Cities for Adolescents - The NexGen Agenda

Adolescents are often overlooked in urban planning and their unique needs remain unmet. What if they were given a voice in shaping the cities they live in?
Join us to explore how adolescent voices can shape urban futures-one public space at a time!

Prerna Vijaykumar Mehta

Facilitator

November 5, 2024 | 09:00 - 10:00

Urban Library - room B

Wri India

India

English

Reference:

UL-B 1

WUF12

Urban Library

Summary

As we live within a climate crisis, it is imperative to make every voice count. Adolescents are rarely represented in urban development and their needs are thus rarely addressed. The future belongs to them and it is critical to center their voices as we shape inclusive urban futures.

Our work in the two Indian cities of Jaipur (Rajasthan) and Bhubaneshwar (Odisha) as part of the Healthy City for Adolescents (HCA) initiative, is a proof of concept centering whole-of-society approaches , to open channels of communication between adolescents, communities and multi-level government bodies. It exhibits how the meaningful inclusion of adolescents, in co-creating public spaces, can make cities more inclusive and liveable.

To spotlight this power of collaboration, we will be presenting our public space assessment framework that has been co-created with 400+ adolescents across diverse cultural and socio-economic backgrounds.

Objectives

There are four key objectives of the event:
a. Present the need for adolescent participation within urban development processes and the value they add through their involvement.

b. Present the process of co-creating the Public Space Assessment Framework (PSAF) as an innovative model of collaboration between adolescents, local governments and civil society towards inclusive, accessible and participative urban public space development

c. To present the PSAF as a means that can facilitate meaningful adolescent inclusion within multi-level urban governance, that in turn, can encourage meaningful participation while strengthening partnerships between different spheres of government, civil societies, community stakeholders and young people.

d. To share the evidence of meaningful inclusion of adolescents as equal partners for localization of SDGs through contextual tools and actions.