International Centre for Sustainable Cities "Public Participation"

Development of the Warsaw Transportation Round Table
Since 1995 the Institute for Sustainable Development (ISD), a Polish non-governmental organization, has conducted work on an alternative transportation policy with the basic premise that environmental requirements should be the point of departure for building such a policy. It recognized the emerging conflict between those who believe that city infrastructure should be geared to automobile use and those who would address the issue by developing the public transit system as a more sustainable option.

During this time, the City of Warsaw created a new department called the Public Consultation and Dialogue Centre (PCDC). Its mandate is to increase public involvement in City affairs and sustainable development. One of the first issues the PCDC concentrated on was transportation problems in Warsaw. Working with ISD and other NGOs, it began to look for ways to involve the public in the decision making process and build more sustainable transportation for the City.

With support from the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF); ISD began a project focusing on public participation. The goal was to create a public involvement process that would provide political leaders with recommendations on urban transportation issues and the related dilemmas involving land use, economic development, quality of living and social equity. Warsaw was chosen as the first city.

In the fall of 1999, the Warsaw Transportation Round Table (WTRT) was given official support by the Deputy Mayor of the City of Warsaw and the PCDC. The PCDC was given responsibility to administer it and support was sought from ISD in Poland and ICSC in Canada. Three key people involved in setting up this Round Table process, the Deputy Mayor and the heads of ISD and PCDC took part in a study tour to see how transportation issues were addressed using public consultation mechanisms in the cities of New York, Minneapolis, Seattle and Washington in the US, and Vancouver in Canada. A partnership was developed with the Communication and Education Department of the Greater Vancouver Regional District (GVRD). The GVRD is recognized within Canada as a leader in public participation and their experience has provided important input to this process.

Five stakeholder groups represented by 17 members
Government - 4 members
Environment - 3 members
Social - 4 members
Business - 3 members
Academe - 3 members
Andrzej Kassenberg, President of the Institute for Sustainable Development is the principal facilitator and Chair of the WTRT and Dominica Babicki from ICSC is the assistant facilitator.
Decisions are made by consensus and specific "ground rules" on how the WTRT would function were agreed upon.

In February 2000 the WTRT was initiated by the three Deputy Mayors responsible for transportation issues at a meeting of stakeholders. At this meeting the first topic for discussion by the Round Table, "Traffic Zoning in Warsaw" was discussed. The basic framework of the Round Table was presented and interest groups were asked to put forward names of individuals who would represent their interests at the Round Table. Close to 100 people attended this meeting and at the end, a representative from each of the five interest groups was chosen. In May 2000 the Round Table met for the first time - sixteen of the seventeen members chosen by their constituencies attended. Over the next month, the WTRT met four times. At the last meeting, they agreed, by consensus, on a set of recommendations on traffic zoning in Warsaw. These were presented to the Deputy Major at a well-attended news conference on June 27, 2000.

Since this first round of meetings, the WTRT had two more series of meetings. They have followed the same structure set out in the first series of sessions with each of the next two topics ("Development of the Road Network" and "Public Transportation") taking five to six sessions before a set of recommendations were developed.

The WTRT has attempted to operate within the 10 principles for building consensus developed by the NRTEE in Canada. Some recommendations are qualified by a "subject to consultation with stakeholders" clause and ground rules are changed by consensus. The proceedings are taped and are available to the public. Information is available on the PCDC website and people are encouraged to contact their "stakeholder representative" to have their views taken into consideration. Steps have been taken to replace WTRT members who do not show commitment to the Round Table process.

Time limits for meetings have been strictly adhered to and each session of the WTRT has taken between four and five meetings. While the WTRT members do not agree on how many sessions will be needed to develop a set of recommendations, there seems to be a general consensus that it should not take more than five sessions. A monitoring plan was developed as part of the WTRT structure. At the beginning of each new WTRT meeting, before discussions begin on a new issue, a presentation is made on behalf of the City of Warsaw on how the recommendations made by the previous meeting of the WTRT have been implemented.

CONTENTS