Climate change is reshaping our cities — with heavier rains, rising seas, and more frequent flooding. The old approach has been to build bigger pipes and concrete basins, but these solutions are costly and rigid. Nature-based solutions offer greener, better, and more resilient adaptation measures — especially when they are designed together with the people who will live among them.
Why nature-based solutions
Urban areas are increasingly feeling the effects of climate change. Our cities are not designed for changes in precipitation or to rising sea levels. It is increasingly observed, that during cloud bursts, urban areas are flooded, sewers are overfilled and spill over, and the functionality of society is affected. Traditionally, cities rely on “grey solutions” – pipes, concrete basins, and underground tunnels. These are easier to price and plan but are often expensive and inflexible. Nature-based solutions (NBS), however – approaches that work with nature rather than against it – can effectively manage stormwater and reduce flood risk, while also providing a wide range of co-benefits: enhanced biodiversity, cleaner air, and recreational value.
These social and environmental benefits are, however, hard to measure monetarily — and often overlooked. To realize the potential of NBS, there is a need to simplify the design process, better document the benefits, and importantly: make sure communities are part of the process. This is because the success of these solutions is not only about planning for the engineers and architects — it depends on the people who live, move, and spend time in these spaces.
The challenge: designing with communities not just for them
It can be difficult to include and prioritize public input in urban planning against logistic, technical and economic arguments. As a result, the decision-making process often lacks transparency, which can lead to unsatisfaction and low acceptance of new climate adaptation projects. This is especially relevant for nature-based solutions, where the long-term social and environmental benefits are harder to quantify and communicate.
We want to change that — by making citizen involvement a foundational part of early design, and translating their preferences into actionable planning tools, that easily and effectively can be used by planners. Furthermore, we aim to show people how their input shaped the final decisions, with the aim of increasing trust and visibility throughout the process.
Our solution: a digital tool for co-design
The idea is simple but effective: involve citizens in the reasoning behind and the early planning of urban development for climate adaptation — and make their input usable by planners and engineers.
How it works:
- Scenario input by engineers/ planners
2. Citizen engagement – firstly through physical meeting and then via digital platform, where citizens can vote and comment on different scenarios
3. Feedback is interpreted and translated into GIS-compatible layers, making it directly useable by planners to include in design adjustment
4. Implementation of final design
5. Final feedback loop, where citizens gain insight into how their feedback has been utilized.
Why it matters
This approach helps bridge the gap between participatory planning and technical implementation, between citizens and planners. It helps planners make more informed, accepted decisions, and it ensures that NBS projects reflect the needs and values of the people who will live with them — without complicating or slowing down the planning process. When citizens can see that their voices shape their city, it builds trust, support, and better outcomes.
From Input to Impact
1. Planners define the starting point
The process begins with urban planners identifying areas where future developments or nature-based solutions (NBS) might be implemented. This information is provided for the app developers and uploaded into the application, with background information and context added for citizens to explore.
2. Citizen meeting
Citizens are invited to a community meeting where the proposed developments are presented. This step ensures that everyone is informed from the start and has the chance to ask questions directly.
3. App-based engagement: giving everyone a say
After the meeting, citizens receive access to the digital platform, where they can continue exploring the proposed solutions and provide feedback at their own pace.
Details
Users see a satellite map of the project site with highlighted areas of potential intervention.
By clicking on these areas, they can read more, see what others have said, vote, and leave their own comments.
This approach gives citizens the opportunity to reflect, engage thoughtfully, and ensures that all perspectives are heard.
4. Turning citizen input into actionable data
Citizen feedback is then processed and translated into sentiment layers — GIS-compatible data showing levels of support, concerns, and preferences across different areas. These layers can be directly integrated into planning tools, giving engineers and consultants a way to account for social priorities alongside technical and economic considerations.
5. Final feedback loop: showing the impact of participation
After planning decisions have been made, the app has a final feature: it shows citizens how their input has been used in the process. This feedback loop builds trust, transparency, and accountability, making it clear that contributions were not just collected, but genuinely influential in shaping the outcome.
Try the app!
Click the link below or scan the QR code, to take a look of a demo of the app.
https://www.figma.com/proto/RgcoZJK0eKXzmDO9D9eaHc/NextGen–Copy-?t=g4E6272hsJN0sBkK-1
Future perspectives
Future work will focus on scaling and improving our design tool for wider use in nature-based solutions. Inclusivity will remain central, so the tool must ensure participation from diverse groups by offering multilingual access and user friendly design. Future research should also explore how to include artificial intelligence (AI) and predictive modelling in the design tool. This can be used for sentiment analysis, because AI can process large volumes of citizen feedback and classify it into themes or priorities. This makes it easier to translate citizen opinions into structured data for planners. AI can also help with testing thousands of design combinations and highlight options that best balance ecological, social, and economic factors. Predictive models can simulate how different citizen feedback regarding nature-based solutions like green roofs, rain gardens and permeable pavements might perform under different climate scenarios like heavy rain and flooding. This will help planners choose inclusive solutions with the best long term climate resilience.