The report’s title is translated into English ”Rudkøbing Harbour now and in the future – a study of the potential for business development and new settlement for Langeland Municipal by developing Rudkøbing Harbour”. Langelang is an island and municipal in the Danish outskirt area and it is like many other muni-cipals in the outskirt of Denmark compared to Denmark as a whole threatened by declining and aging population, lower education and income level, higher rate of unemployment and by loss of work places in the industry.
The study was carried out from May 2010 to April 2011 and it continues an ongoing work on development of new methods based on the idea of activating local amenities and combining local growth strategies with architectural intervention in provincial towns in the rural outskirts. Theoretically the study’s method builds on literature on participatory democracy and on innovation and learning while the analytical framework draws on literature about experiences and about lifestyle and tourism habitus. Before the study was carried out a winner project in an international architect competition about the future plan and architecture for Rudkøbing Harbour and its connection to the town had been found.
The winner project served as point of departure for activating of local actors and the local resources and made up the framework for the participatory processes. The winner project included 10 pinpricks strategically placed in the harbor and its surrounding areas (front page illustration). To engage the local citizens firstly a focus group with persons from cultural life, business and well-known local engaged citizens was established and among those ambassadors for working groups - one for each of the 10 pinpricks - were elected. Then followed a citizen meeting at which the winner project and the study were presented. 89 locals participated in the meeting and among those 40 citizens from different part of local life and with diverse educational and socioeconomic backgrounds joined one of the working groups.
The 40 group members were invited to participate in three seminars with the following titles:
1. From idea to innovation;
2. From innovation to projects description, and
3. From project to political anchoring and financing.
The seminars were arranged on three Saturdays in autumn 2010 from 10 am to 4 pm. Experts were invited to support with details on the project developments and students were engaged to help the group members to write and formulate their ideas into a document. The study illustrates that with a guided process that included introduction to and use of advanced innovation and business strategies translated into everyday language, is was possible on the basis of the local citizens’ ideas to develop 10 innovative project descriptions and have them anchored at the local policy level.
The analysis of the types of experiences embedded in the 10 projects held against the lifestyle and tourism habitus showed that potentially the developing of Rudkøbing Harbor on the basis of local actors activating local amenities would able the Municipality to attract newcomers with higher educational level, tourism and entrepreneurs inside also creative business. In addition some of the activities included experiences that may attract city and conference tourists. Such potential newcomers, the entrepreneurship and the tourists are attractive to Langeland Municipal so that it becomes possible to change the downward spiral and improve the general socioeconomic status on the island.