Building Collaborative Relationships through Digital Projects

The Rowan Public Art project (http://publicart.rowan.edu) is an online, interactive digital scholarship website of campus public art. The project includes descriptions of Rowan\u27s public art including original photography and video, an interactive campus map, and links to library resources on the art, the artists, and public art in general. Digital scholarship projects like this offer libraries ways to collaborate across campus, position the library as leaders in collaboration, and demonstrate that the library is an effective collaboration partner. This project has allowed us to support the efforts and successes of others across campus. We have collaborated in the creation of this project with entities as diverse as University Publications, University Planning, the Rowan University Art Gallery, and the Department of Art. All of them have contributed in significant ways to accomplishing this project. Since we have launched this project additional collaborations have been initiated and proposed. The Department of Geography is already using it for course material in urban geography and public art and as a result are now partnering with us on a new project to collect data related to public art. A writing arts instructor is planning to use this project as a core piece of her composition class. This project is but a piece of our long term goals with the Digital Scholarship Center at Rowan University Libraries. Soon similar digital scholarship projects will be initiated to develop research and creative opportunities, curricular assets, community outreach, and student and faculty success. These projects serve as models for effective collaboration across campus and transform the library into an organization that directly supports campus initiatives and goals. Mike and Jon will discuss this project and how it fits within the libraries\u27 plans with digital scholarship and collaboration

Geographic information systems for rural water supply management

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are databases linked to digital maps. Many public and private sectors in Uganda have begun using GIS technology to facilitate more effective analysis, planning, and management. The Bundibugyo District Water Office, in collaboration with the Directorate of Water Development (DWD) and World Harvest Mission (WHM), has actively applied this technology to the area of water resource management. We are currently updating and compiling a database of all water sources. We will then begin producing relevant charts and maps. The end goal is to translate this information into effective action for the operation and maintenance of existing water supply systems and informed planning of future systems

Envisioning the future village: the role of digital technology in supporting more inclusive visions in the neighbourhood planning process

This thesis presents the development of a digitally aided Collaborative Envisioning Framework, to support disenfranchised young people in contributing to a ‘shared vision’ of their community’s future. Drawing from the research areas of planning, design, collaboration and envisioning, this study sought to address the existing democratic deficit in local decision making activities, by utilising the new potentials of digital technologies. The research aim was to support communities, particularly disengaged young people, in becoming involved with decision-making activities, namely generating a shared vision for a neighbourhood plan. Since the radical policy changes to the National Planning Policy Framework and Localism Act 2011, members of the public have been handed increased responsibility and accountability in contributing to the local decisions affecting them. However, the tools and resources have been criticized for not engaging and including all sectors of the public, particularly young people (who arguably have the most to gain, or lose, as a result of decisions made). Using community and neighbourhood planning as a microcosm of a larger problem, this study looked towards the potentials of digital tools as a way to address this democratic deficit. To discover whether they offered anything more than existing tools, by helping young people to contribute to the generation of a ‘shared vision’ (a requisite of a neighbourhood planning application). It also addressed the assumption that the public had an understanding of what creating a ‘shared vision’ entailed, and had the skills and knowledge required to create one. It firstly identified envisioning as a design activity, which needs creativity, imagination, empathy, collaboration, communication and deliberation, and then identified ‘designable factors’ such as processes, tools (digital and non-digital), environments, and services which are able to support these, focusing on which were most suitable for the young audience. The research also explored behavior and motivation theories which guided the design of an envisioning framework. To achieve this aim, a constructive design research methodology was adopted consisting of a designed artefact - ‘The Collaborative Envisioning Framework’ which was utlised throughout numerous workshops. The interactions between the workshop participants and the envisioning framework generated multiple sets of qualitative data, which were analysed and interpreted to form the next iteration of the framework. The research demonstrates that existing tools and resources aimed at supporting inclusivity and meaningful visions for neighbourhood plans are not, in their current form, adequate to firstly, engage the diverse groups of people they should be including, and secondly, to support a generative, creative activity of envisioning, and suggests that the use of digital tools (namely Ageing Booth App, Morfo App, and Minecraft) offer something new. The original contributions to knowledge are: an advancement of constructive design research methodology; contributions to the discourse surrounding the purpose and value of visons within community planning; and a practical ‘Collaborative Envisioning Framework’ which can be followed by public sector and private organisations who seek to support communities in producing ‘visons’ for their community

Citizen E-Participation: Bringing the “E” to Facilitated Workshops

Citizen participation initiatives enable public decision-makers to integrate the knowledge and preferences of citizens into municipal planning processes at an early stage. To this end, workshops are frequently and recurrently utilized instruments, which foster the collaboration of citizens with public authorities and with one another. With the rise of ICT, e-participation has evolved as a strategic pillar in digital governance, but has not fully reached participation workshops yet. Establishing an integrated e-participation approach that combines traditional and e-participation instruments poses a challenge in practice. Therefore, we apply Collaboration Engineering to design and evaluate an e-participation workshop process, which incorporates theoretical and practical requirements, allows the seamless transfer of digitally generated input across instruments and process steps, and sustains a workshop execution by domain-specific practitioners. Evaluation results suggest promising potentials of the developed process design for increased idea elaboration and more effective documentation of workshop-based participation

A PBL Collaborative and Cumulative Dynamics Towards Urban Sustainable Environments

Erasmus+ CityLab Program at Universidad de Belgrano School of Architecture and Urban Planning, has focused on urban structure as generator of dynamic and transformable spaces, through a local case located at Juan B. Justo Avenue corridor, Buenos Aires, Argentina. The CityLab project motivated students to experience an integrative 3-year Problem-Based Learning process, related to Morphology Communication and Digital Media, Urban and Territorial Planning, Final Degree Project, as well as integration with School of Public Relations. More than 75 students participated in this international programme to explore, diagnose and re-think city scale, as well as to discover, build and apply technological tools. Land use and mobility regulations were introduced with the participation of stakeholders and external experts in different stages from diagnosis to final project validation. Student’s and teacher´s staff contribution to the academic final conference “PBL for Sustainable Cities”- September 2018, Bogotá, produced a motivating socialization in collaboration with local partners

Conditions for networked co-production through digital participatory platforms in urban planning

Contemporary urban development is increasingly characterized by collaboration and co-production between ‘experts’ and the ‘public’ in urban planning processes. Recently, local planning actors have adopted digital participatory platforms (DPPs) which are specifically built for networked engagement and collaboration purposes. However, the knowledge on embedding DPPs in wider planning dialogues is still limited and scattered. The aim of this paper is to provide a better understanding of the organizational conditions for the successful adoption and implementation of such networked co-production. Through a set of semi-structured interviews with representatives from public agencies and platform companies, we have analysed how organizational conditions for networked co-production manifest themselves in seven cases of DPP implementation. The analysis shows that these conditions are co-constitutive and co-evolutive rather than concurrent or sequential, with strong links between the compatibility of public agencies, attitudes to co-production, organizational cultures and incentives for co-production. The results critically emphasize the need to adopt holistic approaches to networked co-production, allowing for extensive experimentation and ‘learning by doing’

Sensors securing sustainable digital urban logistics—A practitioner’s perspective

AUTHOR=Knapskog Marianne, Browne Michael. TITLE=Sensors securing sustainable digital urban logistics—A practitioner’s perspective. JOURNAL=Frontiers in Future Transportation. VOLUME=3. YEAR=2022. URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/ffutr.2022.993411. DOI=10.3389/ffutr.2022.993411. ISSN=2673-5210The transport of goods, equipment and waste to, from, in and through urban areas (urban logistics) are essential for the economic vitality of the city but at the same time make urban environmental and social targets more difficult to achieve The European Green Deal and the UN Sustainability Goals also challenge the ways of addressing planning and management. At the same time Covid 19 has led to new challenges for urban logistics together with changes in consumer purchasing and travel patterns. Digitalisation offers new ways of collecting data and providing input to planning and modelling of urban logistics that might alleviate these challenges. This article addresses how digitalisation and especially sensors can contribute to new forms of data for analysis and play a role in developing sustainable digital urban logistics measures and plans through data collection and sharing. The research contains empirical insights from a survey and workshop in Norway. The results from the survey show that sensors are the digital solution that practitioners see as most useful for urban transport. This is supported by results from the workshop supporting a sensor scenario. When it comes to the digitalisation process, the practitioners expect that the different levels of government will facilitate digitalisation of urban logistics and most practitioners have the opinion that all levels of government should do more to facilitate new solutions Testing should take place as collaboration between private and public actors. Due to Covid 19 the government level is seen to have an important role for exchange of information and advice, and for giving economic incentives and support, rather than providing law and regulatory changes or the reorganisation of public services. The local level is considered to have an especially important role for digitalisation including data for modelling, planning or public procurement procedures. The article addresses these questions by reference to the partnerships for freight transport in London and Gothenburg. This article adds insights for planning practitioners into how sensors will challenge as well as provide new possibilities, to suggest new paths for planning and modelling urban logistics and an amplified role for freight partnerships.publishedVersio

Unleashing the Power of Capacity Building: Transforming Governance and Policy Implementation in the Digital Era

This study aims to outline the strengths of capacity building and the problems associated with the lack of capacity in the context of governance transformation and policy implementation in the digital era, and initiate an innovative and sustainable capacity-building strategy as a fundamental solution. This study uses a qualitative approach and document analysis to obtain a more detailed analysis. Data was obtained from the National Planning and Development Agency, namely the National Medium-Term Development Plan (RPJMN) 2020-2024. This data included human resource development and infrastructure development in terms of information and communication technology (ICT) related to digital transformation, as well as policies that support digital transformation. The findings of this research illustrate that in terms of the quality of human resources, there are still shortcomings in skills and collaboration between government, universities, and other stakeholders in the industry, and there are still inequalities in access to information in various regions. In addition, there are still obstacles to the implementation of digital transformation in Indonesia in the delivery of public services from the aspects of leadership and political commitment, budget availability, infrastructure readiness, and the digital divide. Thus, strategies are needed to deal with them effectively. It can then be concluded that the dimension of human resource development needs to increase worker skills and knowledge related to digital technology in the public sector. Likewise, the dimension of strengthening organizational capacity that changes in organizational culture are key to dealing with governance transformation in the digital era. In the institutional reform dimension, it is important to evaluate and make changes to the existing institutional structures and processes. Keywords: capacity building, transformation governance, digital governanc

Urban Digital Twins for Smart Cities and Citizens:The Case Study of Herrenberg, Germany

Cities are complex systems connected to economic, ecological, and demographic conditions and change. They are also characterized by diverging perceptions and interests of citizens and stakeholders. Thus, in the arena of urban planning, we are in need of approaches that are able to cope not only with urban complexity but also allow for participatory and collaborative processes to empower citizens. This to create democratic cities. Connected to the field of smart cities and citizens, we present in this paper, the prototype of an urban digital twin for the 30,000-people town of Herrenberg in Germany. Urban digital twins are sophisticated data models allowing for collaborative processes. The herein presented prototype comprises (1) a 3D model of the built environment, (2) a street network model using the theory and method of space syntax, (3) an urban mobility simulation, (4) a wind flow simulation, and (5) a number of empirical quantitative and qualitative data using volunteered geographic information (VGI). In addition, the urban digital twin was implemented in a visualization platform for virtual reality and was presented to the general public during diverse public participatory processes, as well as in the framework of the "Morgenstadt Werkstatt" (Tomorrow's Cities Workshop). The results of a survey indicated that this method and technology could significantly aid in participatory and collaborative processes. Further understanding of how urban digital twins support urban planners, urban designers, and the general public as a collaboration and communication tool and for decision support allows us to be more intentional when creating smart cities and sustainable cities with the help of digital twins. We conclude the paper with a discussion of the presented results and further research directions