Benefits and Limitations of Public Involvement Processes in Landscape Redevelopment Projects—Learning from Practice

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The last decades have seen a rapid change in attitudes towards the environment, reflecting a greater environmental awareness of environment among professionals as well as the general public. Public participation has become increasingly more important, playing a relevant role in determining the way society will manage, protect, and reclaim the environment. This trend is “now” recognized by landscape architects, landscape ecologists, and sociologists, among others. A wide range of methods have been established all over the world, including new ways of people interacting, new types of events, new services, and new support frameworks. This chapter addresses the benefits of using public participation in landscape redevelopment and the ways in which the introduction of public opinion can improve the design process. Although public participation has gained wide acceptance among private and public domains, academic literature and research offer still limited understanding on how to accomplish it and what contributes to its success. The relevance of public participation is discussed through exploring the definitions of public participation, why the public should be involved, and the role of participation in project acceptability. Using 3 projects, considered best practice examples, this chapter discusses the use of public participation in the redevelopment projects. The addressed case studies enabled us to explore contributions to achieve sustainable development and the reasons why public participation should be an integral part of landscape redevelopment projects. We conclude that public participation may encourage awareness of “belonging to” a community, sharing common culture and creating identity. It improves community consciousness and responsibility while fostering a “collective sense”. These are “feelings” of considerable importance in the development of new, satisfying, and concerted projects.