The municipality of Poing is demonstrating what innovative design of public space at eye level can look like! The municipality is proactively seeking contact and dialogue with its young people to make Poing more lovable and attractive. This is the second time the municipality has taken this approach.
The mayor, representatives of all factions of the municipal council, the building department, youth work, and the secondary school all worked together on this extraordinary project. Initiated and supported by the Poing-Vaterstetten Adult Education Center, it was conceived and implemented by the intrestik office.
Step by step, 24 10th-grade students at the Dominik-Brunner-Realschule in Poing playfully acquired the know-how for redesigning and enhancing public spaces. On the first morning, they discussed lists of criteria, marked lovable locations on the open-source platform UMaps, and explored these spaces in small groups. The students brought together the impressions gathered during the excursion on the second day. All participants individually expressed praise and criticism for the individual locations. After creating 1:100-scale models from cardboard, wire, and clay, the design of the spaces was improved based on examples. In doing so, the students not only considered their own interests but also adopted the perspectives of other user groups using personas—a methodology from design thinking. Finally, the young people presented their model designs to the municipal council and the mayor. Despite critical questions, the proposals held up and were submitted as oral proposals in the subsequent discussion and presented as results to the municipal council.