In the context of our Social Design course and the MUNICIPAL project, we are going to work on, each of our group members was asked to collect some thoughts on the social design and energy issues in our municipalities and combine them in a map, which we present in this blog post.
The map shows the different collected issues of each city (marked in the respective color) and how they relate to social design, energy issues, and each other. We found some overlapping areas for the different cities. For example, both Zurich and Risch Rotkreuz got certified as Energy Cities. Since Energy City is a Swiss Initiative and Certification associated with the organization European Energy Award, of which Russia is not a part of yet, it would be interesting to know if Odintsovo would also get such a certification if it existed there as well. Another big cluster area made apparent in the map is Mobility. In Zurich and Odintsovo, mobility seems to be an important intervention area for social design.
Focusing on Energy Issues, we see that the Swiss municipalities are concerned with energy efficiency and resourceful and sustainable energy consumption, which does not seem to be a focus area for the city of Odintsovo.
With this map, we also wanted to bring forward the aspect of social design that is overarching and affects all sorts of design. That’s why Energy Issues are embedded in the sphere of Social Design because, in our opinion, they cannot be separated from each other.
Polina, Stefanie, Sven