[Update Dec 16: attaching the presentation prepared through this post]
If you were to speak on the subject "Mobility Projects and citizens Engagement - Are we doing enough", what points would like to cover? How would you present it? Will be great if learned people here can give their suggestions for putting together a presentation on the subject.
Points that we all hear about from various groups and individuals
- Equitable engagement - how does lower middle class, poorer folks get to engage?
- Engagement through NGOs, versus directly with citizens - what are the differences?
- Direct engagement with citizens - the challenges?
- What exactly is engagement? Any difference between "complaints", "suggestions", "ideation", "reviews", "feedback on specific proposal"
- Would engagement be of different nature depending on the types (listed above) ?
- How best to define outcomes for engagements - democracy or established personal dream/preferene (ex: car) versus "what may be better for sustainability" (ex: mass transit)?
- Good examples of engagement recently in Bangalore? Or any other city in India?
- Likewise, bad examples? There would be many here perhaps, but mention with reasons why these were "bad" examples?
- Correlation between Transparency and Engagement? Will more Transparency increase the engagement "workload" for planners, or reduce it over long term?
What else? Or what all in above list don't make sense? Would really apppreciate everyone's inputs. And I promise to make a summary of all inputs on or before Dec 9, and upload it here in a presentation.
cheers,
SB aka Pranav
| Attachment | Size |
|---|---|
| Mobility and Citizen Engagement v3.pdf | 1.47 MB |
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My two pennies worth.
"If you were to speak on the subject "Mobility Projects and citizens Engagement - Are we doing enough", what points would like to cover? How would you present it? Will be great if learned people here can give their suggestions for putting together a presentation on the subject."
I, hardly a learned person to give my views. However I felt that the parameters of
1. Good [Radical] town planning and
2. Daily commute and health of the community as whole as the objective function
are ignored as the parameters in the objective function of the problem.
The human blood circulation impressed me how a city should think of sustaining its health. Perhaps a pretext to allude to this as an analogy may make a talk on the subject interesting I thought.
My two pennies worth.
thanks, but ..
Thank you PSA sir. However, I was looking more regarding the process of citizen engagment itself as opposed to "what to be discussed as part of the engagement". your point #2 sort of touches on that - pick right objectives to engage.
Namma Railu, Bus Day examples!
Namma Railu engagement was initiated after IDD in a subtle challenge asked for a concrete proposal. Initially for some of us the engagement objective was to see the proposal gets implemented in some form or the other. For some in their wisdom, engagement ended after submitting the Call to Action report.
I deduce both good and bad examples from this engagement. Good, was able to produce a quality proposal that is appreciated by all and more ever taken seriously by many.
Bad, cold shoulder given by the GOK due to state of governance in midst of allegations and counter allegations. No positive signals from govt side or SWR.
Bus Day, was another example which had both bad and good results. Good results, awareness in BMTC to spruce up website, add few routes. Bad results, nothing real tangible in terms of objective of such exercise. Even after mountain of feedback, BMTC still drags its feet to bring in systems and technology to build its back end for managing its operations. This is even after a corporate house had come forward to do it voluntarily for them.
The moral of the story in all our public engagements is that Citizen's are demanding the digital service, but govt is still operating with 'Electronic Tube' versions. Citizens are demanding information on their touch-pads, govt is still struggling to give an answer in paper? Citizens are demanding to be served in information age, govt continues to serve them in colonial style.
Reach 1 Metro Day to publicize Metro Usage
Reach 1 Metro is underutilized. It is loss for BMRCL until all reaches are fully opened. Just how Bus Day popularized Volvo usage, same way a Metro Day could be started with feeders from all possible localities on either sides of Metro. This will also allow BMRCL and BMTC to address all the feeder issues and popularize Reach 1 Metro until further reaches are opened.
Engage with DULT to adopt a
Engage with DULT to adopt a robust and meaning full Road Standard to cater for all road related issues. This should be realsed fast. We could also engage with BWSSB and BBMP to maintain, preserve with correct usage of this imortant asset called roads of the city.
Transparency in public engagements!
Most of the times it is atken for granted that, Govt is not obliged to provide a response to the submission of suggestions from the public. Even the advocacy groups do not have the expectations for such a response from govt agencies.
But if you want the public engagement to go one level up, it certainly has to go one level in transparency specially in the area of responding to public suggestions. If not there is no difference between the current state of engagements public servants do, like District Collector's receiving petitions from public on their tours to Villages and towns. isn't time for change?
Here is an interesting case of public engagement on Black money from Finance Ministry
Don't you think it will be of immense public good, if FM goes a step further and publishes all the responses received from public and corresponding consideratiosn from Govt side. Public will get to know what was accepted, what was rejected and reasons thereof.
First question would be -
First question would be - what is the point of engagement if there is no "feedback" on what suggestions were accepted, why other ones weren't, no means to "track" progress etc. Periodic website updates, news releases would be great starts.
Engagement could happen in public places like Kalyan Mantaps (hired for say 3 hours or so) conveniently located in the locality affected.
Bi- or tri- lingual pamplets distributed through newspapers or post or mailed with utility bills (like water bills) should clearly inform public about the agenda and potential shortcomings. Or, +ves and -ves on how peoples' lives is projected to be affected.
Most important, engagements should be held close to lunch hour or during evenings to elicit wider participation. The participating officials can take other time off. People should be made aware (or law passed) that litigation route would be closed or made very difficult for non-participating members unless exceptional circumstances are shown.
the eventual presentation
Thanks for all the comments, and emails. Have attached the presentation prepared for this.
Mobility and Citizen Engagement v3