Tactical Urbanism as an Innovative Urban Governance Tool: Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately impacted urban communities, particularly those with vulnerable populations, prior inequalities, and poverty. Tactical Urbanism (TU), characterized by short-term, low-cost, scalable interventions with a vision for long-term change, has gained attention as a means of promoting urban resiliency in the built environment. Viewing through the lens of urban governance, this chapter introduces TU as an open and collective innovation ecosystem in the real-life setting that has the potential to tackle some of the long-standing local problems in the post-pandemic era. The chapter provides an overview of TU practice and research by reviewing academic and grey literature, as well as studying various TU examples implemented in public open spaces after the COVID-19 outbreak. The main aim of this study is to understand the factors that have made TU an increasingly relevant and widely used approach in public open space transformation during the COVID-19 pandemic. By examining the driving forces behind its recognition and adoption, we hope to shed light on the potential value of TU as a powerful governance tool for fostering innovation in urban environments. The way that short-term, low-cost, unsanctioned innovations can eventually lead to sanctioned practices demonstrates the importance of TU in enabling bottom-up initiatives to inform top-down processes. Through active participation, experimentation, and co-creation, this approach can help ensure that public space interventions are responsive to the needs of the community, particularly underserved communities. And as a result, it can contribute to the co-creation of more resilient and equitable cities under uncertainty.