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Welcome to the CitiObs Community-led Action Toolkit! This resource is for citizen communities within Citizen Observatories who are motivated to take action in environmental protection. It's packed with easy-to-use tools to help your group come up with ideas, plan, and carry out your own projects – big or small – that can actually make a difference and lead to positive change.
Throughout this toolkit, you’ll see the terms “Citizen-led” and “Community-led” used interchangeably. This is intentional. We recognise that meaningful action can start in many ways, sometimes from a motivated individual, and other times from a collective effort. “Citizen-led” highlights personal initiative and responsibility, while “Community-led” emphasises collaboration and shared ownership. Both are valid pathways to impact, and this toolkit is designed to support both ends of that spectrum. From solo changemakers to organised community groups.
Want to get started? Keep reading!
Don’t know what Citizen Observatories are? Head to our Glossary
Below, we list a set of cross-cutting values which this toolkit aims to set as a baseline for a shared vision between the content and tools of the following sections. These values align with the New European Bauhaus values and those of the Distributed Design Platform.
While the toolkit presents the values in a general sense, it acknowledges that they may need to be further defined and contextualised based on the unique experiences and characteristics of each CO initiative. It encourages readers to tailor the implementation of the values to their specific local contexts, considering the needs and aspirations of their communities.
What are cross-cutting values? Just like the rules of a game that everyone agrees to follow, no matter what part of the game they’re playing. They help make sure the work stays true to its purpose, no matter what stage you're in or who is involved.
Openness
Openness refers to the mentality and approach to share and make processes transparent, replicable, and accessible. It enables the iterative and replicable nature of actions. This openness extends to various strategic priorities, including open design, open science, open technology and data, and being open to the world, fostering collaboration and knowledge exchange.
Inclusivity
Encouraging a dialogue across cultures, disciplines, genders, and ages is essential for fostering inclusivity, diversity, and a comprehensive understanding of complex issues. By promoting cross-cultural exchange, interdisciplinary collaboration, and inclusivity in all aspects, we create an environment where diverse perspectives and experiences can enrich discussions, inspire innovative solutions, and facilitate collective learning.
Empowerment and changemaking
Empowerment involves taking control and the increased responsibility for yourself and your environment. Fostered through collaborative approaches and openness, empowerment ultimately aims to improve quality of life through changemaking. Our focus on these values goes beyond technological solutions, seeking transformation in individuals, communities, institutions, and cultures by shifting thinking, attitudes, values, and consciousness. We embrace community-led change as a powerful force for creating meaningful impact.
Co-creation and participatory practices
Co-creation is a collaborative approach that involves individuals working together on equal footing to develop projects using various methods and tools. It emphasises the use of diverse resources and ideas to create new actions. This process fosters meaningful participation and agency among communities, enabling them to actively contribute to the design process while promoting inclusive and diverse solutions.
Beautiful
Being inspired by art and culture, and going beyond mere functionality, allows for the exploration of creative and imaginative solutions that respond to deeper human needs and aspirations. By integrating artistic and cultural elements into design and innovation processes, we can tap into the emotional and aesthetic dimensions that resonate with individuals and communities, creating meaningful and transformative experiences.
Regenerative
Regenerative making and design principles aspire to renew and restore the systems that we are part of, rather than just replacing or devaluing them. This involves creating reciprocal relationships and embedding a regenerative design culture from the beginning, with a focus on net positive benefits for both the environment and society.
Readers can use this toolkit freely by navigating through each section, without any particular predefined order. However, even if readers can jump into different sections as needed, the toolkit follows a logical sequence that progressively builds upon tools that can help navigate a generic community-led action co-creation process.
In each section, when possible, links to existing resources are provided. The overall toolkit is also meant to be iterative, and it provides reflection tools that can help better define future steps and reflect on the results achieved.
Conceptually, this toolkit is divided into the following parts:
Welcome!
Initiation
Working with Creatives
Planning for impact
Reflection
Need inspiration?
Initially, the (2) Initiation section aims to provide tools that help collaboratively shape the actions by the Citizen Observatory, focusing on the active role of communities within the CO. This is done by providing a curated selection of different co-creation tools, as well as resources from various projects and practitioners experience. A special section, (3) , is dedicated to the connection with —and involvement of— creatives in the co-creation process and implementation of the actions. The (4) Planning for Impact section is aimed at providing guidelines, based on previous experience and other tools, on how to plan, produce and deliver a community-led action.
(5) If you are planning a more complex citizen-led action, you want to continue it or seek more resources for the future, we recommend that you do an impact measurement that later supports the value of the action. If your action is smaller or one-off, it’s OK to skip this step.
Finally, the (6) provides a compilation of previous projects and examples that may inspire Citizen Observatories in their actions, linking with the previous sections when relevant.
If you want to take action but you don't know how, this toolkit was designed to help you. It provides a selection of co-creation tools to help you devise/create, organise, and deliver actions that can make a positive change, allowing you to go beyond planning, sensing, and awareness towards concrete action.
Think of this as a collection of helpful areas divided into 6 sections – Initiation, Implementation, Working with creatives, Reflection, and an Action Gallery, which you can explore in any order that suits your needs. You can use it by simply browsing through the different sections that interest you most, kind of like choosing what you need when you need it.
This toolkit sits at the intersection of creativity and community-driven initiatives, showing how collaborating with creatives adds value to your projects by bringing innovative and engaging approaches. It is built on an important set of values of being open, sharing and making sure everyone feels included, helping you feel empowered to make change, working together creatively to go beyond functionality, and aiming to improve our environment through regenerative making and design principles.
We’ve kept things simple and action-oriented. In this Toolkit, you will find:
A step-by-step process for planning and launching a community-led creative project
Real examples of how communities have worked with creatives to drive change
Tools & templates to help you get started right away
Tips on finding and collaborating with creatives—even if you've never worked with one before
By providing guidance on finding and involving creatives, particularly through connections like the Distributed Design Platform, this resource aims to nurture collaborations that enhance the impact and reach of your community-led actions. Those special tips for working with artists and other creative people will make your actions become more impactful.
This toolkit aims to empower you and your community to move beyond just awareness and planning towards concrete actions that lead to positive environmental change. Keeping this in mind, this toolkit also provides resources which can help to foster relationships between Citizen Observatories and other communities in the local context, especially creatives, artists, local (maker)spaces and the cultural communities in the areas where the Citizen Observatories are based. This is brought about by providing tools and facilitating these connections through the Distributed Design Platform.
You might be wondering, why this toolkit in the first place? Well, it was created for Citizen Observatories, groups of motivated individuals eager to protect their environment and enact positive change, who may lack the specific guidance and tools to translate their passion into effective action.
By using this toolkit, you gain access to methods and resources that can drive energy and enthusiasm within your group, help you narrow down ideas and define the scope of your action, and map the resources you need and have available. More importantly, it also provides guidance on how to collaborate with creatives, which can significantly amplify the reach and impact of your projects with innovative and engaging approaches.
A crucial part of any community-led or citizen-led action is the thoughts and considerations put into it. It allows us to pause, look back, and ask: “Did we create the impact we hoped for? What worked well? What could be done differently next time?”. This chapter is about deepening our understanding, improving future actions, and making the invisible impacts of our efforts more visible and shareable.
To effectively do this, we need to measure and manage impact in a thoughtful way. This includes:
Tracking outcomes with clear indicators
Reviewing the results
Impact reflection also allows us to communicate our progress with transparency and purpose, whether to our community, potential funders, or broader networks.
In this chapter, you’ll find tools and guidance to support the reflective phase of your action. Whether your initiative is large and ongoing or small and temporary, reflection helps to give meaning to your work, amplify its relevance, and prepare the ground for what's next.
mapping the resources needed and available
This will be done by providing a curated selection of different co-creation tools, as well as resources from various projects and practitioners experience.
Connecting and collaborating with local creatives can bring new ideas for how to work towards taking action for a more sustainable future. The arts and creative practices can create emotional connections and inspire people to get involved and take action, making a stronger impact, and broader reach. With this approach, innovative engagement methods can be experimented with to generate new narratives and inspire transformative change and with the help of an artistic perspective.
Knowing where and how to look will speed up outreach and make collaboration more intentional, strategic, and ultimately more impactful.
During this phase, the form of the community-led action is developed more fully, considering all the participants and developing a plan for addressing the environmental challenges at hand.
This section will start by providing guidelines on how to develop the citizen-led action plan and continue by providing guidelines on aspects to keep in mind when working on developing and implementing steps of the project.
This toolkit highlights the importance of these actions being primarily community-led, and it provides tools for these initiatives to have an impact in their local context without having to rely on external processes normally led by other stakeholders in the Citizen Observatories (COs), such as scientific publications, or direct policy change.
This approach builds upon the Ground Truth 2.0 (GT2.0) co-design methodology, and the results from its Demonstration Cases.
Using the GT2.0 co-design approach as a starting point or basis for involving the community, incorporating lessons learned and experiences from the GT2.0 project's practical application.
Essentially, the toolkit applies the key understanding gained from GT2.0 that citizens are often motivated for direct environmental action, and is specifically tailored to help support these action-oriented efforts, regardless of whether they fit a traditional scientific data collection model.
More than giving support to engaged communities, this toolkit also acknowledges the diversity of Citizen Observatories, both in their variety of forms and processes, and, while keeping a focus on communities within those COs, it provides co-creation tools that can result in widely different actions, including artistic interventions and displays, protests, public forums and presentations, among many others. No matter the final shape and form of these actions, or whether they target change around space usage, increased environmental protection or visibility of a problem that concerns the community, this toolkit's main focus are communities involved in the participatory processes taking place in the Citizen Observatories.
Keeping that strong community-led focus in mind, this toolkit also provides resources which can help foster relationships between COs and other communities in their local context, especially creatives, artists, local (maker)spaces and the cultural communities in the areas where the COs are based.
The main goal is to promote the collaboration of these diverse communities in the co-creation and implementation of the community-led actions, and the potential enhancement, impact and broader outreach of the results.
This is brought about at two levels:
by providing tailored guidance for engaging with creatives and facilitating the connections with the creative sector in general
by leveraging on existing networks such as the Distributed Design Platform (led by Fab Lab Barcelona | IAAC)
The Distributed Design Platform acts as an exchange and networking hub that brings together a diverse member base from cultural and creative institutions, connecting makers, designers, and creatives. Through this network, the Community-led Action Toolkit aims to make use of powerful and already existing resources to create opportunities for diverse forms of community-led actions, while providing a strong link with the New European Bauhaus, as the Distributed Design Platform is an official partner of the initiative and its values are strongly aligned with those of the NEB.
Exploring existing creative initiatives
Creative culture and art communities spark innovation, imagination, and originality when facing local and global challenges, inspiring with their unique perspectives and creative processes. Citizen observatories can benefit from the involvement of creative minds in their activities since they can facilitate new ideas and unconventional solutions. This will result in dynamic, engaging outcomes and amplified lasting impact that may resonate with more diverse audiences. This section highlights why creatives and artists can be of great help for these processes and will be the introduction to following sections in which we will see how art-related groups and creative practitioners can be part of COs' citizen-led actions.
“Artists are not a luxury; they are a necessity for transformation.”
Still a work in progress!
If you’re looking for ideas or simply a spark of motivation, you’re in the right place.
In this section, we’ve created a compilation of inspirational experiences and transformative actions by Citizen Observatories, often collaborating with artists and creatives who have imaginatively merged their talents with scientific inquiry. These stories highlight the original ways in which art and science can intertwine to inspire curiosity, build community, and deepen our collective understanding of both the natural world and the human experience.
From groundbreaking initiatives to unexpected partnerships, the gallery serves as a living repository for anyone seeking inspiration for their actions, through examples celebrating the profound impact that citizen-led action and artistic expression can have, all while cultivating curiosity, fostering collaboration, and promoting a deeper appreciation for the interplay between art, science, and our shared human experience.
Initial examples collected during the toolkit's development showcase the diversity of potential actions, including:
New European Bauhaus
The resources of this section provide inspiration by showing how others have successfully connected art and creativity to environmental sustainability and awareness.
Campaigns
Dialogues
Collective actions, such as community-based mosaics or taking garbage from canals
Events like dance and poetry recitals or mimes guiding traffic
Experiences like participating in pollution pods to smell pollution
Actions like closing streets or creating large-scale graffiti
Art Pieces, such as sculptures visualizing air pollution
Crafts, like ceramics made with glaze containing particulate matter
Competitions, such as photo competitions mapping flood risk
These examples demonstrate the wide variety of forms citizen-led actions can take, often integrating creative approaches to address environmental problems.
Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially.
The licensor (CitiObs or any of their project partners) cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms.
Attribution — You must give appropriate credit , provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor (CitiObs or any of their project partners) endorses you or your use.
ShareAlike — If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you must distribute your contributions under the same license as the original.
No additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.
Here are the key terminologies used in the toolkit:
A community-based environmental monitoring and information system that involves the participation of citizens in observing and reporting on their environment, often using technology like mobile phones or the web.
An initiative or a series of actions primarily conceived, organized, and delivered by citizen communities within a Citizen Observatory, often focused on addressing local environmental concerns and creating positive change without necessarily relying on external processes.
A collaborative process where multiple stakeholders, including citizens, researchers, and other relevant parties, work together to jointly develop ideas, solutions, and actions, ensuring diverse perspectives are integrated.
A European networking, with an established member base of different European-based cultural and creative institutions, hub that connects makers, designers, and creatives, facilitating collaborations and showcasing their work, and serving as a resource for Citizen Observatories seeking creative partners.
A European Commission initiative aiming to foster a sustainable, inclusive, and beautiful future by connecting design, sustainability, accessibility, affordability, and investment, and serving as a set of values that the toolkit aligns with.
The first stage in the citizen-led action process, focused on collaboratively defining potential actions, driving community energy, narrowing down ideas, and setting the initial scope and resource mapping.
The stage where the citizen-led action is planned in detail and carried out, involving the development of an action plan, boosting visibility, and considering practical aspects of execution.
The final stage focused on evaluating the impact of the citizen-led action, reflecting on the results, learning from the experience, and considering how to make the action replicable for future initiatives.
Fundamental principles or ideals (such as openness, inclusivity, sustainability) that underpin the entire citizen-led action process and guide the selection and application of tools and methodologies.
Encompasses individuals and organizations within the cultural sector, including artists, designers, makers, and cultural institutions, who can bring unique perspectives and skills to citizen-led actions.
Planning can help streamline these processes but there may be some aspects to keep in mind while implementing the citizen-led action (see our section for planning the CO actions). This section provides a set of recommendations that will help the CO during the process.
The resources available in this section have the objective of facilitating collaborative work and aiding in the implementation of citizen-led actions. Below there are some guidelines to keep in mind:
Document the process
If the resources and time allow for it, it’s recommended to document the production preparation and execution implementation processes of the citizen-led action. This can be done through audiovisual recording and communication but also by documenting practical, functional, and operational aspects. This documentation serves as a research resource to make the learning from these co-creation processes visible and enables knowledge sharing to make these citizen-led actions improvable and replicable.
Catch-up with the group
Coordinate periodic meetings with the participants involved (e.g. creatives) to help keep everyone up to date, maybe on schedule with programmed activities to celebrate successes, and to address any issues that may arise. Depending on the length and scale of your project, these periodic meetings can be on a weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly basis.
Below, we feature tools that enable us to recognize and value the diversity of the action participants, fostering trust and synergy among them. Additionally, we included a guide outlining potential issues that may arise during the citizen-led action implementation, along with a hands-on task management tool that helps organise ongoing work and ensure task completion. It also offers guidelines and considerations for co-creation processes.
We welcome your feedback to this toolkit via email or on Github. You can also use the feedback buttons on the Gitbook interface.
You will find the following feedback icons on the page.
We really appreciate the feedback, specially if you can add some additional context for us to improve:
So that the feedback is clear, we would like to ask to follow the following guidelines (contributing guidelines):
I'm submitting a …
This is the category of your feedback. You need to choose whether you are reporting a problem you found or requesting that new content be added. This helps the team understand the fundamental nature of your submission right away.
problem report
You found something that isn't working correctly, is confusing, or seems wrong.
new content request
You think something is missing or could be added to make the toolkit better.
In essence, this template provides a structured way for users – whether they are scientists using the methodological sections or creatives engaging with the collaboration guidance – to clearly communicate issues or suggest improvements to the CitiObs Community-led Action Toolkit. It ensures that all necessary information is provided for the feedback to be effectively reviewed and potentially incorporated into future versions of the toolkit.
The easiest way to contribute is via a GitHub issue and, if you can, a Pull request. This process can be scary at first, but it's the way it's done in the open source community.
The urgency of environmental issues is often a powerful reason for communities to get involved. However, keeping that motivation high over the long term in a Citizen Observatory can be challenging. The goal of this section is to help your community feel empowered to brainstorm ideas and step up to lead and take collective action.
Taking action doesn’t need to wait until you’re collecting data. Whether you’re just starting out or already deep in community science processes, you can integrate meaningful action at any stage.
A vital first step is to create an inclusive environment where people feel welcome to contribute ideas, share perspectives, and participate actively. This kind of supportive space is essential for creativity and collaboration to thrive.
Communities are more likely to stay engaged when they feel empowered and involved in shaping the response to the issues they care about. While environmental concerns often trigger participation, maintaining momentum requires deliberate strategies. Here, we explore ways to keep that momentum alive—recognizing the long-term effort it takes to sustain engagement.
Designing settings where ideas can be shared, refined, and acted upon is key. Whether online or in person, giving participants time and space to contribute in a judgment-free atmosphere strengthens collective energy and encourages innovation. Below are two practical tools to kick-start this process:
If your action makes an impact in your context and you want to scale it or inspire others to do the same, the tools and reflections you used during this process will be essential. Replication is about transferring not only actions but also values, methods, and learnings.
Replication strengthens impact and expands reach. It shows that local knowledge and grassroots innovation can be shared, adapted, and multiplied. It also invites collaboration across contexts and builds a stronger, more resilient network of action.
This section builds upon other sections of this toolkit, such as and the . Using the digital presence channels, the community could think of sharing the tools employed online, or even publishing the work formally. An additional tool could be to share any design or work in open repositories listed below.
Document your process clearly (include challenges and pivots)
Share open-source tools or templates
Create a simple guide or “starter kit” for other groups
Develop a community-led action plan.
Your action plan is where ideas meet reality. It's a roadmap that outlines what your community (CO), creatives, and other partners will actually do, when, and how. It helps everyone involved get on the same page, understand their roles, and move forward with confidence.
This stage is often iterative – it’s normal for things to evolve as you learn more and engage deeper. That’s why we recommend revisiting your scope and goals here. Adjusting now can save confusion later.
Finding creatives to work with
Partnering with local cultural, artistic, and creative communities can strengthen citizen-led actions. Artists and creatives bring new perspectives, amplify underrepresented voices, and increase the visibility and emotional impact of your initiative. And the good news? Many creatives are just as concerned with the climate and social issues as you are.
This section offers practical ways to identify and connect with artists, designers, and cultural practitioners, locally and across Europe, through networks like the New European Bauhaus and Distributed Design Platform.
Connect with networks that can help spread your work (e.g. other Citizen Observatories or environmental coalitions)
Ensure collaborative work
Try to involve the community in the process, and aim for activities that generate trust and synergies, adding value to knowledge and experiences, and empowering all participants to take ownership of the citizen-led action. The value of citizen-led actions frequently resides in the collaborative production and collective practice processes, as well as the experience of realising a joint action, rather than solely the planned outcomes.
Embrace flexibility
In some cases, the planned results may differ from the actual results achieved, but if the collective outcomes are satisfactory to the group, embracing flexibility will help manage the group motivation and avoid unnecessary frustration.
Plan for what happens after
In case you alter the public space, you may need to consult whether that’s possible in your local context and make decisions based on that.
What is the current behavior?
This is where you describe the situation as it is now.
If you are submitting a problem report, you should explain what you are currently seeing or experiencing that is incorrect or problematic.
If the current behaviour is a problem, please provide the details of where you found it (which page and section). This is crucial for problem reports as it helps the team locate the exact part of the toolkit you are referring to.
What would you improve?
This is where you propose your solution or suggestion. You explain what you think should be changed or added.
What is the motivation / use case for changing the behavior?
This explains why your suggestion is important or how it would be used. This provides context for your feedback and helps the team understand the benefit of implementing your proposed change or adding the new content.
Other information
This is a space for any additional details that might be relevant but don't fit neatly into the categories above.
You can mark the launch of your action plan with a small event or meeting – something simple to build excitement and invite broader community support.
Creating an action plan is not just about logistics—it's a tool for building trust, clarity, and collaboration.
Here’s what it helps you do:
Define realistic activities, timelines, and expectations
Align everyone’s roles, especially when working with creatives or external partners
Identify key resources and gaps, using your mapping results
Keep the momentum going by making the path ahead visible and shared
It also provides a visual snapshot of your goals, helping you and your group feel grounded and motivated.
This step is about working together to map out:
What needs to happen?
Who does what?
When and with what resources?
If you’re working with creatives, this is a critical moment to build mutual understanding. You’ll need to:
Schedule one or more induction meetings so creatives can learn about the community and its context
Allow time for the creative to do research and development
Involve them early on—ideally since the Initiation stage—to support co-creation
Below you will find a few resources you can use to map this out:
Finding the right creatives can feel overwhelming, especially without existing ties to the cultural sector. But creatives don’t only exist in galleries or design firms—they’re in local associations, grassroots collectives, and emerging networks. Knowing where and how to look will speed up outreach and make collaboration more intentional, strategic, and ultimately more impactful.
To start, clarify what role creatives should play in your Citizen Observatory (CO). Use the culture/SHIFT framework to guide your thinking:
What kind of role are you looking for?
Conceptual and strategic thinker?
Workshop facilitator or community engager?
Someone producing specific creative outputs?
Who should they work with?
CO members, specific communities, or the general public?
What level of experience is needed?
Do you need a seasoned professional or is it an opportunity for emerging talent?
What creative skills are essential?
Workshop design, graphic facilitation, participatory art, speculative design, etc.
Experience with specific groups (e.g., children, policy-makers, academic settings)?
Once you’ve defined your needs, start mapping potential partners:
Step 1: Identify Creative Nodes
Look for hubs and networks that gather creative talent:
Local community
Cultural associations, design schools, fab labs, community art centers.
European networks
Distributed Design Platform: A go-to place for makers, designers, and digital creatives → .
New European Bauhaus Dashboard: Find projects and people combining sustainability, inclusivity, and aesthetics → .
Step 2: Run a Stakeholder Mapping
Use the to evaluate the relevance and dynamics of local creatives and organisations.
This framework was designed to help you understand the following:
Local creatives’ influence and reach
Existing collaborations
This section highlights key methods that can be collectively developed with the Citizen Observatory participants and creatives to enhance visibility. A creative communication strategy and strategically utilising different communication channels, both online and offline, can effectively promote our community-led action and help us to both, engage in our local context, and potentially tap into broader networks such as the Distributed Design Platform.
Remember, a multi-faceted creative approach is key to increasing visibility. Your community-led action can reach a broader audience by combining a strong social media campaign, connecting to existing creative networks, offline communication efforts and online digital presence.
Visibility helps create awareness and generate interest among community members, potential participants, and stakeholders. It allows for effective communication of the community-led action's objectives, benefits, and unique features, ultimately attracting more individuals to engage and participate. Increased visibility leads to broader support, collaboration opportunities, and potential partnerships, further enhancing the action's success.
This section provides a range of tools that can serve as guides and sources of inspiration for enhancing the visibility of your community-led action that can be collectively developed with creatives and artists. Whether you are seeking guidance on social media campaigns, offline communication in the neighbourhood, establishing an online digital presence, or connecting with the communication channels of the Distributed Design Platform, these resources will equip you with insights and tools to make your action more visible and impactful.
If you are planning a more complex community-led action, you want to continue it or seek more resources for the future, we recommend that you do an impact measurement that later supports the value of the action. If your action is smaller or one-off, it’s OK to skip this step.
To gauge the impact of our community-led action to protect the environment and determine if the anticipated effects are being generated, we should track the achievement of these results, ideally by the monitoring of a specific set of indicators. Additionally, impact management implies the treatment of the information obtained, monitoring of indicators, review, improvement or correction of aspects of our action, to finally communicate the impact.
Keeping in mind the following aspects of our community-led action will facilitate impact measurement: (1) the environmental problem we aim to solve and the changes we seek to generate, (2) the stakeholders who will perceive these changes, and (3) the appropriate indicators to measure the degree of change. In the community-led action measurement process, it is recommended to verify the results using measurement tools and communicate them effectively.
The measurement process is a very relevant component of any community-led action, as it enables us to verify and understand whether we are achieving our proposed goals and analyse our performance level in relation to the established objectives. This process involves a series of procedures that help to make the changes we seek to achieve tangible, measurable, and well-grounded. Overall, impact measurement allows us to understand the benefits, learning, or other effects resulting from our community-led action to protect the environment. It is centered around the people who are the action target or beneficiaries, as they are the ones experiencing the changes.
In this section, a variety of tools are available to ensure that the outcomes align with the set objectives and planned activities. Guidelines are provided as a reference to establish a system for measuring and managing impact from the initial approach of the community-led action, providing insight into its starting point and intended direction. The Theory of Change is proposed as a strategy in this regard, allowing for a connection to be made with specific impact objectives, activities, and resources required for their achievement. This systematised the process, enabling measurement, management, and improvement.
Issue
Noise pollution
Participant size
25
Location
Plaça de la Virreina, Barcelona, Spain
Short description
As part of the CitiObs project, the Barcelona case study tackled the pressing issue of noise pollution in Plaça de la Virreina, a vibrant public square in the Grà cia district. While beloved for its lively atmosphere, the square’s popularity has led to ongoing tensions between social activity and residential well-being. To respond to this, FRC Barcelona initiated a community-led process using the CitiObs Creative and Community-led Action Toolkit, blending quantitative noise data with qualitative insights and creative proceses. This had led to a series of co-creation activities with local residents, professionals, and creative — hosted at the Ateneu de Fabricació de Grà cia — resulting in the creation of an imaginative intervention: Rut, a fictional, AI-animated character that embodies the community’s concerns. Rut was designed to raise awareness in a playful yet powerful way, helping visitors and locals reflect on the impact of urban noise while preserving the anonymity and voices of the residents.
Long description
One significant challenge identified in Barcelona was noise pollution in Plaça de la Virreina, a lively square in the Grà cia neighborhood. The square is a vibrant gathering space where locals, community members, and tourists enjoy outdoor terraces, socialize, and embrace urban life. However, its popularity has also led to noise-related concerns for nearby residents. The challenge: how to balance the square's dynamic energy with respect for the neighbors' well-being and the environment? To address this, the FRC Barcelona co-created a creative, citizen-led intervention in the square. The initiative involved a series of collaborative activities, including collective ideation, prototyping sessions, and other co-creation workshops, leading to the creation of a unique interactive fictitious character named Rut. The first steps were led by the Citizen Observatory (CO) and started with the data collection of noise level patterns by the residents in different locations in the square, including Smart Citizen tool sensors installed in a few balconies. In parallel, qualitative data collection was also carried out through a survey approach called Diagnostico Ciudadano (which translates to Citizen Diagnosis) focusing on identifying the noise perception by the affected people in the surrounding area. Following this, two open calls were launched: the first invited the community to propose solutions for reducing noise levels, while the second, in collaboration with CitiObs and the Distributed Design Platform, invited creative talents willing to support the community in developing the selected idea. With the initial results in hand, the co-creation sessions began at the inspiring digital fabrication laboratory, Ateneu de Fabricació de Grà cia. These sessions brought together neighbors, professionals, and participants from the CO, guided by experts from the creative sector and supported by advanced technological and digital tools. The goal was to represent the local community while addressing the noise issues in Plaza de la Virreina. Rut served as a symbolic figure to highlight these challenges, fostering empathy and raising awareness among visitors, all while protecting the anonymity of residents by using artificial intelligence tools.
Reflection is cultural as well as technical. Consider holding team debriefs, gathering testimonials, journaling your journey, or using storytelling as a collective sense-making tool. Ask yourselves what surprised you, what challenged you, and what inspired you. Make space for honest conversations and collective learning.
Because reflection fuels growth and a healthy environment for collaboration. It helps us connect action to meaning, see unintended outcomes, and carry wisdom into future collective efforts. It is also part of care, for ourselves, our communities, and the ecosystems we engage with.
Use simple formats such as team reflections, community feedback circles, or visual storytelling. Revisit your and ask if your assumptions held true. Celebrate things you have achieved, even small ones, and acknowledge what didn’t go as planned. That’s where learning starts.
A group photo exhibition showing before-and-after environmental changes with personal stories from participants.
and This two platforms provide several examples and inspiration through a catalogue of different citizen science projects. Engaging in peer exchanges within Citizen Observatories enables initiatives to share experiences, challenges, and best practices with other organisations or individuals working in similar fields.
Leveraging on creative approaches
Involving local creatives in citizen-led actions can aid in combining different approaches and dynamic practices to create impactful experiences for diverse audiences (more on this in this section). There are many other ways we can build these connections depending on our needs and expectations: simply by reaching out to already known local groups or by creating open calls or hackathons. However, the focus here is to provide tools for COs to define what is expected from external collaborators, what level of experience is required, and what skills are needed. Then, tools and guidelines are provided aiming to support the process of reaching out to creative individuals and communities and promote a mutually beneficial relationship between the participants.
Citizen Observatories can trigger a variety of positive changes. Their impacts can range from changes in public awareness and understanding to changes in people's individual behaviour, or directly improving and taking care of the environment. All these are of great importance, and while many Citizen Observatories aim for one or more of these changes, each type may require divergent, deliberate action to be achievable (check this for further information). Before embarking on the implementation of our citizen-led action, we should collectively define and agree on its scope or, in other words, what are the objectives of the citizen-led action, its desired outcomes (the desired changes that should result from the project, which are related to the overall challenge being addressed), the scale (local, regional, national…), the duration and its outputs (the things that are done or created in the course of the work, which may be physical or practical (such as a workshop).This involves a collective reflection process by the CO, linking them with the identified environmental problems or needs that require attention, and aligning them with the impacts sought by your Citizen Observatory.
Before you can bring a community-led action to life, you need a solid understanding of what you have, and what you don’t. This means taking account of your community’s strengths: spaces, data, tools, networks, skills, and communication channels. It also means acknowledging gaps: which competencies are missing? Where do you need support? Getting clear on this early helps you avoid burnout and blind spots later. If certain skills are lacking, such as communication, visual storytelling, or facilitation, you might consider teaming up with creatives or tapping into other local collaborators.
Partners
Types of stakeholders enagaged
Citizens, creatives (designers and makers), bar owner, local community organisations, scientists
Tools used
* Creative Radar * Creative Power: Co-designing an open call for creatives with the Distributed Design Platform * Collective Ideation * Starfish model
Impact & Learnings
This exciting citizen-led action has generated invaluable insights for the CitiObs project by showcasing the power of merging diverse skills, such as behavioral change methods, digital tools, and citizen participation, to develop collaborative solutions. Through the use of structured feedback loops, these activities helped to continuously refine and improve both the tools and methodologies available for future Citizen Observatories. The experience in Barcelona demonstrates how creative, community-centered solutions can address urban challenges while empowering local residents.
Links & documentation
A shared digital diary or Miro board where team members post reflections anonymously.
An open community forum to share results, receive feedback, and discuss future ideas.
Before you rush into action, step back and take a moment to plan. Defining the scope of your community-led initiative is not just a planning step — it’s the backbone of long-term impact. Whether your Citizen Observatory (CO) aims to shift awareness, spark behavioural change, or directly address an environmental issue, clarity on your objectives, outcomes, and scale will ensure your energy is well-placed and your progress is measurable.
Defining the scope means agreeing on:
Objectives: What are we trying to achieve?
Desired outcomes: What changes should this action trigger?
Outputs: What will we produce or do (e.g. workshops, media, campaigns)?
Scale: Is it local, regional, national?
Duration: How long will it take?
This collective reflection links your CO’s intentions with real-world environmental issues — and with the kind of change you actually want to see. Different goals demand different strategies, resources, skills, and tactics. So yes, it’s worth the time to get this right.
Start with these key questions, using these prompts to lead your group into a productive conversation:
What are we seeking to achieve?
What are the aims of our project?
What outcomes do we want — both tangible and intangible?
What will we create, document, or deliver?
What’s the best scale and timeline for this?
If your action is more ambitious, check out the section on Impact measurement to plan for broader outcomes.
As a guidance, some of these questions will help understanding the scope of the project and help us defining next steps. For example, for citizen-led actions that are larger in scale or outcomes, might want to visit the impact measurement section too. Below we include some tools that can help navigate this process:
Shared values and motivations
Understanding the terms of the collaboration with external communities, especially with a focus on artists and creatives, is an important step as it involves external potential collaborators who might have different dynamics than those of the CO. This process can happen naturally in many cases, but it’s important to keep it in mind so that collaborations can be fruitful at both personal and collective levels.
You can use the stakeholder analysis tool to find a node near you. Alternatively, you can reach out to one of the existing networks and directly reach out to creatives and organisations through there. Or in case you are aware of an existing node or association.
Make sure that you have clear what, when and how you would like to involve the creatives in your citizen-led action journey. Ideally creatives are part of this journey as early as possible, as they add value and quality to the work. A brief, in shape of a one-page PDF can help to summarize your ideas and make clear to new team members what the objectives and expectations are.
Have in mind that the creatives’ support will add value to your citizen-led action. The creatives’ participation should not have as the only objective “making things pretty”. In case you cannot offer monetary support, try to find other alternative reciprocal (mutually beneficial) exchanges that benefit you and the creative practitioners (that go beyond just visibility of their work).
This conversation should be held closely with the creatives, to ensure that expectations are clearly agreed upon.
More on that in the next section Working with Creatives.
Mapping your resources is not just a planning formality—it’s how you ensure your community-led action is realistic, strategic, and resilient. Without knowing what you’re working with, you can easily overpromise and underdeliver. Plus, understanding your team’s skills and gaps helps you reach out to the right people, build stronger networks, and create more sustainable outcomes. Later in the process, this clarity will help you identify potential partners—like cultural organisations, local governments, or NEB members—and make your case when asking for support.
The tools shown below will guide you through a clear, structured resource-mapping process. These frameworks will help you visualise what you have, what you need, and who can help. The goal: build a dynamic, interconnected system that reflects your community’s unique strengths and potential. Don’t just think in terms of physical stuff—include skills, relationships, and local know-how. For help connecting with artists and creatives, check the next section on Working with Creatives.
Once your Citizen Observatory (CO) has gathered a range of ideas, it’s time to shift gears – from generating possibilities to taking steps toward real action. This stage is all about collectively choosing the most relevant paths forward and keeping up the energy by moving toward practical outcomes. Using tools from this section, especially when paired with Resources Mapping, your community can assess feasibility, make decisions together, and start shaping clear next steps.
This is also the moment by bringing in creative collaborators – local artists, designers, or makers – who can introduce fresh thinking and facilitate new ways of selecting and refining ideas. These tools are designed to spark creativity, support collaboration, and make sure that the final direction reflects the community’s values and capacity for change.
Narrowing down ideas helps turn early enthusiasm into tangible progress. It keeps momentum alive and builds clarity around what to work on next. This process invites diverse voices to find common ground and ensures the final idea is both representative and action-oriented. Involving external stakeholders or creatives at this stage can strengthen ideas with fresh insights and broaden support.
Now that your Citizen Observatory (CO) is moving into a “decision-making mode”, it’s time to explore six practical tools that help refine ideas, prioritise efforts, and imagine real-world impact. These methods are designed to spark discussion, weigh options, and guide your group toward action that feels both meaningful and feasible.
Whether you're designing your own Citizen Observatory (CO) or deepening an existing one, these tools and references can help you align vision with action, connect community efforts to policy, and shape meaningful interventions for the future.
Safe (easy wins, but less inspiring)
Best avoided (low value, hard to realise)
It’s a powerful way to prioritise efforts and stay aligned with what matters.
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