Study title

Europe has never been homogenous and is increasingly becoming more culturally, ethnically, and religiously diverse over the last century. The diversification of European cities can be an opportunity for increased tolerance and bilateral exchange or might lead to conflict and fear. Understanding how our urban neighborhoods and their public spaces facilitate tolerance, rather than fear should be a critical research field within the built environment disciplines, bringing together knowledge from design, geography, and social sciences, all the while informing policy and local government priorities. Current literature supports that intergroup contact can lead to greater levels of tolerance, and spatial conditions can play a significant role in facilitating or inhibiting these interactions. Well-integrated urban spaces such as streets, squares, courtyards etc. within neighborhoods have the potential to enrich public life and in the long run reduce discrimination and fear. The project ‘Places of togetherness’ (PLAofTOGETHER) uses ethnographic, transition design and participatory research methods to a. investigate the role urban space play in community cohesion and the social integration and b. to develop an innovative participatory tools that can be used to advance marginal urban spaces into places of togetherness by communities and local government. For the project, fieldwork is realized in the city of Nikea, an area developed a century ago as an Asia Minor refugee settlement, and continues even today to be the place of residence for many newer immigrants. The research focuses on the unique, extended network of shared open spaces in the middle of its building blocks. In the area, there are 134 buidling blocks that have either a shared alley or courtyard at their centre. The collected data include a series of maps (shapefiles), the 3D documentation of the representative typologies of the refugee housing in the area, as well as selected building blocks and their...