This project has partnered with older residents as citizen scientists; the City of Unley and South Australia’s Office for Ageing Well as a policy connector, to respond to the growing global challenge of ageing populations living in expanding urbanised spaces, where access to quality public green spaces is imperative for supporting the well-being of older residents.
A key aim of this study was to develop a new understanding of how older residents use and experience their local public green spaces by engaging them as citizen scientists in data collection and interpretation of these spaces and exploring what roles they can play in co-creating age-friendly cities and communities (AFCC).
The project was undertaken in South Australia in 2022-23, with 31 older citizen scientists, using an age-friendly evaluation tool (smart phones or booklets) to audit neighbourhood green spaces as part of their daily life. Each park audit allows participants to respond to both Likert scale and open-ended questions about different park features, such as: shade, paths, seating; what activities they used the park space for, and what they think could be improved. The tool allows participants to upload photos while geocoding their location and recording the date and time of the audit. In 8 months, citizen scientists completed 350 audits, covering 51 green spaces across the City of Unley.
Findings of this study will be discussed, including solutions for better engagement models with older people for AFCC in local government and development of universal design principles for age-friendly neighbourhood public green spaces.