Workshop for the development of the city centre of Hvidovre

In 2014 GivRum in collaboration with the Municipality of Hvidovre arranged a workshop involving citizens and other stakeholders in a temporary development of Hvidovre town centre. The workshop was the starting point for an ambitious and long-term strategy for using temporality in the Municipality of Hvidovre. The main object of the workshop was to examine the potentials for user-driven activities and qualify the elaboration of the permanent development of the area.

The challenge
For a number of years the Hvidovre citizens had not used the potential of Hvidovre’s town centre as a central gathering place. The area of the town centre is located between the town hall, the community centre, the health centre and the local cultural centre, Risbjerg Farm; all needed to undergo a development, so it could be inviting and attractive to be in.

In 2014 Hvidovre took the first step of an ambitious and visionary master plan for the area. They launched a small-scale strategy for a temporary use of the area to slowly mature the area for the long-term permanent development. In this context GivRum was involved to address the following challenges that the municipality was facing:

• Development of the framework for an active city life.
• Acknowledgement and maintenance of the functions, which already work.
• Involvement of the citizens in the development process.

GivRum’s task was therefore to investigate the potential of citizen-driven activities with the aim of getting a wide group of stakeholders involved in temporary activities.

The solution
GivRum invited stakeholders from the area to a development workshop that was designed to generate ideas on how the town centre could be developed from merely a passage to an actual space for urban life. Initially the workshop was intended to be a kick-start to the temporary development of the city centre by activating local resources. In the long run the ambition was that the involvement would form a foundation for a widespread community-driven engagement around the creation of activities, all of which would keep the town centre as an active and lively space in the heart of Hvidovre.

Both the local enthusiasts, local actors and politicians attended the workshop and they all got the opportunity to participate in the development. The participants developed concrete ideas for activities in the area based on three physical points of impact, which could act as a physical framework for the activities of the town centre:

• Risbjerggård. A cultural centre, which primarily has been used by local associations.
• Projekthuset. An old villa, which was located next to Risbjerggård, before it was torn down a year after the workshop.
• Pladsen & Haven. An open outdoor area placed around Risbjerggård and Projekthuset.

The ideas that emerged from the workshop were to inspire and be translated into concrete temporary activities. Thereby the Municipality of Hvidovre used temporality as a strategic method of involvement, which created local ownership of the town centre. The town centre was not to be developed just to shape urban life. The town centre was and is to be developed in order to demonstrate and underpin the borough of Hvidovre’s diversity and great citizen engagement.