JC @ Intergenerational Play Space at Jat Min Chuen

Project Period

2022 - ongoing

Location

Jat Min Chuen, Yiu Wai St, Sha Tin, Hong Kong

Project Lead

Jockey Club Design Institute for Social Innovation (J.C.DISI) of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU)

Project Background & Inspiration

In a high-density city like Hong Kong, communal areas in housing estates are vital for relaxation and social activities, but age-segregated designs and age-specific play and fitness equipment often hinder intergenerational play and interactions.

Since 2019, J.C.DISI has been pioneering “Intergenerational (IG) Play” as a socially innovative approach to address the challenges of “Double Ageing” – the ageing population and ageing housing stock. This initiative involves multi-disciplinary collaborations, prototyping, and community co-design. In 2022, with strong support from the Hong Kong Housing Society (HKHS) as a strategic partner and funding from the Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust, J.C.DISI began collaborating with HKHS and local partners to implement this concept at Jat Min Chuen (JMC). The goal is to develop a replicable “software-led hardware design” model for transforming public spaces in housing estates through the IG play space concept, thereby building social capital in the community and supporting older adults to age in place.

JMC is among one of the first public housing estates in Shatin, with over 40% of the population being 65+ and 25% of the elderly population being 75+; despite its high concentration of seniors, the estate itself is still relatively young, making it an ideal location to test the IG play space concept. 

What happened in the project?

1. Community and user habit studies through tactical urbanism experiments

Various public engagement activities, such as the ‘IG Fun Day’, ‘IG Inclusion Festival’ were organised in collaboration with HKHS, Hong Kong Federation of Youth Groups and J.C.DISI’s project team to understand the existing public spaces users’ patterns, explore the potentials of community space and residents’ aspirations towards the community. 

2. Participatory co-design workshops

In collaboration with MLKK Studio and GoodLab, J.C.DISI organised three community co-creation workshops in JMC, engaging over 110 residents and local stakeholders in March 2023. Utilising participatory co-design, participants delved into their pain points, needs and aspirations for the community, where their insights and feedback formed the foundation for the design principles crafting a bottom-up design concept that fosters and incentivises intergenerational engagement around JMC.

Project Impact and Key Takeaway

Prototyping is an effective way to incentivise and solicit ideas from community stakeholders on how to design an enabling environment to suit their needs as well as pre-empting facilities management concerns. This also acts as an initial-stage consensus building exercise to test their receptiveness towards the new play space design concept.
A successful third place requires the design consultant and facilities management team to incorporate community voices and feedback at the project inception stage – not later. Local knowledge and stakeholder feedback will inspire the team to consider new ways to enhance accessibility, safety, comfort and legibility in the new landscape and playscape while extending residents’ ‘stay time’ and ‘play time’ at the re-modelled public realm.

INNOVATION

Adopting an age-integration mindset in reimagining our open space to promote intergenerational interactions and incentivise physical activity

Innovating a replicable “hardware + software” model for futureproofing our housing stock to improve intergenerational harmony and support ageing in place

Supporting service innovation through cross-sector collaboration and social capital development

COLLABORATION

A collaborative effort involving funders, developers, estate management teams, academia, local residents, NGOs, local schools, and businesses within the community aims to understand and realise their aspirations. This is achieved through co-designing both hardware and software program solutions to foster an intergenerational community and support ageing in place:

1. A partnership between HKHS, HKFYG, J.C.DISI, and PolyU focuses on developing soft programmes, particularly on social design, health management and service learning opportunities.
2. Synergies between J.C.DISI’s concept of intergenerational play and HKHS’ “Caring Engaging Smart” initiative aim to create an environment conducive to intergenerational co-living, supporting HKHS’ Social and Elderly Wellness initiatives.

EMPOWERMENT

Building social capital for the community – residents are empowered to share their aspirations and collectively contribute to an inclusive environment for all, while fostering an intergenerational community to care for each other.

Encouraging residents of all ages and abilities to adopt a smart, healthy and active lifestyle and support at-risk older adults to be more physically active.