Oliver SCHMITZ, RWTH Aachen University, Germany
In the last decades, many cities in Germany are facing the loss of important inner-city functions, which lead to an increasing number of vacant business properties and was even intensified by the Covid-19 pandemic. To counteract this development, the Federal Ministry of the Interior is funding 13 pilot projects across Germany. One of them is the “Academy for Collaborative Urban Development” in Aachen. The research project is conducted by an interdisciplinary team from five institutes from Aachen University in cooperation with experts from the city municipality such as the mayor herself.
In cooperation between local government, university and civil society, the project aims to find innovative solutions for a resilient inner city by developing strategies to increase the quality of use, the quality of life and the quality of stay for all. Involving as many stakeholders as possible (tradespeople and service providers, residents, students, cultural workers, initiatives etc.), we aim to create ideas and solutions on site in a collaborative process.
One project of the Academy is the investigation of vacant business properties and their potential of being reused (for retail or gastronomy) or converted (other forms of use). In a first phase of the project, qualitative interviews were conducted with owners of vacant business properties. In a second phase, other groups of stakeholders like retailers and restaurateurs will be included, in order to capture as many perspectives on the future inner city development as possible.
In our presentation, we will discuss the possibilities and limitations of the collaborative process from our perspective as involved scientists. This includes the organisational structure of the project as well as the integration of scientific methods into local governance and spatial planning processes.
Mots clés : civil participation|inner-city functions|research methods |Covid-19 pandemic
A103526CP