Urban Living Lab for Local Regeneration : Beyond Participation in Large-scale Social Housing Estates

Nele Aernouts is an assistant professor at the Cosmopolis Centre for Urban Research, Vrije Universiteit Brussel. Her research focuses on the spatial design, planning and governance of social and collective housing and processes of in- and exclusion that go along with it. Theoretically, it is informed by studies and debates about participatory planning, housing policy and the commons.

Francesca Cognetti is Associate Professor of Planning and Urban Policies at the Politecnico di Milano and the Rector’s Delegate to Public Engagement. Her teaching and research concentrate on public/social housing, social inequalities and the right to the city. She coordinates field labs and action research in deprived contexts, employing a collaborative, policy design-based approach.

Elena Maranghi is architect and urban planner, she has been a research assistant (post-doc) at the Department of Architecture and Urban Studies (Politecnico di Milano). Since 2013, she hasbeen a part of Mapping San Siro action-research group. Her research activities focus on social housing, local competencies, co-designed urban regeneration, and urban living labs in marginalized areas. She currently works for the Municipality of Genoa (Italy).