In modern society, citizen participation in the planning domain has emerged as a major theme reflecting a trend of diversification, multiculturalization, and democratization. As a consequence, the participation paradigm is emphasized in the domain of ...
In modern society, citizen participation in the planning domain has emerged as a major theme reflecting a trend of diversification, multiculturalization, and democratization. As a consequence, the participation paradigm is emphasized in the domain of planning activities. With this trend, many countries has reinforced the participation in the planning system as in the United Kingdom.
In spite of this changing planning environment, the urban planning law in Korea has introduced the limited participation method in a certain planning stage. Under the present planning law, public hearing is stipulated as a participation method in the adoption stage of the master plan. Therefore, new institutional framework is urgently needed for the enlargement of public participation in the planning process.
Generally speaking, major aim of new town planning is to develop a harmonious community with sustainable paradigm. With its characteristics, new town planning is more appropriate place than that of existing cities to examine genuine participation planning.
As a new town, the development of Sejong city has paid great attentions from the people not only stakeholders around the development site but also the residents of the rest regions in the nation because of its functional characteristics of administrative city relocated from Seoul, the capital city. The purpose of this study is to devise the improvement measures of citizen participation with focused on Sejong city planning process.
The participation methods employed in Sejong master plan was mainly traditional methods such as public discussions, meetings, and hearings, etc. Participation opportunities in Sejong city plan were provided to the limited people in a certain stage as in the existing urban planning process. As a whole, the degree of citizen participation in Sejong city was insufficient in terms of participants, participation methods, subjects, and processes.
Major participation problems identified in Sejong city plan can be summarized as following four items.
The first problem was unsystematic participants selection through top-down method. Considering its administrative functions relocated from the capital city, participants in Sejong city should be included as many residents as all the regions in the country. But, participants in Sejong city plan were selected from the residents living Chungcheong including Sejong and Seoul region through the top-down method.
Secondly, the discussion subjects were selected not based on the residents needs but for the planning purposes. Therefore the residents had the great interest in the goal settings, they had no opportunity to take part in those activities. On the contrary, they were permitted to participated in such less interesting topics as welfare facilities, landscape planning, etc.
Thirdly, participation places were held in the limited regions, mainly in Seoul and Chungcheong, Moreover, every public hearings was held in large-scale conference rooms, which made citizens hard to express their opinions in the secession.
Fourth, citizen participation was only available in the limited planning stages. There was no participation methods was allowed in the goal setting process which urgently needed for the genuine participation. Public hearings were held mainly for administrative purpose without the consideration of citizens' conveniences.
Lastly, in spite of the advanced information and communication technologies can be supplemented to the traditional methods, only limited traditional participation methods were employed in the planning process.
As a way of improvements, following measures are required. Firstly, participants in the planning should be selected as a systematic and upward method. All the people should have opportunities to take part in the whole planning processes. Secondly, participation subject should be chosen based on the demands of citizen. In order to encourage people to take part in topics in which they have great interest, it is necessary to analyze the value and distribution of citizen. Thirdly, participation place should be easily accessible. It is desirable for people to express their opinions in their own community, but there is limitation in reality considering the widely distributing citizen. Therefore, combining places such as large conference room and community units is needed rather than selecting only one type of place. Fourth, participation in the whole process of planning should be taken into consideration. The recently revised the guideline of city master plan which suggests various participation methods in the whole planning process is a advanced participation strategy. Fifth, ways to encourage self-help methods such as voluntary and independent participation should actively be adopted in the planning process. Traditional participation methods should be complemented with new methods considering the features of participants and new town. Institutionalization is needed to implement those improvement measures including improving the traditional methods such as public hearing, which is most frequently used in the existing system.
Changing planning paradigm is required the meaningful measures to enhance citizen participation in the urban planning process. Under the present institutional framework of urban planning, participation planning should be adopted as a sector plan in the urban master plan.