Matkala Niina
Planning Manager
Vitality
The Riihimaki.fi website uses Google Translate.
The city of Riihimäki hired two summer planners for June to observe and analyze Riihimäki in the spirit of an irresistible wart city. What are the best places in Riihimäki and what should be developed? What is the city like that a young person would like to return to after studying?
- In Riihimäki's zoning, we wanted to offer the opportunity for summer jobs to young people who are interested in developing their own hometown. Work as a summer planner can be an inspiration when young people are thinking about which field they will go to for further studies. In addition, it has been rewarding to hear Vanessa and Minea's thoughts and views about Riksu, which is beloved by young people, says Niina Matkala, head of planning.
Vanessa Härkönen, 16, and Minea Kammonen, 18, who worked as summer planners during June, How do young people enjoy themselves in Riihimäki? - report has now been completed.
The young people's observations include that Riihimäki, as a small town, offers versatile opportunities for young people, for example in the field of education, culture and well-being. However, the city has few facilities for young people to stay and meet.
During the observation period, Härkönen and Kammonen noticed that young people's favorite places were the shopping center Atomi, the land-based swimming pool, the newly opened McDonald's and other fast food restaurants, and for example Hirvijärvi beach.
The list of the most important development targets has included free indoor spaces intended for living, where young people could spend time together.
- In the summer, Riihimäki has a lot of comfortable outdoor spaces, for example in parks, but in bad weather the opportunities to stay are limited. Young people lack a place to meet, Härkönen and Kammonen think.
Meeting places are especially needed in the center and near the Atomi shopping center. For the marketing of facilities and events, more channels like Instagram and Tiktok, which are popular with young people, should be used. It is also important to develop and increase commercial services that meet the needs of young people, so that young people would choose Riihimäki over neighboring cities in the future.
The summer planners also participated in the stakeholder group workshop of the Voimala development project, where they got to know Voimala's development plans and were able to share their own perspective on what the common living room of the townspeople should be like.
- We believe that young people will especially enjoy Voimala's aesthetics and lounge areas. The facilities designed for Voimala offer an excellent solution for the meeting place that young people are longing for. In the future, the planned services will act as attraction factors for young adults as well. Hopefully we will get to see these plans come true, say the summer planners.
A large number of young people move away from Riihimäki at some point in their lives, for example after studies. The most important thing would be to create a warm image of Riihimäki for young people even before moving away, so that it is attractive to return after studies.
- Riihimäki is a homely and functioning small town, which is especially evident in the quality of public services and customer service, which we consider to be Riihimäki's absolute strength. Riihimäki also has very good transport connections to, for example, the capital region and Tampere. For these reasons, we consider Riihimäki to be a city where it would be good to settle down sometime in the future, Härkönen and Kammonen state.
Check out the report How do young people enjoy themselves in Riihimäki? (pdf)
The report is a part Riihimäki's built environment program implementation and it will be used in future city planning.
Planning Manager
Vitality
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