All Things Urban

Community is the key to most urban planning projects. But how to engage with citizens to make sure their voices are heard and all involved parties – planners, clients, residents – are happy? This article is sponsored by Maptionnaire— a community engagement solution for comprehensive collection, analysis, and reporting of citizens' feedback and ideas for developing urban environments. Maarit Kahila and Anna Broberg, both holding a PhD in urban planning, founded Maptionnaire in 2011, which has since been used in over 40 countries. Maptionnaire believes that successful, resilient, and inclusive planning is achieved only together with residents – because they are the ones who have unique knowledge about their living environments. In this piece, Maarit and Anna explain why community engagement is essential and how Maptionnaire can help you navigate the key tools of efficient community engagement.

One of our community members, journalist and blogger Michal Manor, researched how Eindhoven - a smart and innovative city - is coping with the COVID-19 crisis. Michal believes that Eindhoven is a tolerant city, promoting the values of cooperation and togetherness, and she would like to share her insightful findings of the city's solutions to the ongoing pandemic.

The multidisciplinary nature of urbanism means there is a wide range of research methods available. Can filmmaking be one of them? The founders of Maison d'Être described their cinematic experiments and how they use documentary to explore the notion of ‘home’, one of the least studied yet promising themes in contemporary urban studies.

In our new comprehensive series on urban tech, we're taking a deep dive into how we can leverage new technologies to improve city living.