Introduction

For many of us, a formative part of our childhood would have been time spent in a favourite outdoor open space. Drawing on the outputs of engagement projects in the east end of Newcastle upon Tyne, this chapter reveals how young people create meaningful relationships with local open spaces and how these spaces play an important role in their everyday lives. The chapter goes on to suggest that a young person's perception of open space is very different to how planning policy and practice perceives these components of the city's neighbourhoods. This may be due in part to an absence of any ongoing participatory process by which young people can exert influence over the decisions made about the places that they value. Using a Lefebvrian theoretical context, we suggest that these young people experience a marginalisation of their political ‘right to the city’ and that the policy impacting upon their ‘corner’ of the city remains the domain of adult decision makers (Lefebvre, 1996).

Children and young people comprise a significant part of Newcastle's population. While the United Nations define ‘young people’ as being between the ages of 15 and 24, the young people referred to in this chapter range in age from eight to 24 years old, thereby including a proportion of children within the study. Within Newcastle, the eight to 24-year-old age group makes up 28% of the population (although this figure includes a large student population). Within the three ‘east end’ wards of Byker, Walker and Walkergate, where the chapter's case studies were located, the same eight to 24-year-old age group comprises 22% of the population, which compares to the England and Wales average of 21% (ONS, 2011). These are three of the most deprived wards in the city.

The open spaces referred to in this chapter include those that are green, or hard landscaped public areas, or a combination of both, and bear closest resemblance to the definition for open space as used by the Scottish Government (2008).