Action for the Citys mission focuses on sustainable urban community development and environmental action. Our core program areas are thus neighborhood empowerment through individual behavior change and collective action to improve public space and public services. In 2010-2011, Action for the City aims to extend this core organizational competency through the Reclaiming Public Space project in a low-income, high-density Hanoi neighborhood. In addition, we seek to increase our local base of support and donors through an effective communications and fundraising strategy.

Realizing that public space in Hanoi is currently almost non-existent, and the resources that do exist are being abused, we decided to work on this issue. Further more, it is a pressing local problem that relates to Action for the Citys mission, combining both environmental and social aspects. The specific objective of the project is for a process of public space formation to be designed and tested in one disadvantaged neighborhood of Hanoi.

There are three main results that should be obtained at the end of the project: (i) A scanning survey to identify abused or obsolete public spaces in Hanoi is conducted; (ii) An abused or obsolete public space is transformed with participation of community members and local government; (iii) A guidebook for participatory public space making process for replication in other communities in Hanoi is completed.

An estimated 3,000 local residents, half of them female, will benefit directly from the public space improvements, both in improved access to public space as well as increased voice in local decision-making. Project outputs, including the survey and the public space guidebook, are designed to be replicable and usable by other communities throughout Hanoi and elsewhere in Vietnam.