Creative Urban Methods: Mapping and Analyzing Urgent Issues around Infrastructures in Public Spaces

Nanna Verhoeff, Sigrid Merx

In 2019 we launched the research initiative CRUM. Short for Creative Urban Methods, CRUM aims to develop a transdisciplinary toolkit of interdisciplinary methods for mapping and analyzing (issues around) infrastructures within public space to contribute to the development of (more) sustainable urban infrastructures. The toolkit is intended to be implemented in academic research and teaching contexts, as well as in contexts of participatory citymaking practices. CRUM wants to bring together ongoing urban and creative research in the social and geo sciences, and the humanities at Utrecht University. We aim to organize a productive exchange around this shared interest in (and perceived need for) a robust methodology for collaborative work. In a series of workshops already existing creative methods developed in various contexts within Utrecht University and beyond will be selected, fine-tuned and adapted for implementation in the context of research into (futures for) sustainable urban infrastructures. Outcomes of these workshops provide input for a book proposal for the toolkit and a didactic plan for its implementation in educational contexts at Utrecht University. 

Infrastructural Thinking

Public spaces in contemporary cities are infused with infrastructures – e.g. of energy, waste, mobility, sociality, knowledge, and information – that co-shape our private and public lives, have an impact on our experiences and well-being, and that enable (or disable) us to live, work and move around in the urban environment (Verhoeff, Merx, De Lange 2019). However pervasive, the various interconnected and constantly transforming infrastructural networks embedded in our cities are largely invisible to us citizens on a “street level.” Awareness of the presence and insight in the (dis)functioning and impact of these infrastructures, their interrelations, but also our own participatory position within these networks is urgent for urbanites to be able to fully participate in public life as well as to participate in collaborative city making practices and what Teli et al. call recursive engagement (2015). Specifically, contemporary urban challenges around energy transition, waste management, water management, mobility and migration, and the extends of digitization and datafication need to be approached from this “infrastructural thinking” so as to allow for a (critical) citizen engagement with, and collaboration in efforts to work toward, (more) sustainable urban futures.

To develop this infrastructural thinking in such a way that urbanites themselves can be productively engaged with issues around and transformations of urban infrastructures, we believe a sound qualitative research methodology is needed that is both analytical (what are these infrastructures, how do they manifest) and critical (what do these infrastructures ‘do’), as well as actionable (how can we act in, co-shape or (re)design infrastructures). Moreover, we believe such a methodology should necessarily be interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary, given that the complexity of the urban environment cannot be understood from a single vantage point. (Verloo and Bertolini, 2020)

Today, in academia as well as in urban planning, we observe an increasing interest in creative urban research methods, on the one hand, and in collaborative approaches to city making (Foth, Bryskov, Ojala 2015; De Lange, De Waal 2019) on the other. These comprise methods such as data walking, performative mapping, experimental ethnography, dramaturgical analysis, interface analysis, and action-based research, research by design, and critical making; methods that can be characterized as performative methods, mapping methods, and/or making methods. They share a perspective toward spatiotemporal and relational structures of urban environments, dynamics of change and forms of mobility, and with a phenomenological emphasis on embodied experiences of the (citizen/academic) researcher. When brought together and redeveloped in relation to one another, these methods can be particularly valuable for addressing challenges and questions around sustainable urban infrastructures and facilitating the necessary awareness and insight needed for a grounded actionability of researchers as well as citizens in co-creative processes.

Creative Methods

We consider these methods to be creative methods: embodied and explorative, and experimental and interventionist. Creative methods are especially productive in bringing different perspectives together, providing fresh approaches (Kara, 2020; Dunn and Mellor, 2017) and generating questions and raising awareness around complex subtleties (Eisner, 2008). This is particularly valuable for practical as well as theoretical engagement with complex social and environmental issues, with different stakeholders in specific, situated social environments, as well as within interdisciplinary research and education contexts. Also, creative methods are productive for participatory, community-based, and action-based research and are able to reflect the multiplicity of meanings that exist in social contexts, allowing for different stakeholders to participate in debate and collaborate in (practical) research (Hjorth et al. 2019; Van der Vaart, Van Hoven, Huigen 2018). Moreover, creative methods value situational specificity (Kara, 2020) and can provide access to emotional and symbolic aspects of people’s experiences not easily accessed by mainstream methods (Dunn and Mellor, 2017). 

This was the first of a series of blog posts for KWALON. In our upcoming posts we will introduce and discuss different creative urban methods and their potential for exploring and investigating issues around urban infrastructures.

Literature referenced

De Lange, Michiel, Martijn de Waal (eds.) (2019). The Hackable City: Digital Media and Collaborative City-making in the Network Society. London: Springer

Dunn, Valerie, Tom Mellor (2017). “Creative, participatory projects with young people: Reflections over five years.” Research for All 1, 2: 284-299, https://doi.org/10.18546/RFA.01.2.05  

Eisner, Elliot (2008). “Art and Knowledge” 3-12 in: J. Gary Knowles & Ardra L. Cole (Eds.), Handbook of the Arts in Qualitative Research; London: Sage

Foth, Marcus, Martin Brynskov, Timo Ojala (eds.) (2015). Citizen’s Right to the Digital City: Urban Interfaces, Activism, and Placemaking. Singapore: Springer

Hawkins, Harriet (2011). “Dialogues and Doings: Sketching the Relationships Between Geography and Art.” Geography Compass 5, 7: 464-478

Hjorth, Larissa, Anne M. Harris, Kat Jungnickel, Gretchen Coombs (2019). Creative Practice Ethnographies. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield

Kara, Helen (2020). Creative Research Methods. A Practical Guide. 2nd Edition. Bristol: Policy Press

Teli, Maurizio, Silvia Bordin, María Menéndez Blanco, Giusi Orabona, Antonella De Angeli (2015). “Public Design of Digital Commons in Urban Places: A Case Study.” International Journal of Human-Computer Studies 81: 17-30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhcs.2015.02.003.

Vaart, Gwenda van der, Bettina van Hoven, Paulus P.P.Huigen (2018). “Creative and Arts-Based Research Methods in Academic Research. Lessons from a Participatory Research Project in the Netherlands” http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/2961

Verhoeff, Nanna, Michiel de Lange, Sigrid Merx (eds.) (2019). Urban Interfaces: Media, Art, and Performance in Public Spaces. Special Issue for Leonardo Electronic Almanac (MIT Press) 22, 4 (March 15) https://www.leoalmanac.org/urban-interfaces

Verloo, Nanke and Luca Bertolini (eds.) (2020). Seeing the City. Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Study of the Urban. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.