A set of tools and resources to help shape better cities

The Urban Catalyst Toolbox has everything needed to design and implement integrated and participatory actions in Indian cities. Discover guidance, tools, templates, prompts, explainers and much more to find your way when tackling urban challenges. The Toolbox is organised into the five stages of the action-planning cycle and the crosscutting actions of engaging stakeholders and sharing knowledge. Aligned with the Urban catalyst Method, it draws from capacity-building activities. This means that as responses to urban challenges are updated, city-makers can expect to find new tools on this page – stay tuned!

Analysing problems

As a first step to tackle a challenge, it is important to make the right diagnosis by examining the local context. The tools below will help you:

to have a clear problem statement
to better understand the problem itself and have a proper analysis of the situation
to create a shared vision on how to tackle the problem

Planning actions

While designing actions is obviously central to the process of action-planning, it is crucial not to rush into it.

Before defining a detailed list of actions, it is important to develop a shared vision with the stakeholders involved, which will help designing SMART objectives.
Once a problem is identified and common objectives have been defined, co-creating solutions is the next step. To do this, a safe space should be created for stakeholders to think outside of the box and come to an agreement about the actions to be implemented.
In order to design a coherent and meaningful set of actions, it is then important to check if it answers the objectives and vision previously defined and to make sure it is operational.

Engaging Stakeholders

To succeed with participatory policies, engaging with the right stakeholders at each step of the action-planning process is essential.

In this cross-cutting section of the toolbox, the gathered tools and guidance will help:

to identify the relevant stakeholders for your project
to get them involved in the project
to build a collaborative and sustainable group of stakeholders

Sharing knowledge

Sharing knowledge is important all along the action-planning cycle as it will help making sense of your actions, disseminating the acquired knowledge with peers and presenting results to an external audience.

The understanding of sharing knowledge in this toolbox is twofold:

It is first about capturing and self-reflecting on the lessons learned from one’s actions and making sense of this new knowledge.
It is then about gathering and disseminating collective knowledge further, helping to sustain actions and to remain resilient in the face of challenges.

Documentation

Photographic documentation of selected areas to study the problems in detail

Implementation

The Implementation is a key moment in the Action-Planning cycle, when the actions foreseen to achieve a goal become reality. This stage is not about actions themselves but HOW to set them going, which can be tricky. Implementation presents several challenges tackled by the guide and tools listed below, along the following structure:

Making sure a strategy is operational
Understanding the local conditions for implementation
Reviewing stakeholders engagement for the purpose of implementation
Following up on the progress made in implementation