urban design charrettes & OS

[Birgitt Williams]

I think you are right Jennifer, that it would be great to start off using
OST.

I have facilitated Open Space Technology meetings that achieved the same
result--an architect's design. The key is in knowing how to Work With Open
Space Technology beyond just doing the facilitation. When the prework is
done well, and the givens are clarified including the architectural givens,
the OST meeting including its convergence/action planning can provide all
the info needed for the architect or landscape architect to do his/her
design with the special architect/landscape architect skills.

The first time this was done was work that I did together with landscape
architect Virginia Burt. The resulting design  won an American Landscape
Architect Award.

Blessings,

Birgitt





-----Original Message-----
From: OSLIST [mailto:OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU]On Behalf Of
Jennifer Hurley
Sent: Thursday, February 12, 2004 11:40 AM
To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
Subject: urban design charrettes & OS


On 2/12/04 2:00 AM, "Automatic digest processor"
<LISTSERV at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU> wrote:

> Jennifer,
> thank you for your excellent summary of key points in an urban design
> charette. I have participated in a number of them in the past and know
them
> to be highly participative and an attempt at a democratic process. I am
keen
> to know if you facilitate charettes and if you have incorporated short OST
> meetings into them.
>
> Blessings,
>
> Birgitt

I have worked on some charrette teams but not yet facilitated one myself.  I
also keep looking for opportunities to use OS, and have participated in OS
meetings, but have not yet facilitated one myself.

Most charrette facilitators are architects who have learned their
"facilitation" skills in the trenches and have no separate training in
conflict resolution, mediation, facilitation, etc.  I have been trying to
bridge the two fields, as I think they have a lot to learn from each other.
A short essay I wrote about this ( Hurley, Jennifer. 2003. "The Public
Process and New Urbanism", Research Report for the Knight Program in
Community Building, University of Miami School of Architecture.) is
available at http://www.hfadesign.com/newsroom/publications.html.  Here's
the quick summary:

What Can Charrette Practitioners Learn from Consensus-Building?
By learning from the experience of mediators and facilitators, charrette
organizers
could leverage the event to create more support for the results of the
charrette,
resulting in more faithful implementation. Key aspects that charrette
organizers
could learn from consensus-building:
€ A robust theoretical basis for practice can inform the understanding of
the
process and suggest possibilities when problems arise.
€ Situating the charrette event in a larger decision-making framework that
includes pre-charrette outreach and post-charrette consensus-building
increases the chances of implementation.
€ Using the charrette to aid group learning and build civic capital would
leverage the event to develop local leaders who can champion the plan
long after the event.
€ Charrette organizers could adopt specific skills from mediators and
facilitators,
including stakeholder analysis, the use of ground rules, neutral
mediation/facilitation,
agenda-setting, and consensus-building techniques.

What Can Charrette Practitioners Add to Consensus-Building?
I have focused this article on describing what I think charrette organizers
can learn from consensus-building. However, I also believe that charrettes
are a
technique that discussion-based mediators and facilitators should learn
about:
€ Charrettes are a great improvement over discussion-based processes for
addressing physical and design issues. Words are a cumbersome medium
when the problem is visual.
€ The compressed time frame of a charrette creates incredible excitement and
momentum. In contrast, discussion-based processes can take months, if not
years, and are often tedious and sometimes downright painful.

The last two points touch on Chris's question:
So that's why I am asking is their a specific charrette focus that olnly
expert charrette people buld in?

They key is that charrettes have architects, designers, engineers, and other
technical experts working on site to create a plan using drawings.  There's
a specific product expected at the end of the week-long charrette.

I think a one- or two-day OS would be a wonderful way to start a charrette
(perhaps taking the place of more structured "stakeholder" meetings).

Jennifer
-------------------------------
Hurley~Franks and Associates
Planning & Urban Design

1429 Walnut St., Ste. 601
Philadelphia, PA 19102

P: 215-988-9440
JLHurley at HFAdesign.com
http://www.hfadesign.com

Association for the New Urbanism in PennsylvaniA (ANUPA)
http://www.anupa.org

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