The adoption of technology in urban participatory planning with tools such as Virtual Geographic Environments (VGE) promises a broader engagement of urban dwellers, which should ultimately lead to the creation of better cities. However, the authorities and urban experts show hesitancy in endorsing these tools in their practices. Indeed, several parameters must be wisely considered in the design of VGE; if misjudged, their impact could be damaging for the participatory approach and the related urban project. The objective of this study is to engage participants (N = 107) with common tasks conducted in participatory sessions, in order to evaluate the users’ performance when manipulating a VGE. We aimed at assessing three crucial parameters: (1) the VGE representation, (2) the participants’ idiosyncrasies, and (3) the nature of the VGE format. The results demonstrate that the parameters did not affect the same aspect of users’ performance in terms of time, inputs, and correctness. The VGE representation impacts only the time needed to fulfill a task. The participants’ idiosyncrasies, namely age, gender and frequency of 3D use also induce an alteration in time, but spatial abilities seem to impact all characteristics of users’ performance, including correctness. Lastly, the nature of the VGE format significantly alters the time and correctness of users interactions. The results of this study highlight concerns about the inadequacies of the current VGE practices in participatory sessions. Moreover, we suggest guidelines to improve the design of VGE, which could enhance urban participatory planning processes, in order to create better cities.

通过虚拟地理环境 (VGE) 等工具在城市参与式规划中采用技术，有望让城市居民更广泛地参与其中，最终将导致创建更好的城市。然而，当局和城市专家对在他们的实践中认可这些工具表现出犹豫不决。事实上，在设计 VGE 时必须明智地考虑几个参数；如果判断错误，它们的影响可能会对参与式方法和相关的城市项目造成破坏。本研究的目的是让参与者（N = 107）参与参与式会议中进行的共同任务，以评估用户在操作 VGE 时的表现。我们旨在评估三个关键参数：(1) VGE 表示，(2) 参与者的特质，以及 (3) VGE 格式的性质。结果表明，在时间、输入和正确性方面，这些参数不会影响用户表现的同一方面。VGE 表示仅影响完成任务所需的时间。参与者的特质，即年龄、性别和使用 3D 的频率也会引起时间上的变化，但空间能力似乎会影响用户表现的所有特征，包括正确性。最后，VGE 格式的性质显着改变了用户交互的时间和正确性。这项研究的结果强调了对当前 VGE 实践在参与式会议中的不足之处的担忧。此外，我们提出了改进 VGE 设计的指导方针，这可以加强城市参与性规划过程，以创造更好的城市。