Integrating the Community in Urban Design and Planning of Public Spaces: A Review in Malaysian Cities

Published Date
Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences
9 January 2015, Vol.168:357–364, doi:10.1016/j.sbspro.2014.10.241

Asia Pacific International Conference on Environment-Behaviour Studies (AicE-Bs 2014Berlin), Sirius Business Park Berlin-yard field, Berlin, Germany, 24-26
Open Access, Creative Commons license

• Author 

• Wan Azlina Wan Ismail ^a,,
 
• Ismail Said ^b

• aFaculty of Creative Technology and Heritage, University Malaysia Kelantan Locked Bag No.01, 16300, Bachok, Kelantan Darul Naim
• bFaculty of Built Environment, University Technology Malaysia UTM Skudai, 81310 Johor, Malaysia

Available online 21 January 2015. 

Abstract

Both disciplines of Landscape architecture and Urban Planning prepare a development plan for public spaces in cities and towns. Much of the design and planning of the spaces are done by the landscape architect and urban planners without community participation. This practice results in incompatibility of the spaces for the communities; underutilizing or abandoning the spaces, and worse vandalizing the properties of the spaces. This paper argues that community participation in the design and planning of urban public spaces can draw residents to establish a sense of attachment that may lead to community maintaining the spaces. A plethora of studies in human geography, urban sociology, landscape architecture and urban planning were reviewing the themes of community participation in the planning of public spaces. It is found that community participation needs to be underpinned by a philosophy that emphasises empowerment, equity, trust and learning. The quality of decisions made through community participation is strongly reliable on the nature of the process leading to them.

Keywords

Community participation

public places

urban design 

landscape planning

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• ☆
  Peer-review under responsibility of Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies (cE-Bs), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia.

• ⁎ 
  Corresponding author. Tel.: +609-779 7000; fax: +609-7797262.

Copyright © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

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