A New Era for Urban Actors

Abstract

Urban technologies and smart city applications show that a new era has started in urban planning, and a new structure has been formed because of endless information flow and distribution. The participation process has also carried on a new structure with the changes. Urban living labs (ULL) is a form of experimental governance which can offer creative solutions for the problems that cities face today. The research is aimed to determine the new actors in a new era in the process of transformation while interviewing two ULLs in Turkey. Through interviews, decision-making, actualization, collaboration, and participation, processes were established. Moreover, analysis shows that the technological transformation process is currently in the digital environment rather than redound on the spatial environment in Turkey. While ULLs provide opportunities to adapt to technology, they have not become widespread or have not been identified yet to show limitations in cooperation and application.