Speculative Design and Playable Cities: Co-designing a Mindshift in Sustainable Urban Mobility through Urban Gamification

Individual car usage poses serious sustainability challenges in urban areas; however, strategies for public engagement remain underdeveloped, and a mindshift in the way people commute is needed. By mindshift, we refer to a change in the dominant imaginary of the future (particularly the way young people envision urban life and mobility) which is crucial for reclaiming their right to imagine and shape the city. This in-progress study explores how speculative design and urban gamification tools can be used to create such a mindshift among younger participants toward sustainable transportation. To achieve this, we designed and tested four different workshop activities with two vocational and two upper secondary schools in Tampere, Finland. This short paper briefly describes the different activities and showcases a preliminary analysis of the materials produced in the workshops to better understand young people's urban future imaginations and their reactions to the workshop activities.