Last night, our London Festival of Architecture event on the role of AI in community engagement took place, and fair to say it was a success! Following an introduction from Oliver Deed who chaired the event, the panellists each gave a presentation and answered questions put to them by the audience.
The presentations began with co-founder and executive director of ECF, Kathy Jones, who discussed the inception and progression of community engagement throughout the last 30 years, providing useful context for the presentations that were to follow. Kathy’s message that ‘technology is a tool and a tactic, not a strategy’ seemed to resonate with many as she emphasised that relationships are the foundation of engagement, and technology is only valuable insofar as it aids the development of relationships within the community.
Next up was Hamza Shaikh, digital artist and designer at Gensler. Hamza began by discussing the climate emergency, which is having devastating effects on communities all over the world, and how AI can assist in dealing with this, for example by predicting weather patterns. He then spoke about the importance and effectiveness of AI in overcoming barriers to engagement, such as language barriers, in empowering education by providing easy access to knowledge, and in streamlining codes and standards, ensuring better compliance with diversity guidelines. Hamza ended by emphasising that human empathy is at the core of Gensler’s work with AI, thus concluding his impactful presentation.
Stefan Webb of TPXimpact then took to the stage to discuss the difficulties of getting people to engage in the planning process, and how AI could help to get people more involved in areas such as Local Plans which have huge impacts on communities. Currently, the planning process is filled with difficult-to-understand jargon, is not influenced by the time poor, future generations or young people, and is not transparent, with many deliberations by planners and councillors not widely shared. AI could speed up the planning process by helping out with time-consuming tasks such as analysing data, and could help citizens understand the planning process better, thus encouraging them to get more involved in shaping their area.
Finally, CEO and co-founder of Hello Lamp Post Tiernan Mines gave an insightful presentation on how AI can be used to widen citizen participation. He discussed how Hello Lamp Post have enabled people to engage with the physical environment by scanning a QR code and speaking to an AI chatbot. This has the benefit of automating the process of responding to queries and recording feedback which then frees up staff time to work on other tasks. Moreover, by making engagement more accessible, more voices can be heard, hopefully creating a built environment better suited to the needs and wants of citizens.
Following the presentations, the audience put questions to the panellists such as whether AI will complicate or simplify community engagement, whether AI could potentially make people redundant when it comes to conducting engagement, and how technology can replicate the human empathy which is required when engaging with communities. The event then drew to a close, and people stayed to network and enjoy the food and drinks provided by Gensler.
We are grateful to our panellists, our hosts, and to everyone who came along for this thought-provoking event.
If you would like further information on the work that ECF do, and how we could support you in better understanding the needs of the communities you are working in, contact the team at info@engagecf.co.uk
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