Young people feed into first Citizen Observatory

As part of the GREENGAGE project, we launched the first Citizen Observatory in East Bristol between May and July. It aims to give a voice to people we don’t usually hear from through typical community engagement exercises.

As part of this, groups of young people from Bristol Somali Youth Voice and Redfield Educate met weekly with council officers to discuss and raise local issues that could be incorporated into the East Bristol Liveable Neighbourhood project.

The main issues raised were:

  • poorly lit areas making young people feel unsafe in their area, particularly green spaces like Netham Park and Gaunts Ham Park
  • narrow pavements made worse by pavement parking
  • poor quality public transport links and a lack of bus shelters
  • bus services not turning up or running late
  • a lack of road crossings
  • anti-social behaviour, especially in the tower blocks
  • CCTV that’s not working which could lead to an increase in anti-social behaviour
  • tower blocks not having secure facilities, such as door codes not working

Many of these issues are related to journeys to and from school and elsewhere, which can put young people off walking and cycling.

The final session was attended by councillors, who listened to the participants as they concluded their observations. These conclusions will be used to inform future policy and will be integrated into the trial changes with area-specific updates to lighting and CCTV, as one example.

We will run more Citizen Observatories involving people of all ages with an aim to focus on mobility, air quality, safety and healthy living in Bristol.

This work will be supported by bespoke digital technologies and tools to help monitor local environments and to work together through the Citizen Observatories on solutions to these issues.

GREENGAGE sets out to help local authorities to shape their climate mitigation and adaptation policies by engaging with citizens to co-create green initiatives.

The GREENGAGE project is being funded by the European Commission and Innovate UK as part of the Horizon Research Programme, which we successfully bid for as part of our work towards East Bristol Liveable Neighbourhood.

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