Spaces seeking activities - activities seeking spaces: Evaluation and policy design of neighbourhood-wide urban community spaces

Cities thrive on the vibrant interplay of community-driven initiatives and the adaptive reuse of public spaces that foster socio-cultural activities, enriching civic life. However, these grassroots efforts often confront challenges such as spatial inadequacies caused by bureaucratic zoning policies and the scarcity of affordable real estate. Moreover, urban landscapes struggle with the abandonment and underutilization of public buildings and open spaces, hindered by complex administrative protocols and limited resource affecting both private developers and local governments. This study introduces a model for urban policy design, named the “NeighbourHUB” model (N-HUB), aimed at addressing these issues by aligning space demand with community activities through Participatory Cost-Benefit Analysis and collaborative design approaches. Developed by a multidisciplinary team from the University of Cagliari, in collaboration with 30 local community associations active in the neighbourhoods where the model was tested, N-HUB advocates for a gradual, incremental, and place-based approach to optimize space utilization and enhance coordination between local authorities and socio-cultural associations. The findings of case study application presented in this paper demonstrate its potential to improve transparency, accessibility, and usability of spaces, providing guidance for fair urban policy design and effective conflict resolution. [Display omitted] •Local governments and private developers face numerous challenges related to the management and policy design of vacant, abandoned and underused spaces, hindered by intricate administrative protocols and resource constraints.•Voluntary and non-profit associations, community-led organizations and social enterprises, which play a role in addressing growing socio-economic vulnerabilities, often lack adequate spaces for their activities.•Innovative evaluation models for urban policy design are necessary to align the demand for space with the availability of socio-cultural activities.•This paper proposes a gradual, incremental, and place-based model to optimize space utilization and enhance coordination between local authorities and socio-cultural associations, ensuring unbiased and universal of access to these spaces for all.