1 CONTEXTUALIZING
1 CONTEXTUALIZING
Phase 1. Contextualising- Taking one step back
The first phase has a backwards perspective: It is about getting the bigger picture,‘ sensing’ what is going on. The task is to let the daily work rest, and reflect upon the messy realities of mobility planning, and asking the question to which extent the working methods are living up to the given challenges. It is about reflecting why things in mobility planning are the way they are and how they came to be. It is also about looking into other cases where something special has been achieved and understanding what has favoured the emergence of those experiments. This can concern both special single experiments, or more overarching living laboratory approaches in other cities. The single tasks are interwoven with evaluating what all of this implies for Nordhavnen.
This phase is- unavoidably- carried out inside the heads of each planner, but is even more enriching when they are taken up in the dialogical setting of workshops and conferences with direct and indirect colleagues in urban planning. Topics to work with could be:
Task 1-1: Reflect upon the biggest controversies you draw from your daily work and the messy realities of mobility planning. Task 1-2: Reflect upon why things in mobility planning are the way they are and how they came to be. What does this imply for Nordhavnen?
Task 1-3: Identify societal trends, giving indication of the direction in which our environment, economy and society are moving. What trends are visible in your daily work, what are trends you often hear of?( this could be trends like e. g.‘ generation access’, which prefers access to a service over ownership; or the increase of young families living in the inner city)
Task 1-4: Reflect upon to which extent the working methods are living up to the identified challenges and trends. Task 1-5: Study what the main concerns of key stakeholders are in regard to the development of Nordhavnen.
Task 1-6: Study cases with innovative urban mobility concepts elsewhere and understand similarities and differences in the context( here, we might point for instance to documents such as Europe’ s Vibrant New Low Car( bon) Communities by the Institute for Transportation & Development Policy, 2011).
Task 1-7: Reflect what has favoured the emergence of those solutions. What are innovative experiments, which might be feasible in Nordhavnen? What made it possible for them to emerge?
Task 1-8: Study cases where living laboratory approaches have been applied. You might want to have a look at chapter 9“ Living laboratories for sustainability- Exploring the politics and epistemology of urban transition” by James Evans and Andrew Karvonen in the book“ Cities and Low Carbon Transitions”( in there four cases of living laboratories with universities as one strong pillar are introduced: North Desert Village, Arizona, USA; Oxford Road Corridor, Manchester, UK; Urban Landscape Lab, New York, USA; Masdar City, United Arab Emirates)
Task 1-9: Relate Nordhavnen to other urban developments in Copenhagen, understand the differences, and sharpen what constitutes the uniqueness of the role, process and features in Nordhavnen. What circumstances and relationships have led to promising innovative features of the development? What outer pressures, relationships, working methods etc. have implied other valuable ideas to be turned down?
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