The present period of crisis, both economical and of social and cultural values represents an opportunity for a general rethinking of territorial uses and for experimenting new forms of urban transformation. It is now urgent to develop new strategies and tactics of transformation that move towards an ecological, economical and reuse point of view rather than wasting both the available spaces and resources. It often happens that urban landscape, usually anonymous and unqualified, appears revitalized by some positive episodes that result from a fortunate synergy between social actors, available resources and spatial opportunities. Episodes that don't always have a clear lifetime lasting, but that instead, in an immediate and unexpected way, bring important benefits on the environment and have the strength to reflect through time.
Open Source Urbanism is a proposal for an urban transformation system based on the exploitation of technological networks: a system that can allow an immediate interaction between the different actors involved in planning and that is based on information and experience sharing and on setting a network of knowledge and opportunities. The progressive spread of mobile technologies every day more advanced and portable, that contain in a single object all the essential communication tools (web, video, photos, data, etc.), can be a powerful partner in this direction.Through the construction of a hybrid community, which acts virtually on a social network, through the immediate exchange of information, images, multimedia content, we can proceed towards the production of a common ground through which stimulating a physical re-appropriation of space, in which represent an identity, even if temporary and partial. The challenge is to translate the social life of the virtual space in physical consequences for the urban environment.
CITY-HOUND as a tool of the project is social network for temporary use of underused urban spaces. CITY-HOUND connects the space owners (private subjects or public administrations) and people who need a space to realize an idea or a project. It is a tool that intercepts the general moment of stasis resulting from the economic crisis, the great availability of underused spaces and abandoned buildings and the willingness of active and creative subjects to act concretely on the territory. It is a tool that allows to connect what is not connected: people, places, assets and opportunities.
