“Global Research undertook the large piece of work in a professional and collaborative manner. Members of the Citizens Jury have found the products produced by Global Research integral to their deliberations. The speed and quality at which Global Research produced its work reflected the quality of their capabilities.”
Background and aims
Future Melbourne 2026 was a community collaboration project led by The City of Melbourne to develop a long-term strategic plan to ensure Melbourne’s legacy as a liveable and competitive city over the coming decade. The project refreshed the Future Melbourne 2008 plan, which has guided all aspects of the city’s development, prosperity and liveability. The community was invited to share their ideas and vision for the future, prior to a Citizens' Jury deliberating to refresh the plan. The project had four phases:
Phase 1: Community sharing their ideas on the city’s future
Phase 2: Bringing the community’s ideas together
Phase 3: Citizens' jury deliberating on the community’s ideas
Phase 4: Final Plan.
From 1 February to 31 March (Phase 1), The City of Melbourne engaged with its community to capture ideas through over 30 face-to-face workshops, forums and seminars; a questionnaire; and the interactive Future Melbourne website. Over the two months, 2,000 people engaged in this phase posting 970 well-developed ideas and completing 350 surveys.
Our role
Global Research was appointed by The City of Melbourne to 'Bring the community’s ideas together’ (Phase 2), creating an independent synthesised report that compared Melburnian's 2016 ideas with the existing Future Melbourne 2008 goals and priorities.
Global Research collated, coded, synthesised and reported on the 4,500 points made by the 2,000 participants who contributed via the multiple response options available, to prepare the Bringing Your Ideas Together report.
Design and method
Every idea and completed survey was entered into NVivo qualitative analysis software and collated under the most appropriate topic or topics, to inform the refresh of the 2008 goals and priorities. The analysis identified ideas that supported or opposed the 2008 plan, and those that suggested doing things differently, or in new ways. Overlaps and links were also identified between the 2008 Goals and Priorities.
Result
Global Research provided The City of Melbourne an initial Bringing Your Ideas Together report within 10 days of the ideas phase closing, and a final report, including written and visual representation of the findings within three weeks. The report, and its synthesis of all the ideas captured, provided a bridge between the 2008 plan and the 2016 opinions of Melbourne's citizens and assisted the citizens jury in reviewing and rewriting the plan.
Outcome
The Citizens' Jury's deliberations, grounded in citizens' ideas, refreshed the City of Melbourne's 2008 plan and the updated version, Future Melbourne 2026 was released in July 2016. Melbourne will embrace its future development, prosperity and liveability, guided by Future Melbourne 2026. The refreshed plan can be found on The City of Melbourne's website: Future Melbourne.
(image Julian Hacker, Pixabay)
We are proud to be a member of City of Melbourne’s panel, completing over 13 projects for them in recent years. To see more of what we have done for CoM, see our case studies below:
Melbourne: A Great Place to Age ~ City of Melbourne
The City of Melbourne (CoM) undertook a public engagement to better understand what matters to Melburnians when it comes to ageing. This research was created to inform the development of CoM’s, Melbourne: A Great Place to Age strategic plan, which aims to create “a more connected community that brings people together in their local neighbourhoods, and ensures older people are supported to fully participate and feel valued and respected for their unique life experience.”.
Queen Victoria Market - Charter Consultation ~ City of Melbourne
The City of Melbourne (CoM) launched a community consultation process around the redevelopment of the Queen Victoria Market Precinct, engaging Global Research to provide a report with the findings of this consultation. Melburnians were asked to provide their views on how they think a new 1.5-hectare public space, Market Square, should be used.
Moonee Ponds Creek ~ City of Melbourne
The Victorian Planning Authority (VPA) and City of Melbourne’s (CoM) vision for Moonee Ponds Creek is for it to become “a thriving corridor that supports the liveability and resilience of the city”. To achieve this aim, CoM sought community feedback on the draft Moonee Ponds Creek Strategic Opportunities Plan, which highlights strategic opportunities and management issues along the creek. The creek is envisaged as an exemplar corridor for water management, public space and community activity, active transport, biodiversity, heritage and culture.