Futuring Workshop

The Futuring Workshop invited twelve teenagers to develop visions for the year 2050 for their district Floridsdorf. The aim was to formulate ideas and wishes that point towards a socially and ecologically sustainable city and make local teenagers feel excited about becoming active in the co-creation of their future.

The workshop was held in the frame of PlaceCity Vienna (an project focusing on strengthening the centre of Floridsdorf) and focused on visions for the district in the year 2050: Will the area look like a cement landscape? Will inhabitants still go out to shop, or will all goods be delivered to the front door by drones? Where will city-dwellers meet-up when the air is getting hotter and the Danube warms up? We invited the teens to develop fantastic-realistic visions for different spots in their city. Fantastic – because we wanted them to be actually excited about possible future prospects. Realistic – because it is fundamental to think about the city of the future in terms of the climate crisis. To help them, we used the “City Vision-model” we developed through our qualitative study about the usage of the centre: To which one of the three city visions do young people from Floridsdorf feel connected? (1) Is it the Urban Village? (2) The Metropolis where you could get all you would dream about? Or (3) do they rather see themselves as wanderers, hopping from one city to the next?

After playing movie clips to twelve teenagers that showcase how these city visions are portrayed in pop culture, they formed groups to discuss what they regard as attractive features. In a next step, they wrote stories about their future selves in a utopian Floridsdorf of 2050. They used characteristics drawn from the city visions – from the friendly neighbourhood of the Urban Village, the adventurous spirit of the wanderer, to the consumerist glamour of the Metropolis – and transformed these characteristics to meet the needs of the city in the context of the climate crisis.

Their recorded audio stories tell tales of eco-friendly clubbing under the Dome of Floridsdorf, of Winter Wonderlands in the parking garage of Donau Zentrum and equality-producing 3D printers at the public library, while at central Franz-Jonas-Platz, the infamous bar “Stehbuffet” is still as legendary and stuck in time although the new jungle of trees causes the death of those suffering from pollen allergies.

Location

Floridsdorf

Team

Cooperation partners: The workshop took place in the frame of the “Place City” project carried out within the scope of JPI Urban Europe on behalf of the Federal Ministry for Transport

Innovation and Technology (BMVIT). Local project partners: Municipal Department MA 18 (Urban Development and Planning)

Superwien Urbanism ZT OG