Lisbon organized a "coffee talk" to discuss Largo do Rato

In 2014, Lisbon City Council presented the program A Square in Every Neighborhood, an ambitious public space initiative with the aim of redeveloping a series of squares and plazas throughout the city, giving new centralities to neighborhoods. At the time, 30 priority squares were identified for intervention by 2017. Largo do Rato, "perhaps the most intricate road junction in the city, where several important old streets converge", as described, was one of them. O diagnostic work and preliminary study was made, there was a moment of public participation in 2015, but the work never materialized.

The plan was to extend the southern promenade of Largo do Rato to encourage commercial activity in that area and also create a space for people to stay, to reinstate streetcar 24 (this was done in 2018 without touching the Largo), to improve the pedestrian crossing of the Largo through new pedestrian routes, to reorganize all the road traffic with the introduction of a traffic circle, and to remove the parking lot next to the Church of Nossa Senhora da Conceição to create another pedestrian area and place to stay, among other things.

A new job

Despite the work that has been done, Lisbon City Council has now decided to start from scratch. That's why, on October 4, in the late afternoon, two dozen people gathered around four tables for a... coffee talk.

Coffee talk (or world café) is a brainstorming methodology which has recently been adopted by the Lisbon City Council in public participation processes. It was used, for example, in the participatory process on the Almirante Reis axiswhich took place before the summer, and also at the Citizens' Council. Now, the municipality is applying this technique to the participatory process that it decided to initiate for Largo do Rato and should culminate in the preparation of a new requalification projectin the near future. In a "coffee chat"Groups of people discuss a subject at several small tables, each of which can have a more specific theme or objective. This methodology will have been designed by Juanita Brown and David Isaacsin 1995 in the USA.

For about two hours, the participants - who had signed up on the Chamber's website to take part in this initiative - were organized into four groups, spread across four tables; each table had a macro-theme (or pillar) associated with it: Environment, Connectivity, Heritage e Security. The groups rotated through the different tables/themes so that everyone had the opportunity to discuss all the topics.

"This is the first conversation of several participatory sessions that we want to hold to discuss the Largo do Rato issue, a topic that is not easy due to its complexity and technical constraints"Paula Rebelo, an architect from Lisbon City Council's Public Space Department, explained at the start of the session. "We want to create a robust project for the redevelopment of this square with those who know it best, the people who live here and those who also pass through." As in the case of Almirante Reis, the City Council wants the intervention in Largo do Rato not to focus exclusively on the square itself, but to take into account the entire neighborhood, which includes different parishes and streets that converge in those square meters, such as Rua Alexandre Herculano, Rua da Escola Politécnica, Rua das Amoreiras, Rua de São Bento or Avenida Álvares Cabral.

The first coffee talk was promoted by the municipality as part of the Bairro Real festival, an initiative of the Prince + RoyalThis is an association that aims to bring together the people and organizations of Príncipe Real, a territory without formal boundaries. This conversation brought together people of different ages and backgrounds, who were selected from the applications received to represent as diverse a sample as possible. Despite the differences, it was possible to identify consensual ideas - the various tables, for example, seemed unanimous on the need to reduce car traffic and increase the space for people to walk or enjoy the square, but there were differences on how to do thisWhile some have proposed taxing the entry of cars into the city, others have suggested measures to reduce car space as a disincentive to their use.

More people, fewer cars

At each table, the conversation was accompanied by technicians from the Lisbon City Council who, after the discussion itself, summarized and presented the participants' ideas, suggestions and proposals to the other groups. At the same time, and throughout the session, the designer and illustrator Manuela GonçalvesThe Mayor summarized the main topics on a visual board: fewer cars, less traffic, better organization of transport, a cycling network, more trees and greater permeability, green corridors, better air quality, removing heavy goods transport, widening sidewalks and making them more comfortable, more preservation of heritage, better lighting, planning the commercial offer, more security and policing, greater cohesion between the square.

The Lisbon City Council has not scheduled any more initiatives as part of the participatory process for the redevelopment of Largo do Rato, and there should only be news at the end of this year or in 2024. Until then, the new ideas can be cross-referenced with the work that has already been done previously under the program A Square in Every Neighborhoodwhich we recover here. The municipality had told the newspaper Message from Lisbonin November 2022, that the requalification of Largo do Rato is "one of the priorities of the current executive, and as such, the intervention continues to be planned, outside the scope of the Uma Praça em Cada Bairro (A Square in Every Neighborhood) program".