Urban Planning by Experiment at Precinct Scale: Embracing Complexity, Ambiguity, and Multiplicity

Abstract

Urban living labs have emerged as spatially embedded arenas for governing urban transformation, where heterogenous actor configurations experiment with new practices, institutions, and infrastructures. This article observes a nascent shift towards experimentation at the precinct scale and responds to a need to further investigate relevant processes in urban experimentation at this scale, and identifies particular challenges for urban planning. We tentatively conceptualise precincts as spatially bounded urban environments loosely delineated by a particular combination of social or economic activity. Our methodology involves an interpretive systematic literature review of urban experimentation and urban living labs at precinct scale, along with an empirical illustration of the Net Zero Initiative at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, which is operationalising its main campus into a living lab focussed on precinct-scale decarbonisation. We identify four processual categories relevant to precinct-scale experimentation: embedding, framing, governing, and learning. We use the empirical illustration to discuss the relevance of these processes, refine findings from the literature review and conclude with a discussion on the implications of our article for future scholarship on urban planning by experiment at precinct scale.

A participatory approach for empowering community engagement in data governance: The Monash Net Zero Precinct

“…The politics of incumbency underscores the power imbalances that exist between incumbent actors and niche innovators and between formal actors and grassroots actors (Kemp et al, 2007). And yet, our case study of a precinct undergoing net zero transformation also represents a window of opportunity to trial further experiments in empowering community engagement and embedding participatory governance at precinct scale (Sharp and Raven, 2021). From a practical perspective, further trials of our participatory approach could test implementation strategies and enroll larger numbers of precinct citizens to participate, no doubt increasing the diversity of perspectives.…”

“…Urban living labs for instance are urban arenas for designing, testing, and learning from emerging socio-technical experiments and practices with various actors in real-world settings (Bulkeley et al, 2016; von Wirth et al, 2019). Urban living labs are beginning to appear at precinct and related scales, such as a district or neighborhood (Sharp and Salter, 2017; Marvin et al, 2018; Sharp and Raven, 2021). Critics, however, have suggested that transition studies overemphasis on systems underplays the role of actors and agency resulting in a gap so that the role of people is somewhat of an afterthought (de Haan and Rotmans, 2018, p. 275).…”

Smaller is smarter: A case for small to medium-sized smart cities

“…For the last two decades human and urban geographers have called for a focus on the small city [3], and small cities have already emerged as sites for citizen-engaged urban change and renewal, as in for instance the Transition Town movement [47] and the Slow Cities (Cittàslow) movement [33]. Scaling down smart technology experiments to the small city or urban precinct level has led to a Living Lab model for interdisciplinary collaboration, as for example in the Net Zero Precincts project at Monash University Australia [44]. The outcomes of such research and technology design experiments can be transferable to other cities or neighbourhoods or scaled up for larger urban contexts [26].…”

Street Experiments and COVID‐19: Challenges, Responses and Systemic Change

“…Even though the discussion on equity, public participation and democratic procedure in relation to tactical urban experiments has already been begun by researchers, even before the pandemic (for example Caprotti & Cowley 2017; Evans et al . 2021; Scholl & de Kraker 2021; Sharp & Raven 2021), an increasing number of scholars are lifting their voice for more awareness on these issues in the (post‐) COVID‐19 city (Beeckmans & Oosterlynck 2021; Flynn & Thorpe 2021; Schmidt & Zhang 2022).…”