EquiCity

Design and decision problems in urban area developments can lead to conflicts of interests between stakeholders, clash of perspectives, and conflicting goals. Therefore, purely engineering-oriented multi-objective optimization frameworks are not adequate for addressing such doubly complex problems with physical and human dimensions. This project proposes a digital serious gaming approach for creating a ‘smart polder model’, to support transparent and inclusive decision-making processes in urban planning and management. The ultimate aim of the project is to provide innovative participatory tools to better reach social, economic, and environmental sustainability, especially in historic cities, where cultural heritage and its values is to influence decision-making processes in urban planning and management. Particularly, this research develops and tests an interactive approach to collaboratively finding solutions for complex challenges in historic cities, and ultimately reveal the impact of such solutions computationally. EquiCity provides participatory mechanisms for reaching equity and balance among the social, economic, and environmental aspects of sustainability, especially in historic cities, where cultural heritage and its values may get into complex competitions with other economic and environmental values pertaining to decision-making processes in urban planning and architectural design of large and complex buildings.