Piazza Tirana /Tirana Hub+

Published in

Living Streets LAB

7 min readApr 27, 2020

CO-DESIGN SESSION

In this process our intent was to involve the stakeholders and the users in to the design process, to define and understant better their needs and to create the possible solutions. Our approach was based on ‘’partcipatory design’’ because in our process thanks to main proposals whom we had possibility to contact directly, was a kind of our partner. And we already knew our stakeholders approach for the area regarding to our main proposals convection so this process involves ‘’user — centred design’’ approach too. Based on our spatial analysis, community analysis and brainstorming sessions, we detected the needs of our area and created 2 layout proposal in which we also defined our topics and concept before starting the codesign session.

a) FIRST LIVE SESSION WITH MAIN PROPOSALS

After creating these 2 layouts, we had our 1st Live Session with our main proposals; ‘’Comune di Milano’’ (CM); Fabrizio Delfini, ‘’Municipo 6’’ (M6); Aurora Bosna and ‘’Nuova Acropoli’’ (NA); Paola Bafile, Laura. We shared our 2 preliminary layouts with our other boundary objects like; maps, storyboard and diagrams to clarify better our proposals and also help to visualize better the future process. We had our online session in Microsoft Team with using Powerpoint and Miro Online Platform -the facilitation process- and than we exchanged ideas with one another to realise the steering process that helped us undertand better their visions and our way of approach.

After this session, they made an other metting between CM, NA and M6, they agreed each other with the comments and shared their feedbacks to us with a report and also plotting on the second proposal layout which is based on their Project. In their report, they suggested to make some location changes, We can say that they agreed with our new suggestions like; vertical walls and activities, they declined the planters and flowerbeds proposal because of the difficulty to manage and maintain them. They were also against to reduce the dog area but they suggest us to divide in to 2 parts which we also agreed.

b) SECOND LIVE SESSION WITH MAIN PROPOSALS

The second live session has done with the same participants with CM, NA and M6. In this session we came with our considered topics and concepts regarding to collaborative design synthesised the previous process. In this second live session we enlighten better our main proposals about our co-design session and we thought about more focusing our boundary objects with also tools. We explained the importance of the prototypes and other tools which we want to share with the main stakeholders and the other main users. But regarding to fragile situation between CM, NA, M6 between the stakeholders, our main proposals suggested us to share our tools by them-selfs which we also agreed. Because the main aspect for us is taking the main fund of knowledge and understand in the experimentation way with the stakeholders and thanks to our main proposals we gained the stakeholders point of view through our primary partners.

c) DESIGN DEVELOPMENT PROCESS THROUGH THE SECOND SURVEY — CREATING THE TOOLS, PROBES AND BOUNDARY OBJECTS

We creating 2 different kind of tools; the one is the questions were based on master key codification, this is our main possible solution probes which is prepared for stakeholders, because our survey will be deliver by our main proposals so we thought that it will be easy to get the responses from them. The other tools which is more interactive were created in Miro Online Platform and specially prepared for our main proposals. This interactive survey is composed by open questions, multichoises questions and other different visualizations. We offered a schedule sheet with many activities to fill out of everyday during a week, many stickers represents many activities for choosing. In the 9th part, we share the 2 layouts of our concepts, and we came up more specific questions for their opinion. We asked problems and suggestions in their thoughts. Also with sharing many new activities to ask them to divided into different areas and their comments for these activities. Paola Bafile (NS), Fabrizio Delfini (CM) and Aurora Bosna (M6) participated it in our ‘’third live session’’. After the live sessions we transmited our questions to the Paola Bafile to let them reach to the stakeholders. We also got in contact with an inhabitant (Anna Gianuzzi) from Piazza Tirana who we got intouched directly in our first survey. And we also shared our second survey to her, to include the main user to our collaboration. Finally, we received a response from one of the stakeholders through Paola who was very helpful in outlining some concepts; in fact, for example, it emerged that the stakeholders could take care of any plants and flowers in the square without any problem, giving added value to the square.

d) AFTER DEVELOPING THE CONCEPT — CREATING THE POSSIBLE LAYOUT

Regarding to entire process we gained the main primarly aspects thanks to the various analysis and the collaboration sessions . And we synthesized our Project and created our possible solutions in one layout. Tirana Hub + is the new proposal born thanks to the collaboration of all our collaborators and citizens’ needs; our goal is in fact to propose a project that satisfies all the people who live in the Giambellino district. It is a summary project to achieve the best possible result. A completely renovated square to accommodate people of all ages and families. A place designed for everyone, a meeting place, where to spend your free time, a place to stimulate well-being through exercise, a place for grandparents and grandchildren, for adults and young people, a place returned to citizens with a new atmosphere more pleasant and a new identity. In order to create a more lively and active place, the place is designed according to tactical urbanism and temporary solutions. The concept also includes variable areas that serve for joyful activities and other services to provide interaction between citizens and have a space where all users can spend their time with superior quality.

In the new layout, according to the suggestions from our collaborators, we decided to divide the two existing dog areas to create one dedicated to big dogs and the other dedicated to small dogs. The activities that we selected after all our collaboration phases have been positioned throughout the square, in order to avoid unused parts of the square. In order to improve urban furniture, we added benches to create more socialization areas and improve the current situation.

In addiction we have tried to differentiate the various areas of the square in order to make them easily identifiable by people through simple signs or colored indications on the floors. For this purpose, we also have an idea of vertical indications to provide users of the square with general indications of the various areas and all the activities present in it.

Finally, we hypothesized several simulations of the route inside the square to offer to the differentiated fructors by age group: the elderly, families and young people; this guarantees an interaction between designers and people in the use of the square but also suggests the most relevant activities according to own age. For this reason we hypothesized these routes in a very simple and funny way, proposing different solutions for visiting the square even to people who have never been in the place and just for curiosity are there to get to know it better. These are guided tours with an estimated time to spend their free time inside the square. Our goal is revive and repopulate the square and transform it into an active pole for everyone, making it a place for social interaction, culture, entertainment, fun and well-being.