GREEN LABORATORY - DESIGN THINKING WORKSHOP

The informal group Zeleni zid Niš (Green Wall Niš), composed of the residents of Niš neighbourhood called Durlan and eco activists, has launched an initiative to give green area between the residential block of buildings in Durlan the official status of a park. In that particular part of the city, on the territory of the City Municipality Pantelej, there is not a single city park where citizens with their children could spend their free time in a healthy and quality way, enjoy green environment, without cars, waste and concrete. After a three-week action of collecting signatures during May 2021 local activists submitted the petition with collected signatures (1228) and a request to Niš City Mayor, Chief Town Urban Planner and the president of the City Municipality Pantelej that green area between the residential block of buildings in Durlan received official status of a public city park. Responding to the request coming from the citizens a workshop was held with the residents living in the streets in that part of the city, the team of the Chief Town Urban Planner, Niš Regional Chamber of Commerce and the City of Niš Office for Local Economic Development. It was an opportunity for the citizens to express their opinion on how their living space should be developed, what are their needs, habits, what are the challenges they face every day using public areas and thus actively participate in creating solutions and decision making. They want to include the students of architecture in the realization of the project, who should make conceptual design for developing the park. The exhibition of the conceptual designs developed by the students will be held during the next year, after which the best design would be selected for the implementation. Through all its planning and strategic documents, the City of Niš has decided to preserve the existing and form new green areas and city parks - and this is the right opportunity for the City of Nis to realize those commitments and goals. Chief Town Urban Planner generally advocates systemic solutions and the renovation of all public green areas and the development of new ones, which will be a longer-term process at the level of the entire city. What is the message from these meetings, that our ideas and goals are the same; preservation of green areas, trees, more space for children and systemic solutions to problems. The workshop is an example that environmental and similar problems at the local level should be solved through a multidisciplinary approach, cross-sectoral cooperation and networking, primarily in the approach to solving local environmental, infrastructural and similar problems. City institutions, local self-government and civil society organizations, as well as citizens, were gathered in one place. The message is that citizens and local governments have the same goals: preserving green spaces, trees, more space for children and systemic solutions to problems.