Young Smart Cities Learning Situation on:
CREATING SAFER AND MORE WELCOMING URBAN SPACES
KNOWLEDGE PILLS relevant to this SMART theme are:
Driving Question
What can we do to improve safety and the perception of safety in our city through community participation and smart solutions?
Learning Situation
Cities are complex environments, where safety depends not only on actual risks but also on how people perceive and experience public spaces. Poor lighting, limited visibility, unclear signage, neglected areas, overcrowding, or a lack of accessible information can strongly affect how safe and welcome people feel. In smart cities, safety is understood as a cross-cutting issue that involves urban design, communication, community participation, and the responsible use of digital tools. Improving safety therefore means creating conditions that foster trust, orientation, inclusion, and well-being in everyday urban life.
Task
Design an evidence-based proposal responding to your municipality’s request to improve safety and the perception of safety in a specific urban context. Working in groups, you will choose a place, travel route, or public space that is relevant to your everyday life and analyse its main safety-related challenges. Your task is to develop a realistic and feasible improvement proposal that considers spatial design, communication, community involvement, and — where appropriate — the use of simple digital solutions. Your goal is to show how safety and well-being can be improved through thoughtful, inclusive, and community-oriented interventions.
Make sure you follow an enquiry-based approach so your proposal is grounded in solid, evidence-based reasoning. You will move through these stages:
Explore → Research → Analyse → Ideate → Present → Reflect