UrbActivistas: citizens committed to more beautiful, fairer and greener cities
UrbActivistas project was the parallel event of the NEB Festival which involved people in the design of more beautiful, fairer, and greener cities. More than 150 citizens participated in actions such as garden design, collaborative graffiti, ceramic and painting workshops, and Jean Jacobs in order to reflect, create and intervene in the public space. They generated ideas for transforming not only our reality but also our street, our neighbourhood, our city... our future.
Regional
Spain
The project was implemented in different context and territories of the Region of Murcia, in the Municipalities of Cartagena, Cieza, Lorquí, Jumilla and Lorca.
Mainly rural
It refers to other types of transformations (soft investment)
No
No
Yes
2022-06-13
As a representative of an organisation
Name of the organisation(s): EuroVértice Consultores SL Type of organisation: For-profit company First name of representative: Manuel Last name of representative: Moreno Nicolás Gender: Male Nationality: Spain Function: Project Manager Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Carretera de Madrid, km 388. Parque Científico de Murcia (Complejo de Espinardo), Edificio S, 2ª planta. C.P. Espinardo Town: Murcia Postal code: 30100 Country: Spain Direct Tel:+34 968 27 78 45 E-mail:info@eurovertice.eu Website:https://www.eurovertice.eu/
URL:https://twitter.com/EuroVertiC Social media handle and associated hashtag(s): @EuroVertiC #DesarrolloUrbano #Energía #MedioAmbiente
UrbActivistas: citizens who yearn for more beautiful, fairer and greener cities and who are committed to it. This is what EuroVértice (EV) was looking for with this initiative launched as a side event of the 1st New Bauhaus Festival. It aims to take up the values of the Bauhaus to rethink cities and promote their development considering environmental, social, and aesthetic issues, with the participation of citizens.
More than 150 citizens participated in actions such as garden design, collaborative graffiti, ceramic and painting workshops, collective mapping and Jane Jacobs walks in the cities of Cartagena, Jumilla, Lorca, Cieza and Lorquí, different locations sharing a common objective and spirit. It was implemented from 9th to 12th June 2022.
We have reflected, created and intervened in the public space, generating ideas that can transform not only our reality but also that of our street, our neighbourhood, our city... our future. The project had the three NEB pillars on its hearth: sustainability, inclusion and aesthetics and quality of experience were addressed in the five different municipalities:
•Cieza: vertical garden design.
•Jumilla: pictorial workshop ‘take the street’.
•Lorca: biodiversity citizen design workshop and planting action.
•Cartagena: mapping the park and pottery workshop.
•Lorquí: collaborative painting and art gallery explanation.
Moreover, as the municipalities were developing their strategic urban plans by that moment, we complemented the activities with Jane Jacobs’ walks, developed on its framework during the same day as the activities.
Its main objectives were:
1.To bring the New Bauhaus closer to the citizenship.
2.To involve all the citizenship through an innovative participatory process.
3.To promote the urban strategy development in accordance to NEB principles.
4.To connect the different involved municipalities that carry out similar strategies, to find synergies, establish meeting points and common learning activities
Co-creation
Design for all
Community Building
Sustainability
Citizenship participation
UrbActivistas has brought sustainability to the cities following NEB principles. We imagined and created spaces for a sustainable future, and present, and we applied regenerative approaches, inspired by natural cycles, which allow for the renewal of resources and protect biodiversity.
The renaturalization of urban spaces has lots of benefits such as, the biodiversity increase, the improvement of physical health, the promotion of social interaction, the promotion of well-being, etc. The key objectives under this pillar were:
• To co-design the renaturalization of squares, gardens and other areas.
• To create new renaturalized places in the municipalities.
• To foster social interaction in green areas.
• To raise awareness among society.
The activities developed were:
• Cieza: a green space design workshop was developed. Participants planted native species such as rosemary, madre selva or esparto, in a key area of the old town for rest and socialising. This was developed as a pilot activity for reconnecting people with nature.
• Lorca: a proposal for the renaturalization of different areas in a design workshop was developed. In addition, a real intervention in one of them through a plantation in which the citizenship was the main actor.
• Cartagena: a mapping of a garden was developed. Green spaces are places of social cohesion and interaction. In this workshop we evaluated the diversity of uses for which they can be used (shaded, leisure, sports, entertainment areas, etc.).
All of them contributed to make cities more habitable places and revitalizing them, so social interaction is promoted and the sense of belongness of the population is improved.
The participatory approach designed can serve as an example for other local entities, as the initiative is not just about the inclusion of nature in cities, but to do it together with the citizenship so they are aware of their benefits and can participate in the decision-making and co-creation process.
To consider aesthetics, design, and functionality as essential parts of happiness and, thus, as pillars of new urbanism was a key principle of UrbActivistas. They transform cities into places where we can live together and build futures worth living in. In addition, they foster enriching experiences inspired by creativity, art, and culture.
The key objectives under this pillar were:
•To co-design the improvement of aesthetics in cities.
•To perform collaborative artistic activities.
•To increase areas attractiveness.
•To raise awareness about the importance of beauty, aesthetics and design.
Renaturalization actions in Lorca and Cieza, have also aesthetics on them as a key aspect. Considering they were developed in depressed areas which lack attractiveness, we are recovering spaces through a participatory design approach for social interaction while valorising adapted species and increasing their beauty.
In addition, two activities were focused on this topic:
•Lorquí: public space was filled with citizens for the development of an attractive ‘collaborative graffiti mural’ in which the municipality was drawn collaboratively. The result showed the values of the participants, which imagined a green, beautiful and sustainable Lorquí, and was exposed in various cultural events.
•Cartagena: during the mapping we developed an artistic creation activity, in which we reflected on the capacity of public space to be transformed. We created ceramic messages and posters with the proposed uses for the park, which became part of the park to reinforce the role of urban spaces in the citizens’ cohesion.
The activities developed and the whole participatory approach were designed based on the concept that design generates value. The fact that activities were developed mainly by children, gives them more value and increase the sense of belongness of the municipality. Artists guiding and involving children, instead of just performing works is an exemplary approach for others.
One main objective of UrbActivistas was to make awareness that a city can only progress if it leaves no one behind, encouraging the construction of an inclusive and transversal future that considers all opinions and visions and encourages citizen participation, regardless of age, race, profession, culture, or social class.
Other crucial objective is to make people proud of their place so the sense of belonging is regained. To this aim, conducting an inclusive approach is vital, as it is important to include in the project those who are usually marginalized and do not have access to public decisions. Therefore, the co-creation and participatory activities ensured the gender dimension and social inclusion and most vulnerable one’s demands were included.
In addition to the common vision, two actions were carried out in particularly vulnerable urban environments. These were the historic centres of Jumilla and Lorca, where there is a high percentage of marginalized population, with problems that must be addressed with social consensus.
• Lorca: the workshop on improving biodiversity and collective planting was held in a square next to the social centre of one of the neighbourhoods in the historic centre. Thanks to this meeting, the neighbours rethought their environment and how to revitalize it.
• Jumilla: "we take the streets" was developed in a run-down residential area. Wooden stools were personalised with paints, stickers and ropes, and we sat down in different areas and propose improvement ideas through relaxed conversations. Ideas were related to urban disorganisation, few areas for children or unsafety urban development. This was communicated to the local authorities in order to propose solutions.
The exemplarity of this activity resides in the direct participation of the vulnerable groups to improve their quality of life and the innovative participation activities developed, much more efficient than traditional activities especially for vulnerable groups.
UrbActivistas is essentially a citizen participatory activity that proposes the collaborative work of the participants. All the activities proposed were developed in environments known by the citizenship, to improve and promote activities on them. Therefore, it enhanced the sense of belonging of citizens to the place and directly improved the way of life of citizens, by proposing improvements and developing specific and real interventions in the public space.
This project has initiated a new dialogue between the municipal administration and citizens through new channels that seek to refute the model of participation relegated to public information.
The environments selected for our activities represented challenges, such as the rehabilitation of historic centres where population at risk of exclusion currently lives, the renaturalization of urban areas or the aesthetics improvement.
In total, 155 citizens have participated in UrbActivistas. This created a double impact:
-Firstly, the public space has been transformed in the different activities developed, from the sustainability, aesthetics, and inclusion pillars.
-Secondly, and even more important, the participants have acquired a new way of participating in public decision and in the public space. They have been able to rethink places and to reformulate how the municipality processes are done. Therefore, the participants have gained an inspiring experience which can be expanded to the rest of the citizenship and which may maximize this experience in the coming years.
In this sense, not only has UrbActivistas developed a set of co-creation and participatory activities, but has also been a key first step to change the participatory and public involvement culture of municipalities and to promote citizenship empowerment.
These two impacts have one common result which can be summarize in the recovery of the sense of belongness of the citizenship and increasing their willingness to take part in public decisions.
The engagement of stakeholders had three different levels: local, regional and European.
First, at local level, the most important one, had the objective of involvement the different local entities governments and the citizenship. To this aim, a communication strategy was developed to define a common, clear, direct, simple and attractive message for all participants, adaptable according to the channel, target audience and scope of action.
The strategy was drew on existing ones for citizen communication in each municipality so the public was familiar with the process. The messages highlighted the values of the NEB, linking it with the quality of citizens’ daily life and was oriented from a mixed media approach:
• Focused on digital, emphasizing the development of social media and other digital content. A specific image was created.
• Supported above all by relations with the media and target audiences in general.
Citizenship was the main stakeholders involved, considering children, adolescents, women, men of adult age and over 65 years’ people. In addition, local associations actively participated in the process and were a good channel to disseminate the activity and engage participants.
Regarding the involvement of the administrative bodies, the good relationship established by EV was useful in order to engage them in the participation process. The development of co-creative urban plans or strategies, was a great synergy for UrbActitivistas.
Secondly, at regional level, it is important to mention that in the framework of Urban October 2022, a conference involving the different municipalities was developed in order to explain the results of the activity, in an example on how different local entities can benefit from connected experiences.
Finally, at EU level, the inclusion of UrbActivistas in the 2022 NEB festival, as a side event, was important in order to be connected to other EU initiatives and to maximize project impact.
Agents vary from the private sector, local administration and civil society:
-Private sector: EV, the main promotor of UrbActivistas had the main role of designing and conducting the co-creation approach in the different municipalities as well as citizens’ engagement. EV has wide expertise in co-creation methodologies and innovative participatory activities. Thus, they guided local entities and civil society in the design and further project execution. Other key role EV was the connection of the activities in different municipalities in a same period.
-Local administration: they supported the initiative with resources and infrastructure, their aim to try innovative co-creation processes and with the political commitment. Municipality technicians also participated in the design and implementation activities and the citizens’ engagement.
-Civil society: the protagonists of the project. It would have been not possible to conduct the activity without them. Local associations also promoted the project encouraging people to participate in.
Interaction between agents was necessary and one of the main added values of the project, inspiring and fruitful:
-Among citizenship: it was inspiring and fruitful to collaborate in the diagnosis of areas and proposing possibilities of improvement. One citizen does not produce the same ideas, nor implement the same solutions, than in cooperative way. Even more if we conduct positive inter-generational exchanges.
-Between the actors: in the project, different point of views were put in place, not only from different citizens, but also from experts, public representatives or technicians. This ideas interchange was encouraging.
-Among municipalities: in Urban October conference, municipalities technicians, and political representatives, shared their ideas about the project and urban planning, learning from others and for continuing the activities.
-NEB festival: inspiring to know other side events and complement ideas.
A key result of UrbActivistas is the great audience of the event had and which showed the willingness of people to participate through innovative channels. This is clearly connected with ‘Regaining a sense of belonging’, as it is a way to valorize places and to promote its municipalities actively, taking part of this regeneration and putting in value traditions, places, cooperation approaches and, in summary, the municipality itself.
Main outcomes:
-Cieza & Lorca: urban gardens located still being taking care by the citizenship, being an example of an area regeneration, increasing the presence of nature in streets, and promoting social interaction.
-Jumilla: a new philosophy was introduced for a more participatory approach in municipality decisions.
-Cartagena: solutions for garden’s improvement and pottery materials for public space improvement.
-Lorquí: collaborative mural to be used in different cultural events.
As a general result, the encouragement for participation, the change of mentality when coming to public decisions and the empowerment of the citizenship on it, has been one of the main achievements. Specific results are included in the annex ‘project report’.
Regarding the impact related to ‘Regaining a sense of belonging’, the direct participation of the citizens in urban planning, in taking decisions and in giving ideas on how to improve places, is closely related to this feeling. Sustainability, inclusion, and aesthetics were put in place to increase this sense of belonging, putting the citizens on the focus, and making them protagonist of the changes to be done. This is different from experiences in which external experts are hired for urban area’s improvement; the collaboration among different agents and the presence of citizens is the key for success.
Moreover, the events have been conducted by a multi-stakeholder approach and involving citizens of different ages and social groups, so the exchanges and community-building has been promoted.
The innovation of the project resides under the co-creation approach. The mainstream participatory activities such as workshops or survey, are usually inefficient for participation activation, as they just involve those groups who are already willing to participate in public decisions. In addition, they often do not reflect the wide range of citizenship demands, as they have a strict format in which some people do not feel comfortable.
Involving citizens in the processes of reflection and decision-making on public space puts us in a privileged position to make decisions based also on experiential and emotional data and not only on quantitative statistical data.
Therefore, to propose innovative participation approaches is necessary if we want to conduct an integral a real participatory approach. Some innovative practices used in UrbActivistas:
-Jane Jacobs’ walk, neighbourhood or citizen's walk: it is basically a citizen's conversation at street level and in movement. In other words, walking and talking while observing the object that is susceptible to change on a real scale: the city. It is mainly about listening, and teaching how to observe the rich complexity of public space.
-Design workshops, which aims to bring citizens even closer to their municipality, turning them into designers of their urban environment. It goes beyond ideas, and puts participants to work through models or directly on the ground. Participants feel as protagonists of their thoughts and the results are closer to urban realities.
-Collaborative mappings: diagnosis of a specific area by collaborating with other citizens has enormous benefits. It concludes with relevant results for the improvements of gardens, squares, buildings, etc.
-Take the street workshop: to formulate ideas directly in the streets together with neighbours is something relevant and innovative.
-Collaborative mural: putting ideas in common and actively collaborating with others in the design of spaces, murals, etc.
For UrbActivistas development, EV made a preliminary phase in which the structure of the parallel events was defined. EV has wide experience in the development of co-creation process in line with NEB values and sustainable urban planning. Thus, it was possible to conduct this first stage by taking advantage from EV’s own expertise.
Following it, EV engaged the five municipalities, presenting the idea and refining those needed aspects according to municipalities needs and desires.
After their commitment, it was possible to create the final programme. This was a collaborative process between EV’s departments of urban planning, environment and innovation, and municipalities’ technicians.
After this, it was the moment of engaging the citizens and local associations. To this aim, a specific website (urbactivistas.eu) and Instagram account were created. On them, activities were announced and inscription forms created. This was done in a collaborative way with the municipalities, as they also disseminated the event among their own social network and specific channels.
Following it, the last phase was the implementation of the project, in which EV, municipalities and civil society had a great interaction and role.
On the other hand, the participatory process followed an innovative methodology of four steps:
1.Inspire: giving tools to citizens to empower themselves and offering fluid communication channels.
2.Discover: working to discover new challenges.
3.Dream: generating collective ideas to improve the challenges encountered.
4.Activate: obtaining citizen commitment to participate in the actions.
For its implementation, innovative participation activities were developed. The focus of co-creation activities was put on those actors who usually do not take part in participatory processes. This methodology achieved an effective, multilevel and transdisciplinary approach and led to a real co-creation process of the solution, and empowering the citizenship.
The project was designed in order to be an example of local practices that can be an inspiration for other municipalities at regional, national and international level. It is also based on the development of participatory proposals, so in its design the participation of citizens is key. Each municipality used different tools and had different activities, but they shared the same spirit and philosophy. They all followed a similar approach integrating the NEB principles in cities design.
Therefore, we consider that the project has a big potential in the replication and transferring phase, as the methodology and project philosophy is totally replicable by municipalities for the benefit of the citizenship and in different context.
Some of the main aspect to be replicated are:
- Revitalization of urban centres according to people needs.
- Regeneration of historic centres and vulnerable areas, a common problem in several municipalities at national a European level.
- The participatory approach for this project would be also useful for other regions to developed co-created solutions for the development of integral and transformative urban actions.
- Dynamization of the cultural sector of municipalities.
- Inclusion of nature in cities by putting citizens in the centre of the scope.
A proof that replication is on the heart of the initiative was the ‘Decarbonisation of cities in the framework of urban agendas’ conference, developed in the framework of Urban October and in which UrbActivistas involved municipalities, together with many more around the Region of Murcia. The event, among other activities, showed tangible results of the project and the methodology used, being an inspiration for others and promoting the replication of the approach.
Finally, the participation of the project as a side event of the NEB festival also represents this willingness of replication and maximizing project principles impact.
Municipalities and local governments have a vital role to play in contributing to the sustainable development of the planet, as well as in the successful implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals, and the implementation of project such as UrbActivistas is one key elements for this.
The inclusion of SDG 11 to "Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable" is largely the fruit of a campaign by local governments, their associations and the urban community.
SDG 11 represents a major step forward in recognising the transformative power of urbanisation for development, and the role of city leaders in driving global change from the ground up. However, the role of local governments in achieving the Agenda goes beyond SDG 11. All SDGs have targets directly or indirectly related to the daily work of local and regional governments.
UrbActivistas is directly addressing SDG 11 and some others, as the following:
- SDG 4 “Quality Education”: by creating sustainability awareness among the population.
- SDG 10 “Reduce inequalities”: by directly addressing vulnerable groups and depressed areas, giving them high priority.
- SDG 13 “Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts”: by adapting municipalities to climate change and promoting the use of adapted species in the environment.
- SDG 15 “Life on land”: by developing renaturalization processes.
- SDG 16 “Peace, justice and strong institutions”: conducting a participatory approach for decision making promoting social inclusion and leaving no one behind.
- SDG 17 “Partnership for the goals”: involving administration at different levels, citizenship, private sector, so a common objective can be achieved.
In addition, it directly contributes to the Green Deal, by this renaturalization of cities, the Urban Agenda for the EU and, for sure, the NEB values and principles.
