JPI Urban Europe conference: Sound strategic urban planning –

linked with regional planning, including research and innovation smart specialization strategies (RIS3), and balanced territorial regional planning, place and people based

approach to spatial planning

Forward view mirror – strategic shared intelligence for urban planning

Joe Ravetz

Centre for Urban ResilienceUniversity of Manchester

www.urban3.net

Introduction – what’s the problem?

• Synergistic thinking for strategic planning intelligence

3 Project examples:

• FP7 project PLUREL – peri-urban landuse: >>> synergistic multi-level governance

• JPI study: Urban Foresights: >>> synergistic foresight

• JPI project: LOOPER (“Learning Loops in the Built Environment”): >>> synergistic planning process.

Key Issues & forward views…

The objectives

The clients

Contents

INTRODUCTION - URBAN SYSTEMS - FROM ‘SMART’ TO ‘WISE’ ...

• Most urban problems are complex & inter-connected…

• But most policy is simple and not well connected…

• Enterprise / business is a powerful force for one kind of value.

• But other values - ecological, social, cultural - may be equally important

• We need ways of working with integrated social-ecological-urban-economic systems…

• … not only for technically ‘smart’ cities –but more ‘wise’ cities… cities which learn, co-create, co-produce & co-evolve.

• … challenge for strategic planning: how to move ‘from smart to wise’, in policies and processes ?

• Here are 3 projects to demonstrate…

• FP7 project – largest ever study on peri-urbanization

• 33 partners: 4.5 years: 6m euros• Technical analysis & scenario

modelling• Actor / policy / institutional analysis• User friendly ‘assessment tool’ • Recommendations for peri-urban

regional governance & EU policy• www.plurel.net

PROJECT #1: ‘PLUREL’ – peri-urban landuse relationships

Key questions (for this session):• How to do multi-level governance in

peri-urban areas which are between territorial units?

• Is urban sprawl a system effect which needs system level tools?

Linking global-local capital & investment, to enhance

ecosystem services & rural-urban links

Remote top-down governance, disconnected from complex

functions, networks, territories

Result – ‘sprawl city-region’

Governance with social-mind structures, responsive to multiple

complex inter-connected functions, networks, territories..

Result – ‘synergistic-city-region’

Widening social & economic divisions & exclusion

Car dependency, traffic congestion, climate & energy

vulnerability

Outward sprawl of mono-functional

landuses: displace-ment of diversity & resilience: low value

housing next to heavy industry

Fractal spatial pattern enhances

inclusion & cohesion: Integration of green/

blue / grey / gold infrastructure

Regeneration of local diversity & resilience, for

social inclusion & full prosperity

‘Archipelago’ of globalized business parks / retail parks campuses / hubs:

privatized commons

PERI-URBAN MULTI-LEVEL GOVERNANCE

a) ADAPTIVE SPRAWL-I&II b) SYNERGISTIC CITY-REGION-III

Local admin units are networked with

external governance of finance, infrastructure, resources etc: also with internal civic society &

community

These cities are a pain in the ***

cities are corner-stones of prosperity

Our next mall has 20000

parking places located

strategically for 3 cities

Our next mall is a multi-

level facility & community with 3 cities

Local admin units cannot manage external & global forces. Internal tensions between rich & poor in

under-bounded territories

(regional scales are similar to local)

This study at the start of JPI, did a review, database & workshop on 100+ examples of city foresight & long range strategies.

Questions…

• Why is the 'urban' futures / foresight less easy than other systems?

• E.g. energy / emissions has a core of technical factors (physics / engineering):

• Maybe the urban agenda is not only about technical systems (landuse, buildings, etc), - but “relationships” -(work-home, community/ household, cultural-ecological, local-global, etc).

Urban concepts (emerging /

existing)

Urban grand challenges (emerging /

existing)

Urban strategic research

agendas: (‘city images’)

Urban research approaches(emerging /

existing)

PROJECT #2: SCREENING URBAN FORESIGHTS & Studies supporting Forward Looking Activities:

Workshop agenda outline:

SYNERGISTIC URBAN FORESIGHT: FROM SMART TO WISE

LINEAR-ADAPTIVE ‘1-2.0’ MODEL

No it’s a tree trunk!!

It’s a snake!!

“When” is the foresight horizon?

‘STRAIGHT ON FOR THE FUTURE’

“Why” foresight? It’s all about the

money“Who” needs foresight? The command & control elite

It’s a rope!!

No it’s a big floppy thing!!

FORESIGHT THINKING

SYNERGISTIC ‘3.0’ MODEL

‘THE FUTURE –YOU DECIDE’

“Why” foresight – many reasons – cultural, social, ecological, scientific, economic… and a love of elephants….

If we can take off the blindfolds, & see the reality together, we can think ahead together, & act together…“What” is the foresight

question? A list of topics……

FORESIGHT CYCLE

Baselines: counting the units Only the most forceful

drivers of change

Result –trends of growth / decline

Response: power & money

Landscapes of inter-

connections

Result: emergence of creative energy &

ideasMany more drivers of

change are inter-connected

Response: collaborative

action

PROJECT #3: JPI ‘LOOPER’: ‘Learning loops in the built environment’

Student inputs: textbooks, lectures

Process: fact competitions

Outputs: exam passes

PROCESS: ‘Mode-1’

learning: passive information

gathering

PROCESS:‘Mode-2 & Mode-3’ creative, reflexive learning

Pro-active evaluation &

feedback

Outcomes: rounded creative students active in society

Inputs - inspiration, curiosity, human resources

Process: collaborative learning by doing

Objectives Outputs

Process Inputs

Objectives Outputs

Process Inputs

Outcomes Evaluation

Objectives: beat the

competition

Output of projects,

initiatives, collaborations

LEARNING LOOPS - MODE-I LEARNING LOOPS - MODE-III

CITY AS PROCESS: COMMUNITY PLANNING & DESIGN 3.0

Development system is driven by financial profit

extraction

Viable housing & communities are

destroyed to make way for

commercial development

Decision-making is hierarchical, focused on

financial Return On Investment

Resistance & dissent

is excluded

Built form is mono-functional

& unresponsive to human needs

Design is made by machines for machines

Design is made by humans for humans

Built form is multi-functional, diverse & responsive to human

needs

Housing, commercial, ecological uses are

combined for added value

Development based on recirculating financial,

social, cultural, ecological values

Decision-making is inclusive &

creative, focused on Social Return On Investment

Neighbor-hood

forums & Planning For

Real

LINEAR-ADAPTIVE “2.0” PLANNING & DESIGN SYNERGISTIC “3.0” PLANNING & DESIGN

Key issues & forward viewsPOLICY & GOVERNANCE ISSUES

• How to govern the in-between spaces of the peri-urban? (PLUREL)

• How to build long-range horizons into strategic planning & foresight? (JPI-EFP)

• How to manage ‘learning’ from policy to public? (LOOPER).

The synergistic toolkit has been developed from these & others, to provide for…

• Peri-urban multi-level ‘co-learning’ governance.

• Strategic policy foresight mode-III intelligence.

• Participation with a real-time ‘co-learning / co-production’ loop (both technical & human)

RESEARCH ISSUES

• How to research the hyper-complexity of the peri-urban?

• How to research the future with near zero evidence?

• How to understand the complex relations of public & policy-makers?

Again the synergistic toolkit can help…

• peri-urban can be framed as a ‘co-evolutionary systems’ research problem.

• Strategic policy foresight framed as a cognitive (‘2nd order cybernetic’) problem.

• Participation can be framed as a relational / co-evolutionary interaction of discourse & institutions…

“World’s largest feasibility study”

– linking spatial, economy,

environment, society,

governance.

Pathways for collective

intelligence in cities,

economies, ecologies,

technologies & politics,

“Environment & the City”

- critical perspectives on

urban environments

around the world

www.manchester.ac.uk/synergisticswww.urban3.net

Ravetz, J (2017): From ‘smart’ cities to ‘wise’: pathways for intelligent sustainability. In: Bylund, J, (Ed), Urban Transitions Pathways, Brussels, JPI-Urban Europe, available on - http://jpi-urbaneurope.eu/connecting-the-

dots-by-obstacles-friction-and-traction-ahead-for-the-sria-urban-transitions-pathways/