The Stockholm Municipality has set inclusion at the core of its objectives for the city with its “Vision 2040: A Stockholm for Everyone”. Acknowledging the divide between neighborhoods, the government has brought forward social sustainability as a key component to improve the fast- growing city. This research focuses on three of the most stigmatized neighborhoods of Stockholm: Rinkeby, Tensta, and Husby, where residents are predominantly of foreign background, to offer an alternative way of understanding inclusion. Specifically, this study looks into the public spaces at the center of these three neighborhoods in a comparative analysis of public life. The collaborative project presented here shows the importance of these centrums in supporting community life in the suburbs. Drawing from Setha Low’s research on public squares in Costa Rica, the following work suggest public space is not only produced by those who envision it, but also constructed by those who use it, through daily processes, behaviors, and habits. These observed patterns carry significance as they forge the character of a place, and address practices and emotions within a collective identity. The thesis puts emphasis on the dynamic nature of public space, the relationship between morphology and use, and the potential neighborhood centers have for becoming hubs of inclusion.

An important aspect of city life is people’s experience. Perceived safety is one important aspect of that experience. In a large perspective, perceived safety concerns discussions on just public space. In a small perspective, it has direct implications for people’s mobility and ultimately their quality of life. Current literature emphasises the importance of main street as an urban public space. Given that perceived safety matters to urban life in large, and people’s everyday experience in particular, and that the main street has great potential as a public space, it is important to understand perceived safety on main street. The aim of this study is to contribute to knowledge on what is important for street users’ perceived safety on main streets, and how the frontage on main streets can contribute to perceived safety. Through a questionnaire, interviews and place observations carried out on Odengatan, Stockholm, this study finds that among nine perceived safety aspects, “mix of people”, followed by (informal) “social control” and “urban form”, were the aspects that would make the highest number of street users on Odengatan feel safe. It also finds that active frontage was directly connected to the street users’ experience on Odengatan; the three aspects were connected to several factors of active frontage. In addition, it finds that those active frontage factors are able to contribute positively to perceived safety in the case of Odengatan.

This master thesis is intended as a contribution to the understanding of the influence urban form has on urban life and by extension social structures in society, by focusing on gender relations and their reflections on the use of public space. In addition, the aim of the study is to do so in relation to a comparison between two different types of urban environments; one slum area that can be regarded as formally unplanned with an irregular gradually grown street network and one slum area of more deliberately planned character with a more regular street grid. With the use of quantitative methods, such as space syntax, structured observations and correlations studies, differences in co-presence between women and men, in the form of staying in public space, and between the areas are discovered. With the addition of qualitative methods, such as interviews and unstructured observations, as well as a review of the context in which the study is set and a theoretical discourse the reasons behind the differences is discussed. It is suggested that the blurred distinctions between private and public space often found in slum areas and the division of responsibilities and activities between women and men in the given context results in a certain degree of gender segregation in public space. Women are often restricted to the space in proximity of their homes, why it becomes an extension of their homes as well as a space for interaction which creates semi-public spaces. As men more often socialise further away from home in spaces of more public function, this creates a certain degree of segregation between women and men in public space. The most significant physical difference between the study areas proved to be the hierarchal properties of the street network. The clearer hierarchy in the unplanned area implicates that the spaces where women stays generally is of a lower degree of public function. The regular street grid of the planned area resulted in a more even distribution of public function, why men more often also stays in the semi-public spaces in residential alleys. In this way the built environment in the unplanned area reflects and reproduces gender relations in the use of public space. An implication is that since the correspondence between social structures in society and the use of public space is something that can assumed be effected by design, the urban designer has continuously in the context of development of slum areas in the developing world, and in general, an important role to play.

Public libraries are too often overlooked within the planning field. They reflect the cities in which they are situated and reveal the complex societal processes that take place there. Neoliberalism directly impacts the function of the public library and, as a result of leaving urban dwellers with fewer and fewer public alternatives, multiplies and modifies the demands made of it. Through semi structured interviews with professionals within the Stockholm library system, this research contributes to the planning field’s understanding of the public library as a public space and explores the way it is perceived as social, inclusive, and democratic. The interviews are analysed through a conceptual framework that combines literature from the field of urban planning with that of the library and information sciences, drawing additionally on variegated concepts of neoliberalism. The results suggest that the public library is considered by those professionally involved to be an inclusive and multicultural meeting place, which, with the support of librarians, promotes democratic principles through the largely expectation-free welcoming of patrons. Further analysis reveals neoliberal processes to be considered a threat to these characteristics and that this, alongside issues of equality and inclusivity, charges the library as a political space. The research posits the public library an indicator of wider societal processes and encourages planners, as well as other civic practitioners, to better exploit its underutilised informative and practical potential.

From before enclosure, platforms have defined use and purpose within the physical and social world. The demarcation of space through levelling, texture and surface acting together to both enable and restrict use, platforms would later give their name to the socio political construct of the platform as ideological stage. Pier Vittorio Aureli and Martino Tattara write on this at length in the text Platforms: Architecture and the Use of the Ground, where they discuss the relationship between the physical and the public or social aspect of the platform, recognising its ability to both give voice and take it away, and the role they play in creating social asymmetry. The first part of this diploma explores, through novel methods of engagement, this social aspect of public space. By embracing distance and dialogue, it uses correspondence to investigate the physical and social structures that come together to delineate and define the hazy idea of what constitutes public space. This diploma chooses to pose these questions through the lens of cooking and the shared practices that accompany it, manifesting itself in the second part as a meanwhile use of a disused public building that celebrates local food culture, alongside a speculative proposal for an unprogrammed urban terrain that plays on the notion of platforming.
What if such platforms could provide a canvas for a more spontaneous, democratic public life, one where use, access and public rights are less regulated and defined?

Growing cities come with complex challenges. As diverse people live and work in the cities, the public spaces within them must accommodate a range of needs and wants. But who is the city built for? By using semi-structured interviews, site visits, observations and an online survey, this thesis aimed to investigate the public toilets of Stockholm, asking what the role of the public toilets are and how this has been shaped, what peoples experiences of and thus approaches towards them are as well as how we could start to change current discourses and practices, both in developing and using them. The study indicated that the role of the public toilet is to make the city accessible for all, especially for more toilet-dependent people and as a means of equity and that it has become more central and public in the city than before. People’s experiences of and attitudes towards public toilets are indicated to be generally negative but there are several ways which one could change current practices, such as inclusive design processes, more information and transparency, retrofitting and adding value to public toilets in public space rather than taking functions away. The question of public toilets in cities are still highly unexplored and this thesis calls for a change on all levels and for all actors involved to work towards a more inclusive city where our most basic needs are accommodated for in a just and equal way.

The Freedom square in Znojmo was the task to solve. It was solved as a urbanistic - architectural study of the public space in a very bad state. An analysis of the state was a part of this work and as apart of the pre-diploma study. The area is set on the northen part of the historic center of the own of Znojmo. The main problem is the transport, for people unfreandly and illegible public space, calle the Freedom sguare, the contact of the different urbanistic structures, used just for parking the cars and growing the grass. The sollution slows down the transport, connects the green parts of the town. The space is designed to be friendlier and more pleasant and safe for people. The houses are designed as multifunctional with shops and living. the place must be atractive for walkers and bikers. The bikecenter, market place and the first rate of the design of this area will be atractive for people.The place is good forrelaxing and safe moving as well.

The new public library building needs to meet a lot of diverse demands. It has to be developed in conjunction with librarian's needs, it has to react on existing urban conditions and it needs to be self-defining and future oriented, so it will be able to cope with radical changes in the communications we experience nowadays. Our proposition is a reaction to the impulses of the site combined with our view of what a new library should represent. It is: communication, interaction, inspiration. We try to eliminate negative aspects of the selected site and on the other hand, use and develop existing potential. The building tries to terminate the big crossroads next to the site and on the contrary to create a nice quiet public space with the church. It also wants to be a new landmark and icon of the town. The solution we found is based on two main principles. A fence. And a hill. Fence as a guard and prevention from crossroads, as a closure of the urban block and public space with green and church building inside, as a boarder with the industrial part of the town, as a show-off wall, a allure to the world of wisdom and quiet public space behind... It is represented by double glass facade along the border of the site. Hill as an activator of the site, as an icon and a brand of the place, as a second hill in whole town, as an island and oasis, as a place for sport, play, as an open public reading room, as a natural amphitheatre... It consists of a simple green roof raising from the church towards the sky, covering the library buiding.

This thesis presents architectural-urban study using an old jail facility - a major object of the 18th century. Three variants are processed, the first two keep the shape of the old building blocks and give it a new functions with different scenarios. The third variant is more detailed. The proposal consists of the jail original shape - ie. it reveals the square-shaped building with two courtyards. There are two outbuildings demolished and into the resulting space are installed three new buildings, which complement with the existing buildings and completes public space. Two new high-rise buildings, built on the south side, acts as a new landmark and a new building in the north serves to supplement the services appropriate to the locality. Buildings and spaces are linked to the main pedestrian routes, creating a cascade of continuous space - the urban interior.

Master's thesis Městská knihovna v Přerově is developing the new city library for town Přerov. This project is based on semester project strategy for library, which was searching for the best place for the building. Master's thesis is situating the new city library in the locality of “náměstí Přerovského povstání”.