Community engagement and involvement

Particularly suitable for:

• new building developments
• new town and eco town projects
• master planning
• heritage or environment sites seeking a community focus

Years of experience have enabled the Sensory Trust to develop an effective mixture of techniques to engage the widest possible audience. Techniques that put people at ease, activities that are enjoyable, and locations that are accessible enable people who find conventional consultation processes threatening or exclusive to share their ideas and opinions about a site. We collect information on the issues surrounding access barriers to public open spaces. Combined with that we produce assessments of quality of experience, and types of use and activities, and a report on ways in which these can be improved and developed.

Involving local communities in projects is essential to ensure that projects are sustainable beyond the development phase. Projects that have community input have more chance of success, less problems with vandalism and maintenance and there are fewer ‘white elephants’.

It is essential that community input should be seen as an on-going part of the development work. Involvement should occur from the very beginning and contact maintained throughout the life of the project. Simply arranging for a community group to rubber-stamp a finished design or plan is not community involvement.

As part of the Community Involvement package Sensory Trust can:

• Locate and contact appropriate groups and individuals in your area
• Work out a sequence of engagement sessions that dovetail with your development timetable
• Organise and run the engagement sessions
• Provide summary reports of feedback from the sessions at project milestones
• Provide guidance on ways of continuing involvement beyond the end of the project

Fee guidelines: previous projects have ranged from £500 - £10k

Case study: National Arboretum, Westonbirt

Sensory Trust worked with the National Arboretum at Westonbirt to help develop and improve its provision of information and interpretation, concentrating on the area of the Old Arboretum.

We consulted with groups of older people with mobility impairments, people with visual impairments, mothers with children under the age of five with learning difficulties, and the Friends of Westonbirt group. We looked at what information was important and/or interesting to them, what format was of use to them, and how easy it was to navigate around the arboretum. Various activities were used with each group, for example the children were shown specific sensory aspects and collected natural items from around the site to see what increased their enjoyment of their visit (Walk ‘n’ Talk; Nature Palettes and so on). They were then given the opportunity to draw what the most special part of their visit was (Picture Portraits). The Friends group carried out a Sensory Mapping activity which highlighted areas of the site that attracted most visitors, and the reasons why, and also identified areas lacking in sensory richness that could be enhanced to appeal to more visitors and help spread visitors around the site.

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