Participation, Co-Creation, and Public Space

Bibliographic Data

ID19486232
AuthorsMarcus Foth (0000-0001-9892-0208, Queensland University of Technology, corresponding author)
Year2017
Volume2
Issue4
Pages21
Publication date2017-12-31
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe Journal of Public Space (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2206-9658 • E-ISSN: 2206-9658
PublisherCity Space Architecture (PUBLISHER • IT)
DOI10.5204/jps.v2i4.139
OpenAlexW2790758329
LanguageEN
Citations received9
References cited11

A central notion in urban design, urban interaction design, and placemaking is the user of public space, the occupant, resident, citizen, bystander, passer-by, explorer, or flâneur. When the field of human-computer interaction (HCI) first emerged, the disciplines that represented the “human” aspects of HCI included behavioural psychology, cognitive science and human factors engineering. This situatedness begs the question whether the “user” requires different contextualisations beyond the immediate and traditional HCI concerns of the technical interface, that is, beyond usability. This article aims to illustrate the need for placemakers and urban interaction designers to be transdisciplinary and agile in order to navigate different levels of granularity. This article seeks to practice granular agile thinking by introducing five possible ways to think about the “urban user” and the implications that follow: the user as city resident; the user as consumer of city services; the user as participant in the city’s community consultations; the user as co-creator in a collaborative approach to citymaking, and finally; the user re-thought as part of a much larger and more complex ecosystem of more-than-human worlds and of cohabitation – a process that decentres the human in the design of collaborative cities

Agile software development · Architectural engineering · Civil engineering · Human–computer interaction · Interaction Design · Public space · Sociology · Urban design · Urban planning · Usability · User experience design · User interface · Computer Science · Engineering · Persona Design and Applications