PlanYourPlace – A geospatial infrastructure for sustainable community planning

Technological advances over the past 5 to 10 years have made Geographic Information Systems a powerful and affordable tool for geographic analysis and urban planning. These technological advances have also enabled and shaped new forms of communication and participation, particularly within the domain of social networking via webpages such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Connecting the analytical power of GIS with mapping tools and interaction capabilities of web 2.0 technologies, as well as with environmental, economic, and social models should result in a promising toolbox for urban planning. This article presents a framework that outlines requirements and constraints for a web-accessible planning platform within the context of sustainable urban development of established neighbourhoods in the City of Calgary, Canada. The platform focuses not only on the urban planner as user, but more specifically on the citizen as a contributor to the planning and development process, to further include public opinion in the planning process. The following three aspects for the implementation of the participatory planning platform are