Makerthon OWL: Open.Public.Places.

From 5 to 6 June 2020, the motto was "Do your thing!". - The first Makerthon OWL called on creative citizens to jointly develop ideas for public life in times of Corona. Under the title "Open.Public.Places." an interdisciplinary team of regional project partners organised a weekend that offered space for digital exchange and creative ideas.

Date

Start date 05.06.2020 - 12:00
End date 07.06.2020 - 13:00

Key Results of the Event   

The organisers of the Makerthon OWL include, on the one hand, city2science GmbH and the association Energie Impuls OWL as project partners in the EFRE project "Make OWL", the urbanLab of the Technische Hochschule OWL and the WissensWerkStadt team from Bielefeld Marketing. Open Innovation City Bielefeld, a scientific project funded by the state of North Rhine-Westphalia and initiated by the four partners Fachhochschule des Mittelstands (FHM), Founders Foundation, Pioneers Club and owl maschinenbau e.V., was also involved in the organisation of Makerthon OWL and immediately sent a team of its own to tackle a challenge.  

A total of six challenges were presented to the participants at the opening event on Friday, 5 June 2020. These ranged from questions about alternative uses of parking facilities in the city to ways of making public spaces more sustainable. Open Innovation City Bielefeld itself also set a task for the participants, which was as follows: How can waste separation be fun? How can people be sensitised to dispose of their waste properly? The project team gave the participants the task of creating a playful element that motivates people to implement waste and recyclables separation in an urban environment.  

The results, which were developed for these questions, can be found as a download at the end of this article. One example is the idea of the "Recycling Tree", which offers the possibility of disposing of waste in a sustainable way, educates people about sustainability and the environment via information boards and also provides incentives for use via a token system.  

Overall, the feedback from participants on the first Makerthon OWL was very positive. Despite the purely digital implementation due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the teams succeeded in developing realistic prototypes, tackling the challenges together. 

 

Agenda   

  • Friday, 05.06.20: Opening and Presentation of the Challenges and Formation of the Teams  
  • Saturday, 06.06.20: Working Together in the Teams, Interim Presentation and Final Presentation of the Results of the First Day  
  • Sunday, 07.06.20: Testing the Results and Presenting the Ideas and Prototypes to the Other Teams, Mutual Feedback  

Overview Actors   

  • city2science GmbH  
  • WissensWerkStadt team from Bielefeld Marketing  
  • urbanLab TH OWL  
  • Energie Impuls OWL  
  • Open Innovation City Bielefeld  
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