On November 27, the Open Source Lab held an inaugural roundtable discussion at its newly opened office space in Berlin’s EUREF campus. The discussion, which was focused on the question “what is the future of shared open source mobility?” hosted experts from backgrounds in civic tech, the automobile industry, academia, unions, sustainable transportation, entrepreneurship, and design.
The diverse mix of participants set the stage for an event that stood out in terms of the opinions and knowledge shared — there was an atmosphere of real learning and exchange amongst the constructive tension that arose from these various perspectives being at the same table. Despite the wide range of goals represented by the participants, there was a clearly shared goal to listen, learn from one another, and apply this knowledge towards a future in mobility that is sustainable and representative of all types of people and mobility needs.
The discussion began with each participant stating what the ideal future of mobility was for them. Priorities included access, sustainability, zero-emissions systems, open source approaches, social inclusion, and more. A full summary of this discussion can be found on the Open Source Lab’s blog about the event.
Following the roundtable discussion, the event was opened to the public for a short networking and open discussion session. Shortly thereafter, presentations were held by the two international speakers at the event, Gabriel Plassat and Max Kortlander. Kortlander’s presentation discussed the co-creative approach being taken by Waag in two Civitas neighbourhood projects: Cities-4-People and MUV. Each of these projects employs a rigorous co-creative approach whereby citizens and other stakeholders are involved in every stage of the process to identify local mobility issues and create solutions to address those issues.
The roundtable event was certainly not the last of its kind—by the end of the evening, most people were saying “let’s get in touch soon” rather than “it was nice to meet you.” This was indicative of the general atmosphere of the event, which was a solid beginning to the future research and work that will be done at the Open Source Lab in Berlin.
Articles and images: courtesy of Waag Society
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