Decision map for spatial decision making in urban planning

In this paper, we introduce the concept of decision map and illustrate the way this new concept can be used effectively to support participation in spatial decision making and in urban planning. First, we start by introducing our spatial decision process which is composed of five, non-necessary sequential, phases: problem identification and formulation, analysis, negotiation, concertation, and evaluation and choice. Negotiation and concertation are two main phases in spatial decision making but most available frameworks do not provide tools to support them effectively. The solution proposed here is based on the concept of decision map which is defined as an advanced version of conventional geographic maps which is enriched with preferential information and especially designed to clarify decision making. It looks like a set of homogenous spatial units; each one is characterised with a global, often ordinal, evaluation that represents an aggregation of several partial evaluations relative to different criteria. The decision map is also enriched with different spatial data exploration tools. The procedure of the construction of a decision map contains four main steps: definition of the problem (i.e. generation of criteria maps), generation of an intermediate map, inference of preferential parameters, and generation of a final decision map. The concept of decision map as defined here is a generic tool that may be applied in different domains. This paper focuses on the role of the decision map in supporting participation in spatial decision making and urban planning. Indeed, the decision map is an efficient communication tool in the sense that it permits to the different groups implied in the spatial decision process to ‘think visually’ and to communicate better between each other.ou