The coronavirus public health crisis has had a radical impact on daily lives. It has come as an unexpected shock, but many believe it could become an opportunity to profoundly influence new social behaviors in the near future.

Moving back toward normalcy, before the release of an effective vaccine, will be indeed “a new normalcy”.

Many private businesses are gearing up to redesign their internal processes, including communication with customers and their purchasing experience. Economic aid will probably be needed to restart, but we will also need to face uncertainty in the coming months with courage and determination.

But how are Public Services preparing for this “new normalcy”? 

National Health Systems were the first to be hit by the coronavirus tsunami, often exposing (except perhaps the German case) many shortcomings and an unjustifiable lack of preparation (plans drawn up and never carried out) in an area where prevention is fundamental.

If health care has been overwhelmed by this emergency, other areas of public services face a different challenge, as the lockdown is allowing for time to prepare, albeit very little.

Changes will have to be substantial, and the taskforce of experts appointed by the Italian government is already working to bring the country to a “new normalcy”. Some pillars of our society such as Justice, Education and services for the Cultural sector will certainly be affected by important changes, but it will be Mobility, especially local transportation (public or private) that will bear the strongest impact. 

Mobility is definitely the one sector that is suffering most from the COVID-19 crisis, all around the world. Unlike other areas, public transport must continue to operate in order to guarantee access to all social classes.

Public transportation is a right designed to offer equal opportunities, while protecting the weaker segments of society and safeguarding the environment.

Already in February 2020 the International Association of Public Transport claimed that although public transport is an essential service for the social and economic stability of our cities, at the same time, it has to be considered a high-risk environment.

In March, the Italian Ministry of Transport issued guidelines to limit the spread of COVID-19 in transport and logistics but it is evident that, considering the limited attention paid to local public transport, it is very difficult to deal with in a generalized way. While access control systems have already been designed and tested in the train stations and airports because of terrorism, a similar level of control for each single bus, tram or metro car is a new subject matter, making an ad hoc approach necessary. 

In Italy there are more than a hundred transport companies and agencies, often working at a loss. They often compete with one another within the same area, and very few are structured to deal with either the current crisis of their future “renaissance”. Today they are in full lockdown and, as indicated by the Ministry, boarding buses temporarily takes place only through the rear door, in order to protect drivers. Tickets thus cannot be sold or checked on board.

Are these recommendations enough to prevent public transport from becoming places of propagation? Probably not. And tomorrow? What will happen when schools, universities, business centers and factories reopen?

The equation Public transport = Contagion risk is a common thought. 

Some cities are considering developing new cycle paths and adapt urban spaces to promote alternatives to public transport. But the fear is that whoever can will use their own car (in Europe, Italy ranks second only to Luxembourg in the number of cars per thousand inhabitants); those who don’t have this privilege will inevitably be pushed to the margins of society. 

Can anyone even imagine the consequences? The empty streets and clean air of quarantine days will be but a memory in a sad future of traffic and unbreathable air. Buses, trams and metro trains travelling half-empty to maintain social distancing, used by only the lower economic layers of society, will seem useless, leading to proposals to dismantle the service. Low-emission and electric cars will be promoted but, to ensure that everyone can move safely, older models will also have to be allowed to move. The connections with suburbs and peri-urban areas will be impossible, the ZTL (restricted traffic zone) will no longer make sense, and in a short time we will find ourselves sitting safely inside our cars, stuck in traffic in an increasingly divided society. If studies on the correlation between coronavirus and pollution were to be confirmed, the future would be grotesque.

If we don’t try to support local systems of sustainable mobility and public transport now , we are literally triggering an ecological and social time bomb.

The repercussions on the policies needed for economic recovery will be serious . Just think of the significant impact on the world of work, logistics and the tourism industry.

A few days ago Giovanni Scarfone, of the company that manages public transport in Bergamo, the most infected province in Italy (and the world), launched the challenge to redesign the public transport offer to the UITP international network. Following the most recent DCPM (Presidential decree), Andrea Gibelli, President of ASSTRA (Transport Association), expressed the hope that the silence of the government on such an essential matter for the economic and social stability of the country is only temporarily, and that the efforts made for Alitalia were the prelude to an equally decisive intervention regarding local transport. 

As for private companies, economic aid will not be enough to redesign their offer of mobility services.

Digitization will be needed to avoid contacts as much as possible. We will have to rethink bus stops, sidewalks, and turnstile queues. Companies must be able to quickly and constantly communicate withe operators and users , confidently answering questions to build trust with passengers:

• When was the bus/tram/metro sanitized? 

• How many people are allowed and how many are already on board?

• Are there face masks and sanitizing gel on board ?

• Will they measure my temperature?

• Can I get on the bus without a mask?

• Can I reserve a seat?

• Can I pay for tickets on board and if so how: by cash, credit card or with an app?

Almost all the Italian companies that manage local transport will need to take a real leap forward for the quality and complexity of their service. 

And they have to do it in a very short time, during an economic and social crisis and with the oldest transport fleet in Europe. 

The European Union is aware of this enormous challenge, and a part of the aid for the fight against coronavirus is earmarked, in continuity with policies favoring the energy transition, for investments in safer and more efficient transport.

Italy needs to find the courage to save its public transport system and defuse this bomb.

The courage to invest in innovation in public, accessible and shared transport systems. The courage to consider public and sustainable mobility as an experience and not simply as an equation matching supply and demand.

The courage to finally adopt a contemporary service design approach based on behavioral science and communication. 

The Task Force’s lack of expertise in the fields of mobility, planning or service design leads us to think that, considering the fragmentation and specificity of the problem, these resources will be identified directly at the local and regional level.

If so, an Urban Mobility Task Force centrally coordinated but locally managed could work alongside public and private transport companies and help them become more agile face the new challenges of service management, and learn faster.

If so, the network of URBACT, CIVINET and similar projects and a whole new generation of designers and researchers, who for years – in Italy, from Trento to Scicli – have been actively and steadfastly working on service innovation for public policies and sustainability, could be involved. 

If so, we would be happy to contribute. 

——-

This letter was sent to the Government Task Force signed by a first group of professionals and researchers in the field of design, service innovation and urban policies.
Anyone wishing to subscribe please send an email to info@wepush.org

Salvatore Di Dio e Domenico Schillaci (PUSH), Daniela Patti (Eutropian), Silvia Remotti (Paco Design Collaborative), Giuseppe Colistra (GreenShare), Barbara Marcotulli (Absolute People), Simone d’Antonio (URBACT National Point), Vincenzo Di Maria e Claudia Busetto (commonground srl), Raffaele Boiano (FifthBeat) e Matteo d’Aloja (Head of External Relations & Communications di Ghella SpA), Luca Studer (Politecnico di Milano – Laboratorio Mobilità e Trasporti), Leonardo De Micheli, Luca D’Eusebio (Zappata), Flavia Weisghizzi, Daniele Terzariol (Assessore di San Donà di Piave), Marco Dotti (Vita), Silvia Minenti (Service design lead – Doing), Davide Buscato (BusForFun), Emilia Pardi (Project Manager Lead – Bag Innovation), Giuseppe Giaccardi (GiaccardiAssociati), Alessia Mariotti, Marianna Marcucci (Invasioni Digitali), Laura Calandriello Cristiano May Emiliana Mellone e Roberta Milano (Cleanap) Andrea Bartoli (Farm Cultural Park), Francesco Lipari (Cityvision), Sara Petrone (Consigliere Comunale di Salerno), Alberto Ramaglia, Jesse Marsh (Atelier), Massimo Ciuffini (Osservatorio nazionale sharing mobility), Daniele Ficociello Federica Marchetti Zaira Magliozzi Giulia Mura e Roberto Sommatino (Superficial Studio), Andrea Lorenzini (MemEx).

UPDATE: On April 16th we received the following reply sent from Prof. Cingolani:

Good morning Dr. D’Aloja and thank you for your letter. I’ve just forwarded it to the Task Force team that deals with the transport issue. In the coming days we hope to have a first idea of priorities, certainly including transport. Sincerely

The Datathon, originally organized in Palermo and Milan but canceled to counter the spread of COVID-19, will take place online from 6th to April 19th and is aimed at all those who, from the data collected through MUV app, wants to propose your own idea for a new solution or service.

The event, organized by PUSH design lab, is part of the co-planning process that has been involving the community of citizens in more than 12 countries for two years, in order to improve their mobility habits, enhance the data and propose ideas and solutions for new local policies focused on citizens’ needs.

The challenge is free and open to both individuals and teams up to 5 members until April 5th at datathon.muv2020.eu

A prize worth 1000€ will be awarded to the team that will be most voted by the jury of experts.

The experience launched through “Palermo Città Aumentata” is landing in the suburbs of Milan.

Thanks to the Municipality of Milan and its call “Bando alle periferie” that recently funded 14 cultural projects in the areas of Giambellino-Lorenteggio, Adriano-Padova-Rizzoli, Corvetto-Chiaravalle-Porto di Mare, Niguarda-Bovisa e Qt8-Gallaratese, the “Augmented Street Art” arrived in Milan.

Designed by a consortium including the social cooperative Bepart (leader), PUSH, the cultural and creativity center BASE Milano, the publishing house Terre di mezzo Editore, the school of photography Cfp Bauer and the Foundation Arrigo e Pia Pini, the project “Milano Città Aumentata” includes very different activities: photography workshops, mapping of the urban art heritage in the 5 areas, animation design labs for the realization of augmented reality works, a paper catalog, a digital map with the opportunity to register for guided tours in the first widespread museum of augmented street art, an exhibition and much more.

On Street Art Factory website you will find all the information about the workshops and project activities. Moreover, the map of the street art works of the suburbs of Milan will be available soon.

The second Urban Thinkers Campus in Palermo took place from April 6 to 8 at Palazzo Sant’Elia. It was one of the 75 that will happen around the world in 2017.

“Right to the Future”, organized by PUSH in collaboration with the Municipality of Palermo, the patronage of the United Nations and with the support of around 70 international partners and media partners, was aimed to collect proposals and visions for the future of the city and lay the foundation for the translation of the global principles of the New Urban Agenda into concrete actions at local level.

A three-day debate including plenary frontal sessions – Urban Labs – exchange moments with the audience – Urban Thinkers Sessions – interactive co-design workshops – Roundtables – and the first Urban Journalism Academy after the ratification of the New Urban Agenda, coordinated by two representatives of Habitat III and targeted for journalists and communication and media professionals on urban policies.

During the Urban Labs international guests shared best practices experimented in other cities and countries – in Netherlands, Portugal, Israel, Egypt, Cyprus and other regions in Italy – and replicable here in Palermo, while the authors of the best proposals selected by the Steering Committee through the Open Call presented their ideas on the future of Palermo. On April 6 and 7, during the afternoon, there were the three Roundtables on the topics selected by the participants – citizens and representatives of around 30 local organizations – cultural and artistic heritage, public spaces and community living.

The whole Campus has risen a strong interest and participation. More than 200 participants, Palermitans and non, took part to the activities and to the 20 side events around the city during the same week. Around 200.000 users were reached online through the social media channels and the website of the initiative, while more than 1000 followed the online streaming of the conference during the three days.
18 were the countries represented within the Campus.

Furthermore, from April 18 to 22, the Right to the Future Intensive School took place. It was the second edition of the educational programme on service design for urban innovation and it was organized by PUSH in partnership with commonground. The School, sponsored by Fondazione CRT, Confcooperative Sicilia, LUCA School of Arts and Link Campus University, was attended by 16 international students of different age, geographical origin and academic and professional background.
In a five-day full immersion, guided by expert mentors and working in four different teams, the participants elaborated, prototyped and validated concrete proposals for the city of Palermo. Their four projects – on food and traditions, public spaces, tourism and gamification of urban contexts – were presented Saturday April 22 in the context of the Street Food Fest.

The 60 proposals collected through the Open Call, presented by individuals and organizations of 13 different countries, the 10 ideas coming from the Roundtables and the projects developed by the students of the Intensive School will be part of the international publication “Right to the Future: Vision Development Kit for the Future of Palermo” and of a special edition of the magazine UrbanisticaTre.

In order to develop the project “trafficO2 – Social Network for Sustainable Mobility” – PON04a3_00451 – CUP B65I12000430005, the no-profit organization PUSH (C.F. 97285820821, with offices in Piazza Sant’Anna 3, 90133, Palermo, tel. 091616484) is looking for:

No. 1 Web Developer

Attitude to work in team and the ability of coordinating specific stages of development is fundamental.

Familiarity with the following is mandatory:

• Javascript/JQuery

• CSS2/CSS3

• HTML5

• WordPress

• Framework Web (Symfony2, Django, Rails)

• PHP

Familiarity with the following is optional:

• Grunt/Bower

• Coffescript

Please, send your CV electronically (complete with the privacy clause pursuant D. Lgs. 196/2003) with the subject “WEB DEVELOPER” to info@wepush.org.

No. 1 Android Developer

Attitude to work in team and the ability of managing specific tasks autonomously is fundamental.

Familiarity with the following is mandatory:

• Android

•     Java

Possessing the following is a plus:

•     Experience in programming with Web Services

•     Familiarity with API REST

•     Familiarity with Design pattern client/server for mobile development

Please, send your CV electronically (complete with the privacy clause pursuant D. Lgs. 196/2003) with the subject “ANDROID DEVELOPER” to info@wepush.org.

PUSH and AISA – Associazione Italiana Studenti di Architettura – launch the workshop Sant’Anna Jamming.

Piazza Sant’Anna is the name of a beautiful square in Palermo, which has been a parking area for years and that now is finally free from cars, showing its baroque beauty. Unfortunately during the last year it remained empty and unused, risking to become an urban void. 

To give meaning to one of the most important squares of the city, PUSH and AISA decided to organize a thematic workshop for the students of Architecture of the University of Palermo, with the aim of finding creative and low-cost solutions for the regeneration of this space.

After this creative marathon of 48 hours, the projects of the groups will be uploaded on a web platform and valued by the citizens. The two most voted solutions will be presented to the Municipality of Palermo.

The workshop will take place on Friday 27, Saturday 28 and Sunday 29 November at Blow Up, in Piazza Sant’Anna.

On Sunday 29 at 3.30 p.m. at Modern Art Museum of Palermo (via Sant’Anna 21) there will be a final conference of the workshop, during which all the projects developed by the teams will be presented. Everyone’s invited!

Panorama

Fare startup in Sicilia si può. E anche con successo. Il dibattito moderato da Barbara Carfagna, giornalista del Tg1 A Palazzo Mazzarino, sede Università Telematica Pegaso, ha testimoniato che l’isola ha ormai un ruolo consolidato nel settore.

Less than one month to the start of City as a Service Intensive School , the educational program launched by PUSH that will take place in Erice from September 25th to October 3rd , open to young professionals aged between 18 and 35 years old.
The Intensive School will focus on how to prototype services for the cities of the future: using the Service Design methodology the participants will have the opportunity to develop and test innovative ideas able to improve citizens’ live.
The final program is available online: fourteen international Special Guests will guide the students during the 9 days full immersion.

The university students who will take part to the School will have the opportunity to get 6 CFU, approved abroad.

Moreover, the results of the initiative will be presented during the City as a Service Urban Thinkers Campus, international event of World Urban Campaign, that will take place in Palermo next October.

PUSH has already received plenty of applications from all over the world, but still it is possible to apply by September 13th on the website edu.wepush.org.

In order to develop the project “trafficO2 – Social Network for Sustainable Mobility” – PON04a3_00451 – CUP B65I12000430005, the no-profit organization PUSH (C.F. 97285820821, with offices in Piazza Sant’Anna 3, 90133, Palermo, tel. 091616484) is looking for:

No. 1 Web Developer

Attitude to work in team and the ability of coordinating specific stages of development is fundamental.

Familiarity with the following is mandatory:

• Javascript/JQuery

• CSS2/CSS3

• HTML5

• WordPress

• Framework Web (Symfony2, Django, Rails)

• PHP

Familiarity with the following is optional:

• Grunt/Bower

• Coffescript

Please, send your CV electronically (complete with the privacy clause pursuant D. Lgs. 196/2003) with the subject “WEB DEVELOPER” to info@wepush.org.

No. 1 Android Developer

Attitude to work in team and the ability of managing specific tasks autonomously is fundamental.

Familiarity with the following is mandatory:

• Android

•     Java

Possessing the following is a plus:

•     Experience in programming with Web Services

•     Familiarity with API REST

•     Familiarity with Design pattern client/server for mobile development

Please, send your CV electronically (complete with the privacy clause pursuant D. Lgs. 196/2003) with the subject “ANDROID DEVELOPER” to info@wepush.org.

From today until Friday 27 February we shall be in Rome for Crew (Creative Economy Week), a week of study, research, and educational activities on the topics of innovation, startups, and creative economy, organized by IED Roma. This event aims at publicizing IED’s academic year topic, “Self(i3) Worker”, to reflect upon the dramatic changes occurring in contemporary society and in the job markets, and upon the creation of job opportunities for oneself and the others.

Crew is a lab-like event where IED Roma offers itself as hub for innovation and support of business competitiveness in the fields of fashion, design, visual arts, new media, and communication, in order to favor companies’ encounter with the world of cultural and creative productions. In so doing, it aims at activating processes of collaborations, transfers of knowledge, and developments of model and competencies.

IED Factory is the section of the event dedicated to twelve workshops held by professionals of creative disciplines and is open to second year students.

Salvatore Di Dio, Domenico Schillaci, and Mauro Filippi will bring on the table their experience gained in PUSH proposing APPlyIED, a workshop on designing services. Through experimental learning and departing from virtual cases of goods and services needing to be improved, developed, or reinvented, they shall share with the students the methods for service design and fast prototyping.

It will be an experience similar to that of Service Jam. As output, each team will produce a video presentation telling about their experience as users.

For this workshop, an experience of paramount importance for our team, many people have applied and now is fully booked.

The complete program of the event is available on the official website.

“A Scuola di OpenCoesione” (ASOC) [Open Cohesion School] is an innovative, interdisciplinary educational project addressed to all Italian high schools, stemming from an agreement signed in June 2013 between the MIUR and the Department for Development and Economic Cohesion.

The goal of the program is to introduce in Italian schools notions like “Open Data”, “Data Journalism”, “Civic Monitoring”, and “Policy of Cohesion”.

ASOC indeed supports the principle of informed citizenship by promoting activities of civic monitoring of public funding and using information and communication technologies like open data published on the portal OpenCoesione.

PUSH has been chosen to take part to the network “Rete di Amici ASOC”, which gathers the associations selected with the call for application launched by “Amici di ASOC” that will work alongside the schools on their topic they have chosen.

Today PUSH will begin working together with the students of I.I.S.S. Francesco Ferrara. The topic selected is: Tourism and Cultural Goods. It will be a total of five meetings of three hours each, including the development of a project with the educational and technical activities connected to it.

Today’s session is devoted to an in-depth analysis of the chosen topic and in the explanation of the first steps one has to take to collect information and data to foster the project.

For further information, please refer to ASOC’s official website.

On Saturday 7 and Sunday 8 February, the town of Villafranca near Verona will host a boot camp dedicated to the relation between smart cities and the Public Administration. For two days, the best practices of the local administration offices will familiarize with the innovative startups of the Mind The Bridge circuit.

This event, which includes several talks from experts in the field, is organized by E-Globalservice, a service provider for institutions and companies. At the end of the three-day event it will be revealed on which three startups – among the over one hundred that have presented their candidacy – E-Globalservice has decided to invest.

PUSH is among the finalists and on Sunday 8 Salvatore Di Dio and Domenico Schillaci will be introducing it to the public in the pitch dedicated to the thirteen finalists.

The program of the event includes, on Saturday 7, a round-table open to the public and dedicated to the Public Administration, entitled La nuova PA: Digitalizzazione e Smart Cities, Efficienza e Vantaggi Condivisi, while Sunday 8 will features talks by two keynote speakers: Nick Mastronardi, founder and CEO of Polco, and Benedetta Arese Lucini, general manager at Uber.

The program is available on the Eventbrite webpage.

On 29-30 October, in Vienna, there will be the Pioneers Festival, an event dedicated to technology and science and involving those businesses working in these two fields.

During the festival, in seminars and pitches, several representatives of startups and companies will discuss in depth several themes, from the management of companies at their early stage to the technologies used in their own businesses. PUSH will have a place at the Festival: on Thursday 30 October Domenico Schillaci will present and tell about his experience at PUSH and how it uses technology in fostering social innovation.

This event will be held in the picturesque Hofburg. The complete program of the event is available on the official website.

The Urban Thinkers Campus will be held in Caserta at the Belvedere di San Leucio on 15-18 October. This is an initiative of the UN-Habitat that, in association with the Forum delle Culture di Napoli e della Campania, will explore the theme “The City We Need”. The goal of the campus is to bring together urban thinkers, philosophers, writers, journalists, bloggers, urban planners and designers, city leaders and decision makers, businessmen, marketing and communication experts, and all those that in various ways are interested in the topics connected to urban policies, which will mark the approach of Habitat III.

Within this grand event we will have our own space on Wednesday 15, from 2 to 4 pm. The topic of our session is “The City as a Service”, where speakers will talk about a new approach in designing services for the city, an approach having at its center the citizens conceived as a community.

Featured speakers:

 Antonio Prigiobbo – Campania StartUp, NAStartUp  

 Michele D’Ambrosio – Isola Nova Associazione CleaNAP  

 Claudio Esposito – Studio Ines Bajardi AA 

Program of the session: 

 14:00 – 14:10 Registration of participants

 14:10 – 14:20 Introduction to the session  “The City as a Service – The City as Service Provider” (Domenico Schillaci – PUSH); 

 14:20 – 15:20 Speakers’ papers

 15:20 – 15:50 Round-table: “Shared Strategies and Best Practices to Plan the City of the Future) (moderator Mauro Filippi – PUSH); 

 15:50 – 16:00 Closing remarks.

The admission is free, but it is necessary to register on the website.

On 22-24 October in Milan will be held Fieramilanocity SMAU, an event dedicated to technology and innovation. MIUR will be present in the Open Innovation area together with the fourteen winners of the competition “Smart Cities and Communities and Social Innovation”.

The fourteen innovative projects will be presented in a dedicated exhibiting space in order to promote their business ideas and projects, exchange information, and network. Among these, trafficO2, the market-based social computing project for the mobility of urban communities developed by PUSH.

During the three-day event, more than twenty educational workshops will be held by

instructors, analysts, experts in funding for businesses and startups, smart working, open innovation, crowdsourcing, and much more.

Finally on Friday 24 October at 1 pm the innovative projects regarding Smart City and Social Innovation, including trafficO2, will be introduced in only 90 seconds in a speed pitching moderated by Emil Abirascid.