Adolescents Reimagine Public Spaces in Jaipur

02 Mar, 2025

Jaipur, 2nd March 2025: WRI India, in collaboration with Magic Bus India Foundation, today inaugurated a four-day adolescent-focused festival called YuvaScape 2025. As part of the festival, the young changemakers of Jaipur are co-designing elements in Bhomiya Basti community park and championing local cultural diversity through art and performance.

The city's adolescents, many of whom frequent the park, collaborated on designs to improve waste management, integrate comfortable seating and create a space that enables rest, play, community engagement, and exercise while promoting a cleaner, healthier environment. The adolescents co-created these low-cost interventions using temporary materials to test and demonstrate solutions. The improvements were guided by WRI India's Public Space Assessment Framework (PSAF), a data-driven tool co-developed by adolescents to evaluate how a public space caters to individual needs.

Speaking at the launch, Ms. Kusum Yadav, Hon’ble Mayor, Jaipur Nagar Nigam (Heritage), said, "When I arrived, a young adolescent girl showed me the different sections of the park, and I appreciate that every space has been designed on the basis of what the youth want, whether it is to make walking paths and seating spaces, or selfie points. Through this program, adolescents are putting forward great ideas to ensure a better future. I see that many mothers and daughters have joined us at the park today. I strongly feel that when women are part of an initiative, it is bound to succeed." Speaking about how these initiatives could develop public spaces in other parts of the city, she added that, "The Nagar Nigam will support taking forward permanent, long-term solutions."

Mr. Bhupendra Kumar Meena, Ward Councillor, Jaipur Nagar Nigam (Heritage), said, "Just eight days ago, this park looked very different. Magic Bus India Foundation has completely transformed it. This is your place, your home, your future."

Bhomiya Basti Park now offers a live-scale model of an ideal public space, inviting feedback from adolescents and the community, to enable city authorities to arrive at long-term design solutions that work for all. YuvaScape 2025, under the aegis of Foundation Botnar’s 'Safe, Vibrant and Healthy Public Spaces' initiative connects adolescents with communities and government bodies – empowering them to co-create public spaces that reflect their aspirations. Through this project, over 400 adolescents in Jaipur have been trained as "Public Space Ambassadors" equipping them to drive change within their communities.

Ms. Prerna Vijaykumar Mehta, Associate Director, Urban Development, WRI India, said, “WRI India has developed the Public Space Assessment Framework (PSAF) in conjunction with over 800 adolescents from Bhubaneswar and Jaipur. Data plays a critical role in informed and effective policy making and the PSAF allows adolescents to be active agents in the generation of information about their environment.”

Ms. Zoya Siddique, Head - Programmes and Institutional Partnerships, said, "Tactical urbanism initiatives demonstrate how a space can be transformed, not just by design, but by empowering communities to reimagine their environments and fostering a deeper connect with the community."

MEDIA CONTACT

Arundhati Sen, WRI India | arundhati.sen@wri.org
Tanushree Venkatraman, WRI India | tanushree.venkatraman@wri.org

About WRI India

WRI India, an independent charity legally registered as the India Resources Trust, provides objective information and practical proposals to foster environmentally sound and socially equitable development. Through research, analysis, and recommendations, WRI India puts ideas into action to build transformative solutions to protect the earth, promote livelihoods, and enhance human well-being. Know more: https://wri-india.org/

About Magic Bus India Foundation

We work with young people living in poverty, taking them from a childhood full of challenges to a life with meaningful livelihoods. We work with young people’s ecosystems (parents, peers, community and local institutions) to create a network of support for them. Through our programmes focused on life skills education, employability skilling and education enhancement, Magic Bus India Foundation ensures adolescents complete secondary education and youth are equipped for gainful employment. www.magicbus.org