Youth Perception of Public Spaces in the City

For any urban development, the opinion of the final stakeholders is essential. However, the uncensored youth perception regarding the urban environment is rarely included in the decision-making process. Here, we present the youth’s perception of public spaces in the city. The empirical research was...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Jurgita Jurkevičienė, Paulina Budrytė
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2025-01-01
Series:Urban Science
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2413-8851/9/2/25
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1850077983823364096
author Jurgita Jurkevičienė
Paulina Budrytė
author_facet Jurgita Jurkevičienė
Paulina Budrytė
author_sort Jurgita Jurkevičienė
collection DOAJ
description For any urban development, the opinion of the final stakeholders is essential. However, the uncensored youth perception regarding the urban environment is rarely included in the decision-making process. Here, we present the youth’s perception of public spaces in the city. The empirical research was conducted in Kaunas, which is a typical tertiary city. That is why such results are comparable with findings from other middle-sized cities around the world. The photovoice research method was applied to gather data on youth perception of public spaces. The dataset consisted of 793 unique responses from young people. The qualitative analysis was conducted by using MaxQDA 24 software. Our findings suggest that young people prefer to spend time with friends in man-made urban environments rather than in natural or semi-natural green spaces. Many of their favourite places are considered to be well suited to young people’s needs. Suggestions for improving their favourite places mostly revolve around built infrastructure, yet many of them emphasise the importance of sustainable urban development.
format Article
id doaj-art-adeee725fbdf46d0b3769bf2c51ef41c
institution DOAJ
issn 2413-8851
language English
publishDate 2025-01-01
publisher MDPI AG
record_format Article
series Urban Science
spelling doaj-art-adeee725fbdf46d0b3769bf2c51ef41c2025-08-20T02:45:41ZengMDPI AGUrban Science2413-88512025-01-01922510.3390/urbansci9020025Youth Perception of Public Spaces in the CityJurgita Jurkevičienė0Paulina Budrytė1Faculty of Social Sciences, Arts and Humanities, Kaunas University of Technology, Mickevičiaus St. 37, LT-44244 Kaunas, LithuaniaFaculty of Social Sciences, Arts and Humanities, Kaunas University of Technology, Mickevičiaus St. 37, LT-44244 Kaunas, LithuaniaFor any urban development, the opinion of the final stakeholders is essential. However, the uncensored youth perception regarding the urban environment is rarely included in the decision-making process. Here, we present the youth’s perception of public spaces in the city. The empirical research was conducted in Kaunas, which is a typical tertiary city. That is why such results are comparable with findings from other middle-sized cities around the world. The photovoice research method was applied to gather data on youth perception of public spaces. The dataset consisted of 793 unique responses from young people. The qualitative analysis was conducted by using MaxQDA 24 software. Our findings suggest that young people prefer to spend time with friends in man-made urban environments rather than in natural or semi-natural green spaces. Many of their favourite places are considered to be well suited to young people’s needs. Suggestions for improving their favourite places mostly revolve around built infrastructure, yet many of them emphasise the importance of sustainable urban development.https://www.mdpi.com/2413-8851/9/2/25citypublic spaceperceptionurban developmentyouth
spellingShingle Jurgita Jurkevičienė
Paulina Budrytė
Youth Perception of Public Spaces in the City
Urban Science
city
public space
perception
urban development
youth
title Youth Perception of Public Spaces in the City
title_full Youth Perception of Public Spaces in the City
title_fullStr Youth Perception of Public Spaces in the City
title_full_unstemmed Youth Perception of Public Spaces in the City
title_short Youth Perception of Public Spaces in the City
title_sort youth perception of public spaces in the city
topic city
public space
perception
urban development
youth
url https://www.mdpi.com/2413-8851/9/2/25
work_keys_str_mv AT jurgitajurkeviciene youthperceptionofpublicspacesinthecity
AT paulinabudryte youthperceptionofpublicspacesinthecity