THE CITY’S VOICES

The City's Voices project aimed at providing citizens in Aarhus in general and users of the libraries in particular a voice in the debate about the future main library and multimedia centre, later known as DOKK1, at the central harbour areas in Aarhus, Denmark.

Using a website and two interactive tables, one at the Main Library and one in Aarhus Art Building, citizens were able to voice their opinions about the Urban Mediaspace project and the values which it should be built upon. By moving the tables around on a large invisible map of the world, Denmark or Aarhus, users would ‘bump’ into scenarios, which would then be played back to them. A user could then comment on the scenario by adding a sound bite to a specific place on the map. The comments were then saved for other users to hear, when moving the tables around on the map.

All voices were stored in the tables, and during the project, the amount of available information, comments and questions were steadily increased. Subsequently, all comments were processed in a report, which was integrated into the competition brief for the architectural competition concerning the new Urban Mediaspace.