On 24th of June 2022, several Cities and Municipalities from the Flemish region of Belgium gathered together for a presentation and discussion about the URBANAGE Flanders use case. Lieven Raes of Digitaal Vlaanderen introduced the city leaders to the concept of age-friendly cities and local digital twins before outlining on the 2 key scenarios co-created with older adults in the region: the green comfort and the city services planning for older people.
The Green Comfort Index seeks input directly from older adults on a micro level asking them via an app how a public place works for them seeking information on shade, noise, resting places, obstacles, safety and perceived safety etc. This information will help urban planners in the longer term better understand the emotional impact (feelings) involved in urban design helping them to create better spaces (service planning scenario). In the shorter term other residents will be able to use the crowdsourced data visualisations in the app to better find places to go that works best for them.
Interest in the expected impact of the two use cases was high. Questions centred around citizen engagement as well as how to collect the right data to make both use case scenarios a success. At the end of the meeting a common conclusion was reached - in order to ensure good interactions and reliable model simulations, the quality of the data used as an input should be of high accuracy and quality.