Project V4Participation has reached an end
Project V4Participation – Fostering education on participatory processes in urban and regional planning has ended today and we would like to share the most important results that have been reached within the project at our great satisfaction.
The goal of the project was to address the lack of systematic connection between theory and practice of public participation in urban and regional planning. In all of the countries that participated there are many actions that require civil sector to react against the planning solutions imposed by planning and governmental authorities without asking the citizens about their needs and preferences. This is why the decision to integrate an idea of a more transparent and more democratic system of planning into study programs for the designers of the built environment has been made. The collaborative platform has been formed in four countries: Serbia, Hungary, Czechia and Poland, with a pair consisted of a higher education institution and an institution from civil sector in each country. The responsibility of the partners from civil sector was to give an input to the HEI partners with the topics that are important for the local communities. In Serbia the partners were Faculty of Technical Sciences from Novi Sad and the NGO Novo Kulturno Naselje; in Hungary project partner was Center for the Contemporary Architecture – KEK (associated with the University of Technology and Economics in Budapest (BME) as an educational institution); in Czechia ARCHIP Architectural Institute from Prague paired with the NGO Centre for the Future from the town of Slavonice; and in Poland the partnership consisted of the NGO Open Territory Foundation and the Research Centre e-Humanistics at the Marie Curie University in Lublin. The project activities started in January 2018 with the financial help from the International Visegrad Fund. Three workshops were held: in Lublin in April 2018 the main focus was put on pavilions in a large urban housing estate where the students of architecture, spatial planning and art worked with the inhabitants on defining the new programs; in Slavonice in October 2018 students of architecture and landscape planning worked with the citizens to help the community realize what qualities of living environment influence people’s choices to stay, leave or come back to the town; in Novi Sad, students of architecture worked on the assignments related to the spatial and social issues of Novo naselje neighborhood, planned and constructed during the period of stable economic growth in the 1970’s and nowadays having a number of concerns ranging from infrastructure problems to the lack of cultural programs. Additionally, an international exhibition PARTAKE was organized in Budapest in June 2019 showcasing the students’ works as well as the overall results of the project. This was followed by the publication of the book Participatory processes in urban planning with 21 papers from 35 contributing authors who covered the topics including: rationale; methods, tools, techniques and technologies for designing the process and for adaptation of designers’ solutions to the needs and preferences of communities; national perspectives and issues; documented case studies and education on participatory processes. The book is considered one of the most important project results by the project consortium and is intended to open the debate and raise awareness of the importance of citizen involvement in this process among students, professionals, people in community organizations, state and local agencies and decision makers. The book is free for download and use (with rights reserved to the publisher and the authors).
As the V4Participation project came to an end the common belief of the consortium is that the conclusions of the project are very valuable to all the project partners and to the local communities. In Lublin, the project partners have strengthened the relationships between the educational and NGO sector with more and more university professors being active in this network. Students also found the concept of participatory processes important and clearly stated their intent to take part in the future actions of the NGO partner Open Territory Foundation. In Czechia, at Architectural Institute ARCHIP participatory processes have been integrated into two courses after the workshop. This inspired the NGO partner Center for the Future to further engage in serving the needs of local community and plan new actions in the town of Slavonice. In Novi Sad, new ways of cooperation with local partners and stakeholders emerged. Also, a new course within the accreditation of study programs at the Faculty of Technical Sciences is proposed, named Participatory processes in urban and regional planning dedicated exclusively to public participation. Other than that, experiences and working methodologies were exchanged throughout the international network by forming the collaborative platform that would continue to operate after the project completion.
At the end of the project the coordinating team would like to thank all the partners for participating and sharing their experience. We would also like to thank the students that participated in our activities for working hard and embracing the concept of urban and regional planning as people-oriented disciplines. We cordially thank the members of local communities in four countries who shared their insights, wishes and desires inspiring us to try to change things for the better together. We would like to thank Visegrad Fund and the Faculty of Technical Sciences for supporting the project and making our activities possible. Thank you all for the effort you put in creating this network that will surely continue to exist after the end of the project!
If you have further queries about the project please contact the project coordinator Professor Milica Kostres ([email protected]).