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It has been suggested that “space and artifacts constitute systems of communication which organizations build up within themselves” (Gagliardi, 1992a, b, p. vi) and reflect the cultural life within that organization. This is a study of how the “landscape” of a public library (“Library X”), as an information retrieval system, relates to the values of the people who created it. The efforts here are geared towards understanding the physical instantiation of institutional culture and, more specifically, institutional values as they are reflected through the artifact.

This exploratory study, a Ph.D. dissertation completed at the University of Western Ontario in 2013, examines the materially embedded relations of power between library users and staff in public libraries and how building design regulates spatial behavior according to organizational objectives. It considers three public library buildings as organization spaces (Dale & Burrell, 2008) and determines the extent to which their spatial organizations reproduce the relations of power between the library and its public that originated with the modern public library building type ca. 1900. Adopting a multicase study design, I conducted site visits to three, purposefully selected public library buildings of similar size but various ages. Site visits included: blueprint analysis; organizational document analysis; in-depth, semi-structured interviews with library users and library staff; cognitive mapping exercises; observations; and photography.

Despite newer approaches to designing public library buildings, the use of newer information technologies, and the emergence of newer paradigms of library service delivery (e.g., the user-centered model), findings strongly suggest that the library as an organization still relies on many of the same socio-spatial models of control as it did one century ago when public library design first became standardized. The three public libraries examined show spatial organizations that were designed primarily with the librarian, library materials, and library operations in mind far more than the library user or the user’s many needs. This not only calls into question the public library’s progressiveness over the last century but also hints at its ability to survive in the new century.

In the performance measurement and management research field, the applicability of performance measurement systems (PMS) in nonprofit organizations (NPOs) and public administration has been considered a challenge. The diversity of these organizations makes it difficult to define proper terminology and organizational characteristics. PMS evolution has not yet been able to capture all performance dimensions of a public administration and, especially for NPO considering its dynamic and multiple goals. The purpose of this paper is to provide a conceptual framework that identifies and classifies the factors that influence the design of PMSs in NPOs and public administration.

The study was developed through a systematic literature review (SLR). A set of 29 papers were intensely studied, and the results provide a multi-disciplinary and holistic set of factors.

A set of ten factors that influence the design of PMSs in NPO and public administration were found. They were categorized into three groups: factor related to purpose, stakeholders and management.

The study synthesized the literature and provided a conceptual framework of the factors that influence the design of PMSs in NPO and public administration. No individual paper collected in the SLR shows a similar organization of the factors as the present paper. The set of factors indicates the importance of this study for NPO and public administration, and how complex a PMS in an NPO and public administration can become. The conceptual model presented can further assist practitioners in developing design process observing the role that the identified factors play.

The cultural imperative for public buildings in countries like Australia to maintain their intrinsic “openness” – physically and symbolically – faces particular challenges in the context of current global terrorism concerns. Building regulations and counter-terrorism guidelines coexist uneasily, with implications for both public amenity and safety. This is particularly evident in the context of current approaches to hostile vehicle (HV) mitigation.

Based on a review of comparative literature, this multidisciplinary project assimilates design aesthetics and security expertise to assess the advantages and limitations of current counter-terrorism design approaches in Australia, the UK and the USA. The research focusses on public buildings of high cultural symbolic value (e.g. concert halls) in the context of HV mitigation.

Two key recommendations emerge. The first presents the benefits of adopting a layered security strategy tailored to a building's security and symbolic profile mix. The second proposes enhancements to the existing counter-terrorism guidelines based on a model that accounts for both symbolic value and openness.

The research presents new strategies for urban design and security stakeholders to balance openness and security in the design of publicly accessible buildings. While existing research addresses the challenges of terrorism in the design of public space, a literature (and practice) gap exists in Australia, the UK and the USA regarding current approaches to the design of public buildings. Using Australia as a case study, the findings will inform government and industry practitioners seeking more complementary approaches to public amenity and safety in comparable counter-security design contexts globally.

The aim of this work is to provide an initial picture of how some design agencies are contributing toward a paradigm shift and how they are developing in the future to better inform design policies and interdisciplinary work. There is a general agreement that the current government and public sector structure and modes of operation need radical transformation. In this scenario, a shift from New Public Management towards New Public Governance paradigm has been auspicated. Design has attracted attention as a potential approach to support this transformation, but research into Service Design, as well as discussions on its future development, for public sector innovation is limited. This paper is an exploratory study into the individual work of seven representative UK design agencies operating for and within the public sector.

The paper reviews literature on public sector reform and innovation to inform comparative studies of contemporary design agencies working for public sector reform. Interviews with seven designers from NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement, Participle, Innovation Unit, Uscreates, Collaborative Change, Futuregov and Snook are conducted to review their perceived role for public sector reform, their design approaches, exemplar projects and main challenges.

Emerging design strategies for Public Sector reform are: a collaborative design approach that considers all stakeholders as equal co-creators of public value; operating at different complementary levels to aim at systemic change; designing from the inside out (innovation culture) and outside in (market change). These different strategies imply the development of possible different business models. Existing creative tensions appear between embedding and outsourcing strategies, acting as facilitators vs designers, developing both designing and service delivery roles.

This paper is based on a limited sample of design agencies, and it is not a systematic study into the impact of their design work, which should be the object of a following study.

This paper brings Service Design practice into public sector innovation debate to inform future interdisciplinary research and innovation policies. It positions existing design innovation strategies within the wider picture of public sector reform to support a more informed design practice.

Few studies have looked at the UK design agencies for public sector innovation and discussed their possible future developments. This paper provides an original and holistic description of design for public sector innovation with considerations on how it should be interpreted when developing supporting innovation and design policies.

There are two main aims of this conceptual paper. The first is to explore the issues associated with staging events in public spaces, and to produce a typology of different event spaces. The second is to explore if and how events should be designed into parks, streets and squares and whether this might reduce some of the negative impacts and associated user conflicts.

The paper analyses the history, drivers and effects of using public spaces as venues and examines the reciprocal relationships between events and the spaces that host them. To explain the range and dynamics of contemporary events, a typology of event spaces is developed. This typology highlights nine different types of event spaces which are differentiated by the level of public accessibility (free entry, sometimes free, paid entry), and the mobility of event audiences (static, limited mobility, mobile). Using this typology, the paper discusses ways that public spaces might be adapted to make them better suited to staging events. This discussion is illustrated by a range of examples.

The paper finds that it makes practical sense to adapt some urban public spaces to make them better equipped as venues, but designing in events presents new issues and does not necessarily resolve many of the problems associated with staging events. Disputes over events are inevitable and constituent features of public spaces.

This paper makes an original contribution by developing a new classification of event spaces and by synthesising ideas from urban design with ideas from the events literature.

This paper's main objective emphasizes the importance of waterfront design in coastal cities. It reveals that a location is associated with the activities it hosts to become attractive for people or, in other words, to be a destination. In this respect, it proposes students' concept projects for the selected waterfront field study in Istanbul.

This study's conceptual framework is designed according to the qualities compiled from the place-diagram and the power of 10+ (plus) concepts of the PPS (project for public spaces). Accordingly, a fieldwork study based on the qualitative and quantitative research method was conducted as fieldwork in the Istanbul Sarayburnu waterfront, where historical and touristic sight-seeings of the Golden Horn meet with the Bosphorus coastal line. In addition to photo-video recordings, survey questions were also prepared during the field study.

Survey questions inquiries multi questions searching for the place-diagram qualities provide suggestions of 90 people who responded in situ. Results of the case study highlight six alternative proposal projects for the fieldwork prepared based on the power of 10+ concept by the third grade students of the School of Architecture of Istanbul Sabahattin Zaim University (IZU). Based on the survey questions and literature review findings, 10 sub-spatial qualities of waterfronts were disaggregated at the end of the study.

The power of 10+ concept in the study provides a gauge for architects and urban planners; it gives them an excellent tool for assessing the quality of public spaces for placemaking in waterfronts.

Previous studies have generally been based on the PPS's place-diagram qualities with little mention of the interaction with the power of 10+ concept in placemaking. The proposed sub-qualities in the paper's conclusion contribute to architects and urban planners considering a model approach derived from those PPS concepts.

The tendency of urban environments to produce anxiety is well documented in a range of theoretical and historical literature, but there is little current work that considers how public spaces might be designed to alleviate anxiety among their users. This paper presents a series of case studies taken from a lighting design project on the Kentish Town Road in north London to show how urban design can create a more psychologically inclusive public realm — one that offers greater psychological comfort — by enhancing the engagement between users of urban spaces and their environment. The argument is presented in the context of broader issues of social inclusion and other current movements in urban design.

One of the possible systems of project delivery is design & build (D&B), which is widely used in many countries. In the Polish public procurement market, the D&B system has been applied for a relatively short time, only since 2004, and despite the possibility, so far public clients have applied the D&B system only occasionally. This paper describes the current status of using the D&B method in the public procurement sector in Poland. Five hundred and fifty eight completed public-sector projects have been subject to analysis. Items analysed include the design/builder method of award, and types and value of contracts. The results provide insights for owners, the advantages and disadvantages of the D&B system, and highlight the need to change the method of selecting the contractor for the D&B system.

This study aims to fill the lack of quantitative studies of user preferences in quasi-public spaces to observe the use of quasi-public spaces by questioning the contemporary needs of urban communities and to develop design strategies accordingly.

Within the scope of this study, public space design elements affecting users' preferences in the quasi-public spaces of the Podium Park shopping center in Bursa, Turkey were evaluated. By considering the spatial characteristics of the study area, 4 main and 15 subcriteria were determined and utilized by analytic hierarchy process (AHP). These criteria were evaluated by experts and locals with a participatory approach.

According to the obtained results, “events” (S2), “sun/shade” (C2), “safety” (P3) and “planting” (U4) subcriteria were determined as the vital elements for quasi-public spaces.

Although the concept of quasi-public space has been discussed for nearly 30 years, it has been observed that there are no quantitative studies to determine the criteria of user preferences in these open spaces in the literature. This study is the first quantitative research for user preferences in quasi-public spaces and there is no previous study on this subject and study area in Turkey.