The bridge over troubled water - ICT challenging the current participation practices

This case study analyses a town planning process in Finland in which citizens tried to affect decision-making with various ICT applications. A motor vehicle bridge was to be built in the city of Tampere. Many citizens were against it and put large amount of effort to say no to the planned bridge. During the planning process they used: A website to collect and store information about the process, on-line discussion groups for public debate, straw polls to watch over politicians' opinions and composition images to illustrate their own view of how the bridge should be constructed. The results of the study suggest that these uses of ICT applications did challenge the local way of decision-making, which has traditionally been rather closed. Furthermore, the case study points out that it is very difficult to design generic applications that fit every occasion. Local conditions should always be taken into account, and this means that the research of ICT applications and democracy should be connected with the local decision-making and planning processes.