In light of the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) public consultation round of the recently released Delhi Master Plan 2041, Rajeswari Parasa and I argue that an open data culture needs to be built within planning exercises for the Data Governance Blog.
Excerpts below: “To make spatial data more accessible and usable by a wider audience, local planning bodies should find ways to collaborate with open data communities to build tools on top of the spatial datasets, instead of relying on proprietary solutions that financially burden an already resource-crunched system.
The current way in which planning exercises carry out public consultation needs to change. Doing so would allow for holistic, data driven feedback by civil society on ways to improve the plan. By inculcating a culture of openness in the process through improving guidelines, oversight by MoHUA and onboarding relevant civil society partners in the exercise, the ultimate quality of such plans will increase, allowing for a more inclusive and holistic long-term development of our cities.”
Read the full blog post here.