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research article

Operationalizing Switzerland-wide democratic transformation to functional resilient 8-minute neighborhoods

Nick, S  
•
Sharma, E  
November 1, 2025
Journal of Physics: Conference Series

Transforming housing and mobility towards sustainability, resilience, and wellbeing requires action at the neighborhood level, where people experience daily life and make mobility choices. While Switzerland's national and cantonal policies set ambitious climate targets and promote building renovation, local implementation remains fragmented due to weak local democratic engagement in housing and mobility governance, as well as inconsistent metrics and planning tools. In this paper, we introduce a structured framework for neighborhood-scale transformation, defining accessibility scores and maps for essential daily services, operationalizing and further developing the 15-minute city concept. These tools can help communes and cantons identify priority areas, sequence interventions, and facilitate democratic deliberation based on objective data. Applying this approach to Geneva, we demonstrate significant potential, improving 8-minute Accessibility Scores from 47.87 to 78.34 for an average-served commune, and 58.63 to 77.59 for the canton of Geneva. Future research should scale this framework nationally, incorporating actual democratic decisions and sensitivity analysis to improve robustness. By bridging the gap between high-level policy goals and local decision-making, our work contributes to more effective, inclusive, and evidence-based urban transformations.

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Type
research article
DOI
10.1088/1742-6596/3140/16/162004
Author(s)
Nick, S  

EPFL

Sharma, E  

EPFL

Date Issued

2025-11-01

Publisher

IOP Publishing

Published in
Journal of Physics: Conference Series
Special issue title

CISBAT 2025

Volume

3140

Issue

16

Article Number

162004

Subjects

housing transformation

•

neighborhood-scale transformation

•

8-minute city

•

service accessibility

•

democratic governance

•

urban planning

Editorial or Peer reviewed

REVIEWED

Written at

EPFL

EPFL units
LEURE  
FunderFunding(s)Grant NumberGrant URL

Swiss Federal Office of Energy

SWICE

https://sweet-swice.ch
RelationRelated workURL/DOI

IsDerivedFrom

Operationalizing Switzerland-wide democratic transformation to functional resilient 8-minute neighborhoods

https://infoscience.epfl.ch/handle/20.500.14299/253767
Available on Infoscience
November 28, 2025
Use this identifier to reference this record
https://infoscience.epfl.ch/handle/20.500.14299/256418
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