Residents’ perceptions of the urban environment and requests for its changes in resource-type regions (the example of Kemerovo)

The article examines residents' perceptions of the urban environment in a resource-type region. The ideas are identifi ed, and key requests for changing the urban environment are analyzed. The purpose of the article is to identify the ideas of the urban environment and analyze the key requests of residents to change it. Depending on the experience of interaction with the urban environment, general and personalized requests are formed. The presented study, includes a questionnaire survey and the focus group interview with the residents of Kemerovo. The focus group interview was attended by such groups of citizens as “Schoolchildren”, “Old-timers of the city”, a group of representatives of the cultural and educational sphere of the city, “City activists”. As a result, ideas about the history of the city, the problems of the territory, the uniqueness of the city and the future of the city are highlighted. The ideas about the city are formed under the infl uence of various factors, such as an age, an occupation, a level of education, etc. “Schoolchildren” perceive the city as a place of birth and study; “Old-timers” do it through the prism of their experience, including professional; “Historians, cultural experts” see the city as a refl ection of history, and “Urban activists” see a space for the changes and the implementation of their projects. In the minds of Kemerovo residents, industry is an important part of the city; on  the other hand, the transition to new sectors of development is important for residents. It was revealed that residents, even when articulating a request to change the urban environment, prefer to play passive roles in the process of solving urban problems. Kemerovo residents are aware of the problems of the urban environment, but are not ready for concrete actions to solve them.