2025

Adisa Mikhail Ola; Oyedeji Shola; Lau Sian Lun; Sim Tze Ying; Porras Jari

The challenges of innovating for sustainable urban development, such as balancing socio-economic and environmental needs, managing stakeholders, and overcoming regulatory barriers, require multi-stakeholder engagement strategies. A balanced approach to effectively tackle these issues demands combining top-down and bottom-up initiatives to drive technology innovation for urban development. This chapter explores hackathons as an engagement method to demonstrate the potential of sustainability-focused hackathons (SustHack) to spur citizen participation and unite city planners, researchers, and ICT enthusiasts to co-creating solutions. The findings underscore the transformative potential of the SustHack model in empowering citizens as co-creators, driving innovation with them rather than for them. Key success factors of the SustHack model include collaboration, inclusivity, engagement depth, follow-up plans, and partnerships with municipalities. With the SustHack model, cities can raise awareness about sustainability and utilise the collective intelligence of their citizens to collaborate with technology innovators and researchers. This collaborative model ensures that sustainable urban development initiatives reflect the diverse perspectives of all community stakeholders. This chapter contributes to the ongoing discussion about citizen involvement in sustainable urban development, offering practical guidance for policymakers and communities seeking innovative ways to address local challenges.