Negotiating and Designing Public Space. Experiences with a new M.Sc. in Urban Design Program in Hong Kong

This contribution reflects on first experiences made with a newly launched Master of Science in Urban Design program at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. As an important part of this program, students have to develop their design proposal in response to feedback of different stakeholders and community members. Thus the program responds to the growing aspiration of Hong Kong’s citizens to shape the urban development of their city and a lack of a meaningful participation process in the region. With its high density, protected country parks, efficient public transport and large scale housing program, generally, Hong Kong offers important lessons for contemporary urbanism. However, since the end of the British colonial rule and in face of increasing property prices, pollution and the disappearance of local heritage, intensive debates started about the regions future. Another central point of the recent discussion in Hong Kong – and key theme of the new urban design program - is the demand for the rights and qualities of public space. The paper presents the set-up of the design studio, which was closely linked to a course on “urban processes”. During the semester, students had to organize community forums and street exhibitions in a specific district, invite stakeholders and residents and discuss with them their ideas. Their projects, then, had to respond on the various feedbacks and integrate them in their design and policy proposals. The text reflects on the student projects and the lessons learned in the process. It addresses general questions such as the challenges in communicating with a diverse community (e.g. language barriers and culturally different ideas of public space). It addresses the question of the intended and unintended effects of a participatory design studio in the community, and possible follow-ups. And it reflects on the general role of design and designers in shaping community spaces.