Tacit knowledge transfer for city design

This methodology paper aims to inform a multinational competitive research grant application on research approaches for knowledge sharing and in particular, tacit knowledge. The overall project involves researchers, planners and city designers from three continents: Europe, Asia and Africa. The project aims to facilitate knowledge transfer from European model-cities to recipient cities in developing regions. The paper develops a critical review of research methods and techniques for tacit knowledge elicitation coupled with explicit knowledge sharing. Current methods for knowledge capture and its application in urban design overlay on explicit knowledge including the knowledge sharing frameworks under the EU Integrated Urban Development, Directorate-General Regional and Urban Policy. This paper proposes a complementary side to the current framework by applying the Repertory Grid Technique (RGT). RGT provides an approach and a method to externalise participants' knowledge and their tacit cognitive process. The technique links to Personal Construct Theory, thus building a sound theoretical framework. Knowledge transfer for the collaborative project is expected to take place across eight model and recipient cities. This paper provides an appropriate framework showing how knowledge elicitation can take place across project participants including expert city designers, planners and non-cognate stakeholders such as community representatives.