What is it about?
As more people move to cities, it has led to increased tensions in society and a rise in public involvement in urban planning. This planning often happens with the help of computers and online tools to engage more citizens. However, past experiences show that digital participation can present new problems. Online discussions don't always have the same quality as face-to-face interactions, as the way people communicate and share ideas can vary. In a research project, we are exploring how to help citizens make clear and useful contributions on urban planning platforms. We identify issues, set overall requirements, and create design ideas for practical prototypes. We tested these prototypes in focus groups. Our results add to existing research about civic technology, urban informatics, and planning by providing design principles that suggest using AI for feedback and other features to improve interaction and help citizens give more detailed input.
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Why is it important?
Our work is timely and unique because it addresses the growing need for effective citizen participation in urban planning through innovative digital means. As cities expand, they face complex challenges that require input from diverse community members. Our research introduces an AI-based feedback system that helps citizens provide clearer and more meaningful contributions on urban participation platforms. This system uses machine learning to analyze submissions in real-time and give users immediate feedback on their ideas. Unlike traditional methods that require hiring human moderators, our automated approach reduces costs and increases accessibility, allowing more citizens to engage. The feedback is presented on a simple, color-coded scale that encourages users to expand on their ideas, enhancing the quality of contributions. What sets our work apart is the focus on making interactions not only manageable but also engaging for users, especially younger participants who are more comfortable with entirely digital forms of communication.
Perspectives
Our design principles focus on making citizen participation clearer and more transparent, with helpful feedback that improves the experience. This research aims to create a more inclusive urban planning process where citizens can express their ideas for their communities. We want to use AI in civic tech to change how urban planning interacts with the public, making it better reflect everyone’s needs. However, we recognize that AI's full potential is not yet realized, and more work is needed to analyze citizen contributions effectively to assist experts and decision-makers.
Marten Borchers
Universitat Hamburg
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Hear Me Out: Supporting Citizens to Create Comprehensible Contributions on Urban Participation Platforms, Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, November 2024, ACM (Association for Computing Machinery),
DOI: 10.1145/3686971.
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