The MobileWorlds Festival consists of a set of locally relevant activities that bring the nexus of third cultures – mobility planning – arts closer to a wide audience, involving speakers from planning practitice, academics, artists, and a set of engaging workshops.  

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  • Engaging a broad audience with the themes of third cultures and thinking otherwise about mobility
  • Connecting planning, arts, and cross-generational thinking among academics, artists, planning practitioners, and the general public
  • A playful way of bridging gaps between academia, planning practice, and the general public

  • How can we think creatively about mobility?
  • To what extent do people relate to third cultures, and what value can be drawn from this?
  • How can this creativity translate into planning practices, local cultures, and daily individual practices?

  • Attractive location for intended audience – appropriate for both a broad public and public authorities (namely planners), but ideally not too formal.
  • Ideally a location with its own cultural agenda and existing regular visitors, so that their reach can help yours.
  • 1-2 spaces within that location for 40-70 people total (depends on the style you are going for, make sure to check your audience for what you think the number of participants will be on each of the days) seated at tables of 3-5 people plus moving space
  • Kit of materials including:
    • For the unboxing activity: ideally small boxes ready to be folded, or alternatively box-form printed out on A4 page for cutting and pasting (e.g. choose a template from her), dull colour pens (black, dark blue, grey), colourful pens
    • For the Zine- making activities: magaizes for cutting out (collage), colourful paper, colourful pens of different kinds (take out classic black and blue hues!), stencils, scissors, glue, tape, stickers (make sure to have letters, mobility themed stickers, and several random subject stickers), some already folded Zines (made of A4 pages, see some example instructions her)
  • Snacks and drinks (varied types per day and activity)

  • Presentation on local planning strategies
  • Discuss on different cultural contributions, how the intersections between cultures are negotiated and integrated or separated at work, how different cultures influence and are inspiring for mobility, how planning and arts intersect
  • Allow the audience to ask questions or join the discussion

  • Presentation and or performance on an intersection between arts- imaginaries -mobilities
  • Discuss on different cultural contributions, how the intersections between cultures are negotiated and integrated or separated at work, how different cultures influence and are inspiring for mobility, whether / in what ways mobility is an inspiration for work, how arts and planning intersect
  • Allow the audience to ask questions or join the discussion

  • Uncover third cultures, by asking: what boxes we have been put into, or have put ourselves into; what we wish we could be or do if the boxes were not there, or not as prominent / exclusive
  • Provide access to and reflection on what we would like our third cultures to allow us
  • See practical details and a pdf for use with participants her

  • Invite participants to imagine a utopia of mobility futures in a way that they would like to communicate to the world
  • Invite people of all ages to help in this imagination, together
  • Invite participants from both days to feed what they learned on the first day into something they would like to communicate further
  • Invite creativity and imaginaries to flurish, and to inspire across participants, who will likely bring quite different ideas and perspectives
  • See practical details and a pdf for use with participants her

  • Online, it is more likely to gather an academic audience
  • This also makes it relevant to potentially invite 1-2 academic speakers
  • Do keep the aspect of arts, by involving an artist (or more) for a performance, talk, debate and/or activity, or even throughout if possible to help inspire the activities
  • The boxes workshop can be facilitated online through the following steps:
    • Invite the participants to use pen and paper, and the following website to build their box by folding: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiLhYdFPFws
    • Alternatively (or if the folding fails), invite the participants to use one side of a paper as the “outside” of the box, and the other side as the “inside” – they can crumple or rip the paper for the “breaking” of the box effect. It may not be as impactful, but can still work.
  • Zine-making online can be organized via https://zinesforever.com or similar websites
    • If various participants log in with the same account, they can work on the same document, but be careful not to work on the same part of the document at the same time, so that the changes don’t cancel one-another out. This can be solved by assigning one page to each participant.
    • Reserve enough time at the end for sharing about the Zine, so each person can share their insight and experience. Online this is more important than in person because there is less of a sense of others working on this around you.
    • Make sure to have a support team that can go into various groups for the Zine making so that the participants can receive sufficient guidance.

  • As speakers
    • Local planners on mobility topics open to public engagement and to learning from interactions with academia and practice
    • Local planners on mobility topics who would like to share some of their experiences: positive examples and perhaps even challenges they encounter
    • Local artists interested in transdisciplinary work and public engagement
    • Local artists interested in various takes on the topic of mobility / mobilities / transportation
  • As participants
    • The general public – anyone!
    • The audience of the location you will hold the Festival at
    • But you could specifically reach out to
      • Activist groups on themes such as active mobility, cycling, inclusive cities, etc.
      • Local NGOs working on mobility topics
      • Local planners – point to the method as well as the content as inspirational for their work
      • Academics working on mobility topics
      • Students of planning, engineering, geography, sociology and related subjects working on mobility topics
      • Artists interested in mobility topics
      • Arts students working on mobility topics

  • So far, the Festival has been carried out over two days, on Friday for Day 1 and Saturday for Day 2, to cater to different publics: those who can integrate this kind of thing into their working hours, and those who cannot; children who might have school Friday but could make it Saturday; etc. You can also consider holding all activities on the same day, with sufficient breaks, keeping in mind the change in availability of certain audiences, and the possible (mis)match of the Day 1 activities for younger audiences
  • When doing the Festival on 2 days, day 1 being a Friday, you may want to hold it on Friday during the later afternoon, ending with drinks and the exhibition, so some people that can come only after work can still enjoy at least some of the Festival; then the Saturday program can be more family/child friendly and include lunch, which might mean starting around 10.30/11 and going until early afternoon.
  • Try to avoid overlap with, or plan in tandem with, certain key timings in your audience’s schedules, such as vacation and holiday, key conference periods, elections (you may want to avoid or embrace these periods, but be aware of them also in view of the planners’ work load and ability / willingness to speak on certain subjects), and other such schedules.
  • The Breaking Boxes Workshop can end up being a bit shorter than planned at first – you can use the extra time for more discussion, a break, or to end a llittle sooner, depending on what seems best
  • Be aware that if the Zine-workshop involves small children, they may come and go, or not stay for the full day. Ideally, organize in such a way that you still get feedback and point the adults to the exhibition before they leave, even if they do not stay for the formal closing.

  • Book the space (keep regular contact until the date of the event to make sure all conditions are clear and met, and to ensure their dissemination channels include your event)
  • Make sure there can be catering at the event space, and pre-reserve catering (final numbers pending)
  • Get in touch with potential speakers and reserve the time with them
  • Get in touch with artsits / photographers to contribute to your exhibition, if you include one
  • Set up event design (e.g. with Canva or other design method), website about the event
  • Send Save-the-date to relevant attendees
  • Create social media presence to promote the event and make or schedule regular posts about the event
  • Create a registration platform and set up automatic confirmation of registration emails

  • Finalize the program
  • Have the program printed professionally
  • Ensure everything is ready for the exhibition, if you include one, potentially including having photos printed and set up for hanging at the location

  • Send a reminder email to those registered (this can be automatised in some registration platforms, but be sure to check)
  • Make a final check with the event location that everything is in order
  • Give final numbers to be considered for the catering (drinks, snacks, and lunch)

  • Planning meeting with your team for the day of the event
  • Visit the event location and check all details are in order
  • Last minute printing: registration lists, QR codes with program (potentially in various languages), QR codes for Feedback, consent forms for photos if relevant
  • Prepare thank-you gifts for speakers and support team
  • Reserve a space for drinks / dinner after the event with your support team (and potentially the speakers)

  • Set up the exhibition (see what you have agreed with the location, but ideally you will be able to do this at least 1-2 days in advance)
  • If possible, set up the room for the event already as much as possible (exhibition, furniture, podium, chairs, tables, projection, sound, workshop materials, camera for filming the event, reception with programs, registration lists, feedback QR code, nametags, etc.)

  • Arrive 2-5 hours early to the event (depending on how much set-up you were able to do in advance the previous day(s))
  • Put up signs for finding the event
  • Make social media posts about the event starting soon

(note that this can be adapted depending on the exact context and time when speakers etc. are available)

  • As people arrive, invite them to grab a coffee / tea / snack to take to their table; you can invite them to refill throughout the event
  • Opening talk (20-30mins)
  • Introduction of Keynote speaker 1 (5mins)
  • Keynote 1 by a local planner  (10-20mins)
  • Interview & debate with Keynote 1 (40-45mins)
  • Give thank-you gift to Keynote 1
  • Introduction of Keynote speaker 2 (5mins)
  • Keynote / Performance 2 by a local artist (10-20mins)
  • Interview & debate with Keynote 2 (40-45mins)
  • Give thank-you gift to Keynote 2
  • Introduction to breaking boxes workshop, including distribution of materials (5-10mins)
  • Breaking boxes workshop (15-20mins)
  • Brief wrap-up of the day before exhibition, then introduce the exhibition, and drinks

  • Clean-up and
  • Set-up for day 2

  • Arrive 1-2 hours early to the event (depending on how much set-up you were able to do in advance the previous day(s))
  • Put up signs for finding the event
  • Make social media posts about the event starting soon

note that this can be adapted depending on the exact context and audience, e.g. how many children / adults / older adults are present)

  • As people arrive, invite them to grab a coffee / tea / snack to take to their table; you can invite them to refill throughout the event
  • Opening talk (10-15mins, short version of the previous day in case new people are there)
  • Introduce the Zine workshop
  • Moderate the Zine workshop
  • Make sure lunch is served during the workshop, as a break but ideally so that people can keep making Zines, or looking through what they’ve done
  • Consider having extra toys available for children, especially smaller children, to stay entertained if they tire of the Zine making
  • Artistic closing (invited guest or yourself), can include poetry reading, meditation, or something of your choosing
  • Thank your team in front of everyone and call over to the exhibition (if the public is mostly new compared to the previous day, introduce the exhibition again)

  • Clean-up
  • Thank the people from the location you rented

 

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