Plan of uses of Ciutat Vella, in Barcelona, Spanish Planning Award 2019

Plan de usos Ciutat Vella  by 300.000Km/s, (Mar Santamaría and Pablo Martínez)

Goals
A plan that puts the city as a common good

The plan of uses of Ciutat Vella regulates the implementation of public concurrence activities, food shops and tourist services in the central district of Barcelona. This special plan develops a regulatory framework established in 1992 and updated by the European Services Directive, whose implementation motivates the updating of urban planning tools and strategies used in the previous plans.

The plan uses cutting-edge methods of spatial analysis, based on the use of massive data (from the administration itself, from open data portals, from increasing sensorization in urban environments and from Big Data) and its computation (through machine learning and artificial intelligence techniques), and combines them with citizen participation to shape a regulation that aims to ensure the coexistence between economic activity and the quality of life of citizens.

The plan is the result of a one-and-a-half-year process that begins with a technical and political diagnosis, followed by a phase of citizen participation in parallel to the wording that culminates in the initial approval and subsequently final, after the period of allegations.

Context
A regulation motivated by multiple impacts on the quality of life of residents

The district of Ciutat Vella has experienced in recent years a tourist overpressure (derived from the increase of p2p apartments and low cost flights) that has resulted in a growth in economic activities for visitors (leisure and catering), displacing others less lucrative but necessary activities that should serve residents.

This intense economic activity entails a great saturation of the public space, which currently prevents the rest of the neighbors: The noise has gone from being a nuisance to becoming a serious health problem. Thanks to the public sound meter infrastructure and within the framework of the diagnosis of the plan, the impact of the noise caused by the activities, which now exceeds the recommendations of the World Health Organization and the European Union, has been modeled.

These measurements have been contrasted by the Public Health Agency of Barcelona with the scientific literature and with qualitative interviews with different affected groups, resulting in proven evidence of the serious affectation of the noise in the health of the inhabitants of the district.

Analysis
A diagnosis based on massive data and predictive models

The analysis, based on massive high-resolution information, has allowed characterizing the urban fabric plot by plot and building by building from a morphological, socio-economic, demographic and economic activity point of view.

Cadastral and demographic data, activity licenses, credit card consumption, rental price of commercial premises (real estate portals), complaints from the Urban Guard, citizen complaints in the incident channel of the City Council, tours of residents and have been analyzed visitors through Social Networks and the public Wi-Fi network, among others.

These data have allowed the construction of a numerical model of the district, which has been used to establish correlations between economic activities and the main impacts detected (such as the noise of nighttime activities and the incidence of people in public spaces) through the use of Data mining techniques and predictive models based on algorithms.

A plan with dynamic regulation strategies

The plan proposes 5 fundamental innovations: the single zone, the classification of economic activities according to time range, double density, useful area and the concept of residential vulnerability.

In the first place, the idea of ​​zoning has been redefined, understanding that, in this unique area, the implementation of the activities depends on the specific situation of each point of the urban fabric, existing as many areas as plots, according to the detailed resolution of the analysis. The establishments have also been reclassified into two large groups (high and low night impact) according to the incidence of the different activities in the public space.

Unlike previous plans, based on a unit count, several surface conditions (maximum and minimum) have been introduced that aim to ensure the fit of the activities in a grain fabric often.

Finally, the plan is attentive to the residential vulnerability of certain areas of the district that results in more restrictive implementation conditions.

A simulable and evaluable plan thanks to technology

Among all the regulation parameters proposed by the plan, the double density is the most relevant since it establishes a maximum activity threshold from which it is impaired to the quality of life of the district. In the first radius, activities are evaluated according to their typology, adding the useful surface of establishments of the same type. In the second one, the sum of the impacts generated by the activities with the highest nocturnal incidence is taken into account, establishing a maximum global useful surface limit.

The proposed conditions allow to understand the regulation from a dynamic point of view, since the possibility of implantation of the establishments will depend on the saturation of the fabric, a situation that will change constantly according to the greater demand or decrease of economic activity.

That is why the plan is equipped with technological tools for the simulation of scenarios (these being key to the political and technical decision), their application by the technical teams and their continuous evaluation.

Participation
A plan that investigates new forms of collaboration between agents

The plan is the result of a collaborative process between interdisciplinary technical teams (architects, urban planners, lawyers, geographers, specialists in citizen participation, health professionals, etc.) and citizens.

The diagnosis has allowed an active listening of the current situation and problems, thanks to the use of massive data and qualitative information.

Participation has occurred at different times and through several channels. Interviews have been conducted with the most relevant agents (citizens, associations, merchants, etc.) as well as open participation sessions around the most relevant themes of the plan (leisure, culture, restoration). The project has also pioneered the use of the digital platform for participatory democracy in Barcelona (decidim.barcelona), which has allowed participants to be included, collected and assessed proposals with the corresponding return.

During the public presentation, 95 allegations representing the political, economic and neighborhood interests of the multiplicity of agents involved in the drafting process have been presented.