In March members of John Thompson & Partners, one of our publishing partners for The Community Planning Event Manual, were invited by the Governor of Puducherry in India to present the results of a previous workshop in Auroville on the subject of "Sustainable Regions - Cooperative Planning" (see photos below).

More than 50 representative and experts from India worked together and concluded the event by stating that the key for any sustainable plan – be it regional, city or village level – is to improve cooperation and cross-communication between the necessary partners, sectors and stakeholders. In the Auroville-Workshop John Thompson & Partners were able to demonstrate Community Planning as a methodology how to make this kind of co-operation conveniently happen in practice (for more information please visit: http://www.arise-institute.net)
 
Andreas von Zadow of John Thompson & Partners reports that “from the discussion with the Governor of Puducherry we learned that the Pondicherry City Masterplan might be a practical case to apply this methodology to an important planning process, which is currently undertaken by the municipality. A high quality, integrative masterplan which will have to address the current needs and challenges posed by the urban development should be established during the course of this year, perhaps with the help of Community Planning methods facilitated by a neutral team of experts. This would be a great exercise for a municipality and good example as more co-operation and participatory processes are badly needed at many places in India.”

Some of Andreas’ photos of the project can be seen below, including Charles Campion of John Thompson & Partners showing a copy of The Community Planning Event Manual to the Governor of Puducherry.