YourView

Getting residents and other stakeholders involved in spatial projects in an efficient and effective way is challenging. For many local area and communications managers, poorly attended sounding board evenings or confusion owing to differing levels of knowledge are familiar occurrences. YourView is a proven online participation tool which removes many obstacles that stand in the way of communication about projects.

Applied for Houtplein Haarlem

Greater resident satisfaction

Getting residents involved at an early stage in projects within their own living environment often produces better results and greater resident satisfaction. Also, with the introduction of the new Environment and Planning Act, participation has become a mandatory component for many types of projects. Witteveen+Bos is involved in the development of many spatial planning projects and has built up extensive experience of being in contact with many stakeholders, both experts and laypeople as well as professionals and local residents. In order to improve this contact both quantitatively and qualitatively, we developed YourView.

YourView as online addition

At Witteveen+Bos, YourView is often part of a comprehensive participation process which also includes the traditional residents meetings. This tool is an online addition that appeals to those residents already familiar with digital information exchange.

Witteveen+Bos sets up an online environment and assists in generating content and facilitating interaction, including processing responses and feedback on the platform. As a result, anyone who is interested can find the latest information 24/7 and follow the project’s progress step by step. In this way, YourView can support at different steps of the participation ladder. It can be used as a medium to 'send' information, but also to actively collect information from the environment.

An illustration of a tablet. The tablet shows a map with a bridge and roads. You can also see reactions from a neighbour wondering where she should park her car now.

YourView in practice

YourView has been successfully used by 35 municipalities and companies in the Netherlands, Singapore and Belgium, with the aim of increasing participation among residents or other stakeholders. An illustrative example is the Municipality of Schiedam, for which Witteveen+Bos created the design plan. Using YourView, we were able to get the residents of Hogendorpstraat and the surrounding area involved. The window for responding has since been closed, but the site nevertheless gives a good impression of the possibilities offered by YourView. Visit the Municipality of Schiedam’s Yourview platform here(Dutch).

An illustration of two hands holding a tablet. On the tablet you can see an alternative to the current bridge.

YourView accessibility

For YourView, an accessibility study was carried out by Firmground. For this purpose, the fictitious platform wibostraat.inbeeld.app has been looked at. The study shows that YourView fully complies with the requirements set by the government with regard to digital accessibility. Making use of digital tools is not self-evident for everyone; the requirements set for government websites ensure that they are usable for everyone, including people with disabilities.