THE IMPACT OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY (ICT) ON URBAN PLANNING PRACTICE The Prospects for Interactive e-Planning

Abstract

A starting point of this research is the notion of sustainable development, a dominant concept of global development which assumes the harmonization of environmental, social and economical development. In urban planning, a sustainable development assumes, among other things, an interactive participation of the public in making planning decisions on future development, including their responsibility for the implementation and outcome.

This research examines the need and possibilities to develop a new approach that consider the expected changes in urban planning practices take pace due to both the emergence of the information, knowledge, and network society. It explores the input of interactive relationships among Information and Communication Technology (ICT), Urban Planning Process (UPP), and Public Participation (PP) in urban planning activities, taking Khartoum Metropolitan (KM) as a case study.

The main objective of the research is to develop Interactive electronic Planning Approach (IePA) that helps to improve knowledge and level of the PP in UPP to achieve a sustainable development in KM. The construction of such approach is based on historical reviewing of theories and approaches related to ICT, UPP and PP and technological changes. The conceptual frame of IePA is based on the development of the Object-Oriented Approach and the Current Planning System used in KM. Mitchell’s theories (2000) regarding technology and urban societies are used as methodological base in building the proposed model and defining the role of the public in various stages of IePA to KM. As a result a web-site is designed to test the proposed model in a pilot study (Almogran Project, Centre of KM)

The web-site is implemented as participation and commenting tool for Almogran Project, at stage five (proposals evaluation). It allows the users to participate interactively in the planning process. Development of such web-site will be through proposals and applications based on the use case scenarios, combined with tools and technology used for presenting different data (spatial and non-spatial data). Also many recommendations for future researches are set out.