboration and learning as indicators. Results showed that effectiveness and efficiency varied within different professional groups while the questionnaires showed strong preference for e-participation methods, especially Short Message Servicess/Unstructured Supplementary Service Data and emails. The study concludes that the use of 3D visualization and e-participation has the potential to improve the quality and quantity of public participation and recommends further research on the subject.