Urban Planning and Development Needs to Embrace Digital Engagement

People’s lives are busy and attending an in-person community engagement events may not be a priority or a possibility for everyone. The convenience and time efficiency of digital engagement can extend a project’s audience and result in greater representation of a community’s needs. A report produced by Datacom revealed that 57 per cent of respondents stated that they are more likely participate in community engagement if it was digital.[1]  Additionally, a survey conducted in Melbourne revealed that 60 per cent of community members viewed digital engagement as more time efficient and engaging when compared to face-to-face methods.[2]

A common critique of a more digital approach is that they can exclude individuals with limited digital proficiency. However, the digitalisation of services and platforms during COVID-19 has seen a 16 per cent increase in older generations digital proficiency due to necessity.[3] This increase does not disregard the prevalence of the digital divide but reveals a positive trend in digital proficiency. Best practice engagement should include digital and traditional modes to avoid misrepresentation caused by a dominance in one method.

Creating positive attitudes  

Accessible project information and a robust consultation can make a community feel involved and respected. Digital engagement platforms like UrbanTalk increase the accessibility and understanding of a development project. This results in project legitimacy and credibility, which can form trust with stakeholders and the local community. Trust and transparency are integral to forming a positive view of a project and ensuring its long-term success by fostering strong relationships and a sense of confidence. This, in turn, can result in a reduction of project resistance. Negative emotions towards a project can cause community members to oppose the development and in extreme cases stakeholders can boycott their services, resulting in the termination of a development.[4]

Existing Digital Platforms

With the increase of digital technologies and the decline of local newspaper outlets, social media is taking precedence to provide community information, with Facebook being the predominant platform.[5] This trend is seen in a survey of various New Zealand Councils’ use of online public participation, with 96 per cent of councils using Facebook as a form of online engagement.[6] Facebook is successful at facilitating engagement, due to its group discussion format. This enables locals to communicate extensively with each other and project stakeholders.

While there are many positives to the open discussion social media provides, negative opinions and misinformation can infiltrate and dominate these discussions. If there are no other forms of engagement or reputable sources, these platforms can become the main source of information and can negatively skew opinions. Extensive negative views and dialogue can create a ‘toxic’ group environment and can lead to a reduction of public participation in negative Facebook groups.[7]

To reduce the risk of misinformation, a poor public image and reduced community participation, developers and local governments need to utilise digital engagement platforms to distribute reputable information. Unfortunately, there has been a complete dearth of proactive, early digital engagement from the sector, with developers and councils commonly undergoing engagement as a form of damage control or to satisfy statutory requirements. This is despite the fact that the importance of early communication with the community has been well established for years. This is articulated in a 12-year-old journal article on the use of social media and corporate transparency in local governments:

“For local governments, not engaging now involves a greater risk than engaging, citizens will use these networks to talk about them, whether local governments add their voices to the conversation or not”.[8]

Is social media the right digital platform?

Social media is successful at increasing dialogue and satisfaction between local government, developers, and community members.[8]  Although, information in social media posts is perceived to be low quality compared to reputable sources such as news outlets.[9]

To fill this need, governments, local councils and developers commonly use project websites with the aim to provide reputable information. The problem is, there are often multiple, disjointed project pages with limited information that can vary from page to page, making it difficult for the community to engage and find current, reliable information.

Filling the digital engagement void

UrbanTalk is a digital engagement solution to the sparse, poorly managed pages created by government and developers, as well as the low quality, toxic environment of social media. UrbanTalk is a comprehensive digital engagement platform, which provides a solution to community engagement, blending the digital with physical to provide transparency in the development process and ensure community voices are heard. Find out more about UrbanTalk’s digital engagement platform in the video above.

Project pages provide centralised and up to date information, with sections on project timelines, images, site context, design rationale, planning context, community consultation initiatives, construction updates, developer information and feedback forms. These information pages can be supplemented with online surveys, Q&A Webinars and podcasts. In addition to a project’s digital presence, UrbanTalk provides physical QR coded site signage, notification post cards and face-to-face events. This increases knowledge and participation for all members of the community regardless of their digital proficiency.

Platforms like UrbanTalk are integral to engaging and educating communities on development projects. Digital engagement extends the reach of face-to-face consultation to facilitate higher engagement, which can lead to an increase in trust and support of development projects.

Reference List

[1]  Datacom. (2024). Exploring new approaches to community engagement for local government. Datacom.

[2]  McShane, I., & Middha, B. (2021). Expectations and realities of digital public spaces: A case study of digital community engagement in Melbourne, Australia. Articulo – Journal of Urban Research, Online.

[3]  Orthia, L., Maccora, J., & McCallum, J. (2022). “I am trying to keep up to…but it is moving so fast”: Older Australians’ Digital Engagement in Turbulent Times. Canberra: National Seniors Australia.

[4]  Ninan, J., Clegg, S., Mahalingam, A., & Sankaran, S. (2024). Governance Through Trust: Community Engagement in an Australian City Rebuilding Precinct. Project Management Journal, 55(1), 16-30.

[5]  Le Quéré, M. A., Naaman, M., & Fields, J. (2024). Not Quite Filling the Void: Comparing the Perceptions of Local Online Groups and Local Media Pages on Facebook. ACM Hum.-Comput. Interact. 8, CSCW1, Article 100, 22.

[6] PublicVoice. (2018). New Zealand Councils and Online Public Participation. Lower Hutt: PublicVoice Limited.

[7]  Ross, A. (2024). Thinking about the ‘silent readers’: a regional digital ethnographic case study exploring motivations and barriers to participation in public debate on Facebook. Media International Australia

[8] Bonsón, E., Torres, L., Royo, S., & Flores, F. (2012). Local e-government 2.0: Social media and corporate transparency in municipalities. Government Information Quarterly, Volume 29, Issue 2, 123-132.

[9] Le Quéré, M. A., Naaman, M., & Fields, J. (2024). Not Quite Filling the Void: Comparing the Perceptions of Local Online Groups and Local Media Pages on Facebook. ACM Hum.-Comput. Interact. 8, CSCW1, Article 100, 22.