Workshop 22.02

Yesterday we experienced the workshop. I think that even if we were a bit stressed and hesitant sometimes, it went quite well as we found new ideas for our project.

Once our project was presented, we came up with a first question :

-What would you do if you were us ?

These first 5 minutes were kinda brainstorming and each group wrote down ideas they had first in mind. This question was quite successfull as we collected new ideas.
Then, we ask them to pick one idea out and try to find the strategy to achieve it.

A group came up with the idea of creating a 3D-model in order to have a best view of the area. This model could help us when meeting local inhabitants for instance as it could make them visualise easily the area and realise the scope of the project.

A group gave us some example of places with fish farms and hydropower plants which is very helpfull so that we can know what it is possible to do in this kind of project.

Another group thought about transforming the old buildings into museums, cafe, restaurant and focalises in the tourism of the area.

As a last question, we ask the groupe to think about :

- How to reach people ?

A lot of ideas were pointing out : Internet, local newspapers, meetings ... And also the idea to work with and not against Fortum, to cooperate with them. It means to try avoiding "Fortum against inhabitants".

So this workshop has been very helfull, thanks to everyone, we now have more details about what we have to do during the next few weeks. The first step will be to contact the local inhabitants and try to meet Fortum as we've already contacted them, the discussion seems fairly open, it's a start !!

-Caroline

Last saturday, we visited the northern area of our site where the Mustinjoki river meets the Lohjanjälvi(Lohja Lake). We could see one dam, also a church and a manor by the river.

One of the iron mills by the river in Peltokoski

Mustion Kirkko (Mustio Church)

Mustion Linna (Mustio Manor) is adjacent to this church and these area are at the point where the river and lake meets. Now these buildings in the manor area are open as a hotel, restaurant, museum, conferences and so on. (Unfortunately it was closed on weekend...)

You can see information about Mustion Linna

http://www.mustionlinna.fi/

View of the lake

-Meiko

Study trip and something else

On Saturday our group went for a study trip to see the culture around the river. We visited Mustio and the cultural areas and dams close to the village. It was nice to see the cultural sights of the area and to get to know the area.

Tomorrow we will be presenting our workshop. In my opinion it is quite exciting, because none of us has facilitated a workshop before.. Anyway, we know what we are trying to get from our workshop and it is interesting to see what comes out. Hopefully it will be interesting and go well :)

Next week we are going to contact local associations as well. We have chosen to contact village associations and local fisherman's society. At the moment our plan is to interview some suitable persons from the associations and to send a questionnaire for all of the members of the associations. Of course first we must contact them and ask if they are interested in participating at all. :) We already contacted Fortum and will get more information from them in March.

- Mika

I report here my notes from our last meeting with Ulla about the project plan, step by step. These are the points we have to change.

1- Background

How the project is based on the background informations.
Fortum : explain what is and will be the role of the company in our wowhat kind of rk.

2- Stakeholders

Analysis : what kind of relevance/importance (hierarchy) each stakeholder has in our plan.
Who will benefit of our plan on a short term ? Remember that the tourists will benefit of it on a long term, we are not directly concerned about them, they have no links with our work.

3- Objectives : plan + article

Our relation with Fortum will define precisely our objectives.
Actions : design chanels, restore buildings, etc are the ways for us to reach our objectives.
Our plan : DREAM(S) from people, but we have to choice wich category of ''dreams'' (commercial, schoolar, for artists, farmers...? )(the ''dream of somebody''). To reach the people dream : contact a village network, Fortum, architects/urbanist who can know some staff about the place(s).
Try to know about Fortum plans : their participatory methods and meetings, their plan(s), and maybe we can improve these plan(s).

4- Results : not necessary part, everything is already say on the part 3

5 (8) - Organisation/project managment

That's it, but i think this could help :)

Léa

Us (the group) + the most crucial (for us) stakeholders.

strategic points : visit 07.02.10

Water fronts

Views from and to Karjaa Church


Karjaa river parc

Billnäs area : pittoresque, touristic place with restaurants and boutiques

Project planning

We had a meeting with Ulla on Thursday. We decided that our approach for the project would be to contact the local people and to do a visionary plan about their needs and wants. Our work would be like a dream of the inhabitants - a vision of the future of the area. Before that we will contact Fortum to find out what kind of work are they doing with the river so that our work would bring new ideas and not to overlap with something that they are doing.

Probably we will interview the representatives of local associations because organizing an event for the inhabitants would be difficult and take a lot of time.

Today I found at least two associations:
http://www.probillnas.fi/
http://www.mustio.fi/kylayhdistys_byarad/

We can contact them and some local actors to know if there are more suitable associations. We'll probably interview only similar associations so that the work would represent one perspective well (for example the point of view of the local inhabitants).

- Mika

Karjaa trip

Last week-end, we went to Karjaa to explore the watersides of the river and to discover this area trying to understand the context in which we'll have to recreate the fishways.

Some views of Karjaa, a lot of wooden colorfull houses.

Then we visited the site of one of the 4 iron mills : Billnäs


- Caroline

Participatory methods lectures

Even though we hadn't a clear idea of what will be the project speaking of work plan, means, budget and so on, these lectures helped us to focus on what are the headlines of the Mustionjoki River Restoration.

We also found out what could be the background of the area (Mustionjoki valley), the beneficiaries and other stakeholders of the project.

We came up with one question : How to create a perfect relationship between a natural model area and environmental-friendly industrial activities ?

- Caroline

Starting to progress

Our group's work has started a bit slowly and we have still many things that should be considered. The background study has been a quite challenging because there is not so much literature about the river. Also, we are dealing with wide range of different things. Our objective is both cultural and ecological restoration. The culture of the area used to be strongly related to fishing but it is difficult to estimate how important fishing would be for the culture nowadays. Nevertheless migrating fishes are important for the river ecosystem.

We are planning to do a plan which would distract the production of hydro power as much as possible although Fortum has stated that the local hydro power plants are not financially significant for them. Anyhow, cultural and ecological restoration are not disturbing each other. For example endangered shellfish population of the river needs migrating fishes (salmon or trout) for reproduction. Mustionjoki used to be a very good river for fishing and we think that if it would be restored ecologically it would bring tourism to the area. There are not so many good fishing rivers in Uusimaa area.

This week we are finishing our project plan and have a meeting with the mentors on Thursday. Probably then we will have a better understanding about what kind of planning would be reasonable. Probably we are not going to technical details, but are trying to wind visionary plans for the area. Fortum probably has enough technical knowledge about building wish ways etc. We will try to find the things that would be important for the local people and do a plan which would arouse their interest. If the plan is published in local newspapers it hopefully creates debates about the future of the area as well.

Our group visited the area last weekend. Now we have more concrete knowledge about the area and we can start to make plans better. We'll do a lot of brainstorming in the near future!

- Mika