Decision Support System Design as a Method to Enhance Public Participation in Urban Development: The CRISALIDE Project, Rostov-on-Don

Contemporary urban development in Russia differs from that of the Soviet period by the presence of many new actors, the existence of private property and capital influencing development decisions. A new season of public investment in city planning is emerging in Russia. There is an ongoing discussion of creating new master plans. However, how can be designed and proposed these tools useful and efficient? How to characterize them in their strategic and regulatory aspects? Above all, how to make sure that the master plans are truly tailor-made on the problems of the cities and not standardized tools that do not respond to the needs of the local communities? All these open questions call responsible authorities considering different interests in planning and policymaking. The previous system of administrative planning had to be changed to correspond adequately to new conditions. Officially, the current version of the Russian Urban Planning Code requires ‘public discussion’ of any urban development project that should be organised by local authorities. However, the formal evolution of the planning law has found little consequences in practice. Regularlyorganised public discussions remain more rituals than a real planning tool; they have ‘recommendatory nature’ according to the law that allows public administrations to ignore public opinion in their final decisions. The paper represents the results of the one-year experience of the CRISALIDE (EU/Russian Federation financed project through Eranet Rus Plus) project consortium in enhancing public participation in the urban development process. The R&D project, aiming at bringing together technological, social and organizational innovations, uses the area-based approach and experiments within the territory of a brownfield (old airport) in the selected city Rostov-on-Don. The chosen work area attracts notable attention of different local and regional actors due to its size, location, marketing potential and regional significance. Design of a decision support system for this area redevelopment becomes a kind of provocation that helped to involve in thedesign process local experts, activists and policy-makers. Through a series of the organised by the CRISALIDE consortium events, the new collaborations between the local and external actors established and the public discussions of the possible future redevelopment scenarios boosted. Public participation influences the DSS design process and is resulted in the system's goals and methods used that was its main target. At the same time, public discussions at the pre-planning stage is not a common practice in Russia, CRISALIDE proposed and tested a methodology for effectively and efficiently running a participatory planning process capable of grasping the local territorial demand coming from citizens and stakeholders. Moreover, the development of a smart platform, driven by IGis technology, aims at shaping the local decisional environment towards smart design and land use planning

CRISALIDE decision support system for urban development: from idea to implementation. Rostov-on-Don, Russia

This paper aims to synthesize the results of the two-year experience in implementation of the decision support system for urban development. CRISALIDE project (City Replicable and Integrated Smart Actions Leading Innovation to Develop Urban Economies) started in October 2018 and was one of the very few projects financed between E.U. and Russian Federation through the ERA NET RUS PLUS (ENRP) program. It was also the only financed project in ENRP dealing with urban planning topics in this current E.U. programming period (2013-2020). The project became possible due to the rising requests for innovations in urban life resulted in a noticeable shift in a political discourse towards the innovative ICT led economy, the new digital technologies, and the smart city policy in Russia. Though new initiatives seem too focused on technological solutions and lack a comprehensive understanding of smart development, they provoke the appearance of public discussions of the mentioned issues in cities, which themselves are the ecosystems for developing innovation. The missing components might be provided from the bottom level by using the place-based approach and implementing smart planning tools responding to the wicked local problems. This assumption lies in the basis of the CRISALIDE project aiming at bringing together technological, social, and organizational innovations. CRISALIDE was experimenting in the Russian city Rostov-on-Don through a collaborative approach involving E.U. and Russian researchers, creating an innovative digital platform to facilitate the renewal and regeneration of brownfields. The first selected experimental field was the area of the old airport relocated outside of the city. Attracting notable attention of different local and regional actors due to its size, location, marketing potential, and regional significance, the selected brownfield helped involve local experts, activists, and policy-makers to develop an innovation tool and raise a public discussion on urban development. A series of consortium events, new collaborations, and discussions became essential for designing future development scenarios. CRISALIDE system has an open, flexible structure based on urban ontology. It is a variant of artificial intelligence and will serve diverse issues in different cities. Oriented towards support in three main activities in urban development – new construction, reconstruction, and services provision – the system functions in three different modes. Three modes allow implementing required levels of public participation: from the internal communication within city administration to the public discussion involving all citizens

Overexpression of Tear Inflammatory Cytokines as Additional Finding in Keratoconus Patients and Their First Degree Family Members

Keratoconus is a progressive corneal ectasia that may lead to severe visual impairment due to the irregular astigmatism caused by corneal thinning. In addition to its association with atopy, eye rubbing, or genetic component, late reports suggest the involvement of inflammation in the pathogenesis of the disease. Our aim was to determine the concentration of IL-4, IL-6, IL-10, RANTES, IFN gamma, and TNF alpha in the tear film of patients with keratoconus and their first degree family members. We analyzed forty-eight participants in an observational cross-sectional study. The diagnosis of keratoconus had to be confirmed in addition to a minimum of 47 D corneal refractive power by corneal topography readings provided by a Placido-based topography system and analysis of the pattern: irregular astigmatism with an asymmetric “bow-tie.” As for the other groups, the most important diagnosis criteria were a normal topographic pattern with a regular astigmatism. 17 keratoconus patients, 16 relatives, and 15 controls were recruited after clinical assessment as part of the research. The cytokine’s mean values were similar in the keratoconus group and the relatives’ samples but significantly higher compared to the controls. Important differences were found in IL-4 levels between keratoconus patients and relatives and between relatives and controls (mean difference of 302.42, p<0.0016 and 219.16, p<0.033, Tukey’s HSD procedure). In the keratoconus group, using the CORR procedure, we found statistically strong correlations of IL-6 lacrimal concentrations with the disease stage (r=0.56, p<0.01), keratometry (r=0.55, p<0.02), pachymetry (r=−0.64, p<0.048), and corneal hysteresis (r=−0.53, p<0.02). Cytokine overexpression may be relevant for the inflammatory etiology of keratoconus. In conclusion, in the case of some first degree family members, the elevated tear biomarkers may represent a supplementary risk factor