On Friday 19 February, the SMC team held its MCA workshop at Willetton Sports Centre. Approximately 64 members of the community attended the workshop and the overall feeling was one of satisfaction and productivity. The team also held two open house sessions on Friday night and Saturday morning to display the raw results.

 

The participants in the workshop were asked to contribute to the listing of criteria for each of the three categories: environmental, social and economic. The lists were then collated and all workshop participants were asked to vote using a colour coded dot system. For each category, each participant was given 1 red dot (representing 3 votes), 1 yellow dot (representing 2 votes) and 10 blue or black dots (representing 1 vote each). The participants were asked to vote in three rounds for each of the three categories.

 

The SMC team have now collated the preliminary data, which can be downloaded via the following links:
 

*Note: the raw data tables contain all the original material and vote counts from the workshop, plus a preliminary ranking. The rankings will change when the consolidation process is finished.

 

Where to from here?

The team is undertaking a three stage process to consolidate the results of the MCA Workshop into ranked and measurable criteria for the design team. The first of these stages is to collate the raw data. The second is to consolidate and re-rank the criteria. And the third is to work with the design team to identify the measurable aspects within the consolidated criteria.
 

Current status

The team is currently undertaking stage two of the consolidation process to remove any overlap and duplication, and to provide measurability for the designers and environmental scientists. We are endeavouring to make this process as transparent as possible.

 

Stage two of the consolidation process is as follows:

  1. Code the criteria as Soc1, Soc2, Soc3, etc., to allow traceability.

  2. Where necessary and appropriate, combine criteria within a category (eg. combine Soc1 and Soc2) and add the votes. During the process of populating the framework the same criteria often appeared more than once. These criteria will be joined together as one. For example, 'access' and 'connectivity' ultimately refer to the same thing and these criteria will be combined. 

  3. Where necessary and appropriate, combine criteria across categories (eg. combine Soc1 and Env2) and add the votes. For the MCA process to work, a criteria must only appear once and must not be repeated across different categories. For example, while 'noise' is both a social and environmental criteria, its primary location is social.

  4. Where necessary, relocate criteria to another category (eg. Soc1 becomes a new Env criteria such as Env37) and relocate the votes to the new category. For the MCA process to work, a criteria must appear in its appropriate category and must not be repeated across different categories. For example, while 'noise' is both a social and environmental criteria, it should only appear in one category.

  5. Where necessary and appropriate, split criteria into two or more new criteria (eg Soc1 becomes Soc5 and Soc6) and divide the votes evenly. If the attributes within a criteria are significantly different, they will be split into separate criteria and the votes will be evenly distributed. At this stage, this does not seem to be a necessity.