Part of the Empowering communities using geospatial technology session of TICTeC Show and Tells 2021
Tuesday 25th May, 15:00 – 16:00 BST
Zoom
Delib’s new product Citizen Space Geospatial incorporates interactive mapping and geospatial data throughout the digital engagement process — and it will have broad-reaching implications for the field of public participation.
Currently there’s a disconnect between geospatial data, primarily used by governments internally, and citizens who are affected by spatial planning decisions. Planning is dogged by manual inputs, dense documents and paper processes, leaving citizens unable to access local decision-making.
Using geospatial data, not documents, bridges the gap between Civic Tech and GovTech and allows for far more ambitious, in-depth and meaningful participation from residents.
The climate crisis and COVID-19 have made it clear that we have to modernise the places we live and work, and the ways we get between them, if we’re to be ready for the future. Every local policy decision now has a spatial consideration, from how we reduce our transport systems’ impact on the environment to how our cities adapt to more people working from home.
Making place-based decisions more open and transparent builds trust with the public and gives them more control over the decisions that affect them. In turn, this increases participation in democratic processes and generates more useful and diverse data to inform policy. Successful planning decisions lead to better-functioning towns and cities, more appropriate commercial and residential forecasting — and ultimately can stimulate economic growth.
Ben discusses the implications of geospatial data, open datasets and organisations like Ordnance Survey, and their potential to break down barriers to rich, meaningful community engagement in areas such as climate change, futureproofing our cities and adapting to a post-COVID society.
Link: Citizen Space Geospatial