Children have long been one of the biggest user-groups of public space. Children’s experiences of public space have not been fully explored by the planning practice. Children’s viewpoint regarding the city have often been overlooked by the adult world, since children are often seen as lacking rational thought and dependent on parents.  A relatively new planning method for public open space, called Sociotop Mapping has long been used in the city of Stockholm. The Sociotop Mapping have been an effective way of implementing people’s experiences into the process of planning.  The aim of this study was to explore children’s experiences of Public Space by using the Sociotop Method, as developed in Stockholm. The Sociotop Mapping gives actual meaning to human experiences of the city by describing its public space with qualitative values. This study was performed with a qualitative method consisting of two parts. The first part gathered data on public space with placeinventories in the district of Ålidhem in Umeå. The second part of the study derived the experiences of children with in-depth focus group discussions with 14 children living in Umeå. The study concluded that children often find enjoyment in public space, but sometimes might the public space be in crisis, since it cannot handle people that are strangers to one another.

This thesis study assesses the accessibility of green spaces with recreational values in Stockholm. Urban green spaces are considered beneficial for human well-being and for mitigating the negative effects of climate change and increased urbanisation. However, the specific social values that green spaces can provide are often overlooked in green space policies, which tend to focus on proximity and size. Access to urban green spaces with the four specific recreational values greenery, play, tranquillity, and walks, was assessed using a network analysis based on a sociotope map that indicates the social value of all public green spaces in Stockholm. Moreover, the accomplishments of the city's greenery goals have been examined. The study has identified differences in accessibility between areas with different qualities and identified focus areas that require improvements. Differentiation between the qualities has led to more accurate information about the accessibility of green spaces. It can provide a basis for more effective measurement to improve accessibility in the municipality. Since the method is tied to the sociotope map as a data basis, further research is needed to make the method applicable to other municipalities. More-over, the results can be applied in multi-criteria analyses of urban development scenarios to incorporate the social significance of green spaces and user perspectives into planning practices. / Detta examensarbete utvärderar tillgängligheten till grönområden med rekreationsvärden i Stockholm. Grönområden i städer anses vara gynnsamma för människors välbefinnande och för att mildra de negativa effekterna av klimatförändringar och ökad urbanisering. De specifika sociala värden som grönområden kan erbjuda bortprioriteras dock ofta i grönområdespolicyer, som tenderar att fokusera på närhet och storlek. Tillgången till urbana grönområden med de fyra specifika rekreationsvärdena grönska, lek, lugn och promenader bedömdes med hjälp av en nätverksanalys baserad på en sociotopkarta som visar det sociala värdet av alla offentliga grönområden i Stockholm. Dessutom har uppfyllelsen av stadens mål för grönska undersökts. Studien har identifierat skillnader i tillgänglighet mellan områden med olika kvaliteter och identifierat fokusområden som kräver förbättringar. Differentieringen mellan kvaliteterna har lett till mer exakt information om tillgängligheten till grönområden. Det kan ge en grund för mer effektiva åtgärder för att förbättra tillgängligheten i kommunen. Eftersom metoden är knuten till sociotopkartan som datagrund behövs ytterligare forskning för att göra metoden tillämpbar på andra kommuner. Dessutom kan resultaten användas i multikriterieanalyser av stadsutvecklingsscenarier för att integrera den sociala betydelsen av grönområden och användarperspektiv i planeringspraxis.