Participatory and Resilient Urban Planning. PART IV: “Towards a Participatory Urban Community” and PART V: “1st Biennial of Urban Planning in Mexico 2024”

Abstract

Introduction:

PART IV: Fernando D’Acosta López

PART V: Salvador Herrera Montes

Authored by:

Kevin Joel González Hernández, Marian Ortiz Rico Celo, Sebastián Michel Vázquez Garibay, Sara Gabriela Hernández López, Mario Eduardo Martínez Bello, María Neftalí Rojas-Valencia, Luis Barraza Cárdenas, Oliver Hartleben, Diego García Fernández, Adriana González Meléndez, Salvador Herrera Montes, and Tania Romero López

Within the concept of “Forgotten Cities,” which refers to marginalized urban spaces, these occur in the basic urban unit called the “neighborhood,” the urban cell where the fabric of the city begins. The sum of these cells is what generates cities.

PART IV consists of four articles aimed at the direct application of local intervention strategies. Each one focuses on different problems. From the sensory perspective to the role of hope in the collective dream, circular economy strategies are also proposed from different sectors such as construction and technology, contributing to the reduction of the ecological footprint and eco-urbanism in areas with ravines and deteriorated public spaces.

The case of the Listen, Map, Transform workshop: participatory tools for urban resilience are presented. All of them are directly aimed at analyzing and defining, together with the inhabitants, unmet needs in terms of physical infrastructure, services, deficiencies in habitability, and social cohesion.

All of them propose mandatory co-design aimed at building more resilient cities, avoiding empty formulas for participation, and suggest intensive experiences to explore and debate participatory methodologies in urban planning, with an emphasis on Latin American contexts where collaboration and the inclusion of non-technical voices are persistent challenges. For this reason, participatory design is considered a form of governance in construction, combining critical theory, experiential tools and exercises, conflict management strategies, and decision-making to imagine collaborative and transformative urban processes.

PART V of the book briefly describes the award-winning projects from the 1st Urbanism Biennial in Mexico through a selection of the best works submitted in 2024, which are presented below:

• Regulaciones urbanísticas: “Normas técnicas de infraestructura verde Tuxtla”. Urb. Tania Romero López.
• Instrumentos de planeación y financiamiento: “Programa especial de la red de infraestructura verde de la Ciudad de México.” Arq. Maritza Hernández Solís.
• Proyectos de urbanismo y territorio: “Parque Cantera.” Mtro. Andrés Felipe Pastor Álvarez.
• Programas de impacto social: Utopías - Unidades de transformación y organización para la inclusión y armonía social - Arq. Raúl Basulto Luviano.
• Investigación y difusión: ACALLI AOTLI Camino de Agua, Memorias de Canal Nacional.
• Proyectos transformadores del siglo XX: Cuautitlán Izcalli. Concepto de ciudad paralela. Arq. Roque González Escamilla.

The book concludes with a brief description of the authors' academic backgrounds and a compilation of all the bibliographical references used in the book.