On July 23, the Public Participation and Urban Development Innovation Forum, a sub-event of 2015 (the Tenth) Conference on Urban Development and Planning, was successfully held in Baiyun International Convention Center. Nowadays, it has become a trend for governments to incorporate public participation into urban development and planning. In the 2nd Guangzhou International Award for Urban Innovation (abbreviated as the “Guangzhou Award”), quite a lot of cities have developed relatively effective systems for public participation and accumulated a wealth of experience in public engagement in urban development.

This issue of Newsletter focuses on public participation and urban development innovation and selects three representative initiatives to share the innovative ideas in urban planning and development with cities all over the world. For instance, Christchurch, New Zealand developed a community-based activity called “Share a Dream” which collected over 100 thousand ideas to restore the city devastated by earthquake; and Boston, America adopted participatory budgeting and empowered the youth to contribute over 450 ideas, seven of which have been put into practice. Hopefully these initiatives could be referential to global cities.

Cases of Public Participation and Urban Development Innovation:

Youth Lead the Change: Participatory Budgeting Boston

Christchurch: Our Ever Evolving City

Changwon: Resident-led Urban Planning "Building the Best (Eutteum) Neighborhood" Project