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Young People Road-Test Poole's Open Spaces

Young people aged 12 to 18 from the Forum's Open Space Group are going on a minibus tour of Poole to "road-test" public open space. They will visit a number of different open spaces including Arne Avenue in Alderney, Poole Park and Merley Village. They will see and report on what facilities are available, how open space is used by their age group and discover what could be done better in the future.

The idea for the project came from the Council's draft Open Space Strategy which is considering the future use of all public open space in Poole. It was realised that while young people were important users of public open space, more needed to be done to find out what young people thought about facilities or assess what their needs were.

Councillor Don Collier, Cabinet Portfolio Holder for the Environment, said: "This is an exciting opportunity to find out what young people really think about our parks and open spaces - their views matter and this is an excellent way of getting that information first hand."

Mike Childs, Strategy Officer, Leisure Services, Borough of Poole, said: "We want to do a "road test" and actually visit some of our sites in the field with our young customers. The Council wants to engage with the youth and make sure it gets it right when it comes to young people's attitudes and requirements in our parks and open spaces and this is a good start in the learning process. This is a chance to listen to young people direct to see how it seems from their perspective."

The work is being jointly supported by the Council's Youth Services and Leisure Services units. Young people will be joined on the day by an independent observer from the Glasshouse Project, part of the Architecture Foundation - a national educational charity that works with public organisations, residents' groups and young people to promote better "community-led" design and use of public buildings and open space.

Their findings will be considered as part of the final consultation report on the Open Space Strategy that will be presented to the Council's Environment Overview Group later this year. 

Mike Childs, Strategy Officer, Leisure Services, Borough of Poole tel 01202 261319