Digital Collaborative Mapping Tools for Engaging Residents in Placemaking

The main objective of this chapter is to present and assess research approaches designed to involve urban residents in placemaking processes. A critical examination of these research approaches, which utilise digital collaborative mapping tools to engage residents and gather data on their perceptions of public places in urban environments, reveals their potential to support subsequent placemaking efforts. Through three case studies we mainly demonstrate how these research approaches, based on the use of digital collaborative mapping tools, can engage people and encourage them to share their perceptions of public places. We show the data these approaches provide and, more broadly, how the data impact placemaking. The first case study, conducted in Olomouc (Czech Republic), utilised mental mapping to identify public places where residents experience fear of crime. The survey employed a computer-assisted web interviewing method to engage local residents in data collection. The second study, conducted in Vienna (Austria), aimed to explore how perception influences navigation choices, in order to enhance route-planning services. The EmoMap project developed a digital system to collect affective evaluations of the environment as a means of understanding how these evaluations influence people’s navigation decisions. The third case study presents research conducted in Bergamo (Italy), where perception was methodologically used to explore the “happy relationship” between inhabitants and places. The Happy Places digital consultation system was employed to identify common traits shared by various places, based on people’s experiences. Despite the different spatial contexts and methodological limitations of the evaluated approaches, our findings demonstrate the importance of digital tools for engaging communities in the processes involved in the transformation and sustainable development of urban environments. In this sense, digital collaborative mapping tools represent an opportunity for future efforts to capture data concerning the knowledge of local residents. Only by using this data can the reproduction and transformation of the urban environment be effectively and sustainably planned to best meet the needs of its users.