Description
In Romania, urban development is an exclusive task of the local authorities with limited input from the local communities, usually discouraged by the complicated and specialized legal and planning processes, resulting in development plans not targeting real local needs. The project's main objective is to increase the local community’s participation in the selected project area (Dristor area, District 3, Bucharest) in the elaboration and hierarchical classification of local urban development priorities. The project will develop a participatory urban analysis framework and consultation mechanism, in order to involve the local community in the decision-making process, and to increase the capacity of local community members to negotiate their priorities with the local authorities. The project will ensure the participation of the local community through advertising campaigns and by developing working relationships with community members and the local authorities. The project will benefit the local community as main beneficiaries of the local urban development process and the local authorities, which can better target the local communities' needs.
Summary of project results
In Romania, urban development is an exclusive task of the local authorities, with limited input from the local communities, usually discouraged by the complicated and specialised legal and planning processes, resulting in development plans not targeting real local needs. The project's main objective was to increase the local community’s participation in the selected project area (Dristor area, District 3, Bucharest), in the elaboration and hierarchical classification of local urban development priorities. The project was implemented also as a result of the need for an innovative framework through which citizens can get involved in the local urban development policy-making process. This is the main process through which citizens can push forward their local development needs/priorities in a proactive manner. The primary intent of the project team was to rally the citizens to draft a list of local development priorities for one neighbourhood in Bucharest - the Dristor neighbourhood. During the project three analyses were drafted: an expert urban analysis, a participatory analysis and a strategic documents analysis, which were then put together into what was called a “participatory urban analysis”. During the implementation of the project, the online platform ParticipaCity was developed, a platform which was used for citizens’ proposals and voting. As a result of this process, the priorities list was structured and developed into a local action plan which was later negotiated with local authorities and local elections candidates. The main outcomes of the project were: the development of an innovative online platform for collection and voting of local priorities, the replicable framework for citizen participation in urban development policy-making and a group of informed citizens that can supervise the local development issues, group which can also act as a pressure / watchdog group, so that the actions of the local public authority can be actively monitored and supervised.
Summary of bilateral results