Yesterday I had a friend visiting me and as usual our talk drifted into work. Since he is an architect with a focus on large scale development we talked about the idea of user-centric city planning and what input a user observations and co-creation might bring to the table.
I know many architects use the methods I refer to and that the design and architecture processes are born out of the same thoughts. However, the table i mention above is not placed at the architect but rather at the city council - at least that is the case in Sweden and Denmark. I understand that architects are involved in the planning but my friend told me that user-centric methods are not common practise when politicians decide on the development of a given area within a city.
Personally I would love to try the design process on a large scale city planning project. After all the result of such a project directly effect peoples lives so I guess its fair to say that it would be relevant to know how people live and how they would like to live their lifes in the future before you start investmenting in a project like that.
PS. Imagine bringing the above thoughts into a project of this size…DS.