DEGREE PROJECT IN THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT, SECOND CYCLE, 30 CREDITS STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN 2018

Socially Sustainable Planning for Ursvik’s Development and Integration

KRISTEN VERONICA KOEHLER

KTH ROYAL INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE AND THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT TRITA TRITA-ABE-MBT-18277

www.kth.se Socially Sustainable Planning for Ursvik’s Development and Integration

Kristen Koehler

Socialt hållbar planering för Ursviks utveckling och integration Degree Project in Urban and Regional Planning, Second Cycle, AG212X, 30 credits

Supervisor: Stefan Lundberg Examiner: Hans Westlund

Department of Urban Planning and Environment. Division of Urban and Regional Studies. School of Architecture and the Built Environment. KTH Royal Institute of Technology

Abstract As the City of Stockholm continues to grow, there is a looming fear that there will not be enough housing for a growing population. Municipalities within Stockholm County are building up their housing stock to contribute solutions to the infamous housing crisis that is on the rise. With this increase of built development, there is also a faint shadow of the Million Homes Project problems that daunts new projects. The last time the city of Stockholm had built up so much new development, some of the Million Homes Project neighborhoods descended into segregated and vulnerable areas. This project looks at how Riksbyggen, a housing developer, can build housing developments that align with social sustainability practices for integrated neighborhoods, in order to avoid the process of segregation. The research focuses on the study area of Ursvik, a residential neighborhood that has plans to grow by 15,000 new residents in the next 10-15 years. This new neighborhood development will border more vulnerable neighborhoods, Rissne, Hallonbergen, and Rinkeby, which have reputations for being high in crime, immigrant dense, and segregated from neighboring areas. Riksbyggen has two existing housing developments in the area and has plans to build one more. Their recently established indicators for social sustainability can help make a long lasting impact on the social sustainability in the neighborhood. Through this project I hope to contribute knowledge on how social sustainability indicators can be used for planning for more integrated and open neighborhoods. The methods used were observations of Riksbyggen’s sustainability department, meetings with city planners from Stockholms and Sundbybergs stad, a survey of current Riksbyggen residents in Ursvik, talking with members of the housing boards, an analysis of indicators, and testing planning solutions. I found that the sustainability indicators are well focused on the needs of residents but could be improved through better communication of social sustainability goals throughout Riksbyggen and through a better follow-up measuring of indicators over time. More concrete measures, like including a diversity of services as well as tracking neighborhood progress over time can help ease residents’ biggest fear of integration: higher crime and lowered security.

Sammanfattning Allt eftersom Stockholm stad fortsätter att växa finns det en hotande rädsla för att det inte kommer att finnas tillräckligt med bostäder för en växande befolkning. Kommuner runt om i Stockholms län försöker bidra till bostadskrisen genom att öka sitt bostadsbestånd. Men problemen från miljonprogrammets byggande, där en del stadsdelar över tiden blivit alltmer utsatta och segregerade, kastar en skugga och skapar rädsla bland beslutsfattare och planerare för att göra om samma misstag. Den här studien tittar på hur Riksbyggen, som är en stor byggaktör, kan bygga bostäder som ligger i linje med socialhållbarhetspraxis för integrerade grannskap och kan motverka segregation. Studien fokuserar på området Ursvik, ett bostadsområde som har planer på att växa med 15 000 nya invånare under de kommande 10- 15 åren. Detta nya område kommer att angränsa mot mer utsatta områden som Rissne, Hallonbergen och Rinkeby, som har ryktet om sig att ha hög brottslighet, vara invandrartäta samt segregerade från omkringliggande områden. Riksbyggen har två befintliga bostadrättsföreningar i Ursvik och har planer att bygga en till. Deras nyligen etablerade indikatorer för social hållbarhet kan bidra till att långsiktigt påverkar den sociala hållbarheten i grannskapet. Genom det här projektet hoppas jag kunna bidra med ytterligare kunskap om hur sociala hållbarhetsindikatorer kan användas för planering för bättre integrerade och öppna grannskap. Metoderna som används är egna observationer av hur Riksbyggens enhet för hållbarhetsfrågor arbetar, möten med stadsplanerare från Stockholms stad och Sundbybergs stad, en enkät bland nuvarande boende i Riksbyggens bostadsrättföreningar i Ursvik, samtal med styrelsemedlemmar, en analys av indikatorer, samt tester av planeringslösningar. Resultatet visar att hållbarhetsindikatorerna är väl fokuserade på behoven hos men de sociala hållbarhetsmålen kan förbättras om de tydligare kommuniceras och implementeras i hela organisationen samt om Riksbyggen gör bättre uppföljningsstudier av indikatorerna över tid. Mer konkreta åtgärder såsom att Riksbyggen tillsammans med andra aktörer ser till att det blir ett större utbud och mångfaldav tjänster samtidigt som uppföljning av grannskapens framsteg över tid kan hjälpa lindra boendes rädsla inför att Ursviks integration med omgivande stadsdelar skall leda till högre brottslighet och försämrad trygghet.

Acknowledgements This project would not have been possible without the consistent and insightful guidance from my supervisor, Stefan Lundberg from KTH. Thank you for your continual support throughout the researching and writing process.

I would like to thank Therese Berg from Riksbyggen for providing me with the amazing opportunity to research and learn at Riksbyggen’s Unit for Sustainable Development. I feel honored to have the opportunity to learn, observe, and participate with Riksbyggen’s ongoing work towards a sustainable future for housing in Sweden.

I would also like to thank Ulrika Sax for her continual guidance and advising. Your wisdom from many years of experience with Stockholm’s urban planning gave me inspiration and support throughout my research.

I am immensely grateful for the help of Ewa Sundman, Fariba Daryani, and all other informants who aided me in the methods design and research process. Without your help, my methods would have been fruitless endeavors.

Lastly, thank you to all the family, friends, and colleagues that have supported me throughout the master’s program here at KTH. I especially want to thank Oscar for his unconditional support and patience with me throughout this entire process.

My greatest appreciations, Kristen Koehler May 2018 Forward During the Swedish Almedalen Week, politicians and companies hold speeches and seminars to increase political discussions on important topics in Swedish public life. The discussions become especially interesting during an election year, when politicians want their voices heard loud and clear. In preparation for this week many companies hold presentations and seminars to open discussions. Riksbyggen held a seminar on Stefan Fölster’s report Den inkluderande staden. At this seminar, I found myself observing a panel discussing the topic I had been researching over the past few months for this thesis project. The topic of segregation and inclusion in the development of Järva and the Järvalyftet program was what had gathered these researchers, politicians, and developers in one place.

I was fascinated that this topic that I had been having so much trouble clarifying, defining, and analyzing would finally be illuminated on by experts. Yet through this panel discussion, it became more difficult for all of us in the room to agree upon one common definition of segregation, of how to promote better citizen dialog, or which, if any, structural neighborhood changes could actually improve social relationships amongst neighborhood parts. The discussion slowly became more heated as subjects of race and economic outcomes were debated further. Everyone on the panel brought with them a different background of research and experience that brought with it a different viewpoint of how to solve problems of segregation in new neighborhood developments. And although I did not feel that suddenly I was enlightened on the right answers, I did feel like I had more understanding for why this topic is so complicated and difficult to put into clean boxes of ‘problem’ and ‘solution.’

This here was the perfect example of planning as a ‘messy problem;’ the kind we attempt to tackle in a class projects but haven’t had the real-world experience yet to understand fully. Because there is such a diversity of political views, social structures, urban planning opinions and infinite dimensions of personal experiences with place and understanding of our city, that of course this topic would be a bit touchy and controversial. Of course, there is not one solution that we can take from our research and apply to the real life. Of course, there is not one individual who has the power to make the final decisions or to influence change. There are compromises, there are hasty last-minute solutions added, and there are touchy subjects that some choose to tip toe around and others trample over.

I noted this conclusion as vitally important to my research as I look through my documents, maps, and results and think, “well what is the solution?” There is no one perfect solution to bettering the Järva area. All I can do through research is uncover findings and present them in a way that is open and clear. I can hope to suggest how things could work in an ideal world within research, with no promise that the outcomes of my suggestions will ever be realized. In doing this I merely contribute to an ongoing discussion of a very case-specific topic in a very rapidly changing city; and I am purely humbled by the honor.

Table of Contents Introduction ...... 1 Project Aim...... 2 Research Questions ...... 3 Methods Design ...... 3 Research questions and methods ...... 3 Ethics considerations ...... 5 Background Research ...... 6 Social sustainability framework ...... 6 Residential segregation ...... 7 Residential integration ...... 8 The Swedish housing market ...... 10 The Million Homes Project ...... 11 The role of housing developers ...... 12 Social sustainability for Riksbyggen ...... 12 Ursvik Case Description ...... 14 Historical overview ...... 14 Ursvik today ...... 15 The future Ursvik ...... 15 Järva 2030 ...... 16 Study Visit ...... 18 Rinkeby ...... 18 Ursvik ...... 19 Hallonberg and on...... 20 Impressions ...... 21 Meeting with Sundbybergs stad ...... 22 Impressions ...... 23 Meeting with Stockholms stad...... 23 Impressions ...... 24 Survey Results...... 25 Summary ...... 25 Results on integration perceptions ...... 25 Results on social sustainability indicators ...... 26 Suggestions for future development and living environment ...... 27 Survey demographics ...... 27 Comparisons to Sundbybergs survey results ...... 27 Analysis ...... 28 Perceptions from housing board members ...... 29 Indicator Review ...... 30 Introduction of indicators as a tool ...... 30 Indicators for community development ...... 31 Indicators for the built environment ...... 32 CityLab and GRI ...... 33 Reviewing indicators ...... 33 Riksbyggen’s Sustainability Indicators ...... 34 Resident feedback on indicators ...... 36 Indicators for Sundbybergs stad ...... 37 Indicator analysis ...... 38

Planning Method ...... 39 Analysis of Sundbyberg’s planning ...... 39 Recommendations for future development ...... 43 Political implications ...... 46 Discussion...... 47 Trickle down of social sustainability ...... 47 The city as a process ...... 48 Perceptions of safety for the sake of residential integration ...... 49 Conclusion ...... 49 References...... 51 Table References ...... 56 Figure References ...... 56 Personal Communications ...... 56 Appendix I – Sundbybergs stad varumärkesundersökning 2015 ...... 57 Appendix II – Survey Document ...... 58

Introduction Housing has become an extensive topic of discussion in modern Swedish planning, as increasing immigration and population have put pressure on the housing supply. In the last 20 years Stockholm region has grown by almost a half a million, while housing has only increased by half that number (Andersson, 2014). The number will only continue to grow as Sweden’s Statistics Bureau estimates Stockholm County’s total population will increase to 3.1 million by 2050 (SCB, 2017). The Stockholm Regional Development Plan is focusing its efforts on sustainable growth possibilities as there is an expectation to have rapid population grown in the next 25 years (RUFS, 2017). From the perspective of a Stockholm resident, it is increasingly difficult to find housing in cities that is both affordable and livable. Increasing problems from gentrification and lack of integration can cause tensions between residents and housing developers (Thörn et al, 2016). Stockholms stad recognizes this housing crisis and has taken responsibility to ensure 140,000 new dwellings are built between 2010 and 2030 (Stockholms stad, 2016, a). This extensive growth puts enormous pressure on housing developers to create living spaces that do not repeat mistakes of the Million Homes Project from the 1960s and 1970s.

The Million Homes Project was a collaboration of government and private housing developers to build a million new dwellings during a 10-year period ending by 1974 in order to increase the supply and quality of housing in the post-war industrial era. Million Homes Project areas are actually quite diverse both in terms of housing type and cultural makeup. About one-third of the housing was built as single family homes and the residential cultural make-up includes residents from a diversity of different countries (Sax, 2013).

However, the common belief is that all Million Homes Project housing is the same: predominantly characterized by efficient and rational design with concrete buildings ranging from three to six stories organized around a central square with a variety of services. Car traffic was often averted from pedestrian traffic and large parking lots were placed on the outskirts of the neighborhood. The Million Homes Project is controversial because even as the program increased housing stocks and the living standard for Swedish families, over time some of these project areas developed into isolated and homogenous neighborhoods segregated from their surroundings (Hall and Vidén, 2005).

The area of Rinkeby has followed this trend with 66% immigrant population and a classification from the Swedish Police as an especially vulnerable area characterize by high crime and social deprivation (Stockholms stad, 2016, b; Polismyndigheten, 2017). The area is disconnected from the surrounding neighborhoods, both structurally and culturally. Neighboring areas of Kista and Solna are considered prosperous housing areas with strong business districts but their borders can be seen as the highways that divide them from Rinkeby. The area of Ursvik in particular is a close contrast to the Rinkeby neighborhood, in that it lies directly next to Rinkeby but is currently in the process of building new, high-end and inner-city style dwellings. Ursvik is under the administrative governing of Sundbybergs stad and Rinkeby Stockholms stad, making the highway between the neighborhoods not only the structural border but also the administrative.

Riksbyggen is one of Sweden’s leading housing developers and property management companies that has a stake in the development of Ursvik. They currently have two housing developments and another in the progress of being built with 160 new dwellings planned for 2020 in Ursvik (Riksbyggen, 2016, a). Like with most all new developments in Sweden, a consciousness of sustainable planning is on the forefront for housing developers like

1 Riksbyggen. Their efforts to build environmentally sustainable dwellings are manifested through their strict requirements for ecosystem service analyses and environmental certification – miljöbyggnad by Swedish Green Building Council. This work has evolved into a sustainability measurement system called the hållbarhetsverktyg, which takes into account not only miljöbyggnad requirements, but also ecosystem services, mobility measures, establishment practices, and social sustainability. (Riksbyggen, 2018, a). Social sustainable practices and indicators have been designed and set for Riksbyggen, but the next step in the process is tracking how these practices and indicators function as a method for increasing positive integration and connected communities.

The area of Ursvik functions as an excellent case study to analyze the efforts by Riksbyggen to create more sustainable neighborhoods. The neighborhood has the flexibility to be developed in innovative ways, in that Sundbybergs stad is investing a lot in building a new city area, while at the same time the neighborhood maintains a current identity held by the local residents. Their shared border with Rinkeby provides an opportunity to explore how these two neighborhoods could be better integrated and how barriers that segregate these two communities can be softened.

Figure 1Map of Ursvik and surrounding areas source: ESRI Base map, 2018 Project Aim The aim of this project is to explore how more integrated and connected communities can be developed through various approaches through discussions with city planners, resident feedback, indictors for social sustainability, and planning traditions within the case study of Ursvik development. This project will focus on the perspectives of current and potential residents of the Ursvik area to get a better understanding of their relationship to Ursvik’s surrounding areas. A focus on opportunities for positive action on the part of Riksbyggen will also narrow the research for a better understanding of how housing companies can impact the future of neighborhood and community development.

2 Research Questions • What are the perceptions of Ursvik residents on integration with more vulnerable neighborhoods? • How can social sustainability indicators function as a means to promote collaboration and integration? • What are the means by which Riksbyggen can overcome segregating barriers both physical structures and social cultural between Rinkeby and Ursvik?

Methods Design A methods design is important for ensuring research methods answer the questions set out by the project aim. The methods should be able to collect data that can provide empirical evidence (du Toit, 2015). The research to be conducted is for the aim of academic pursuits but with the hopes of providing practical use for future developments by planning practitioners and sustainability specialists. The research is focused on the specific case study of the Ursvik housing and development plans that will continue to progress over the next 15 to 20 years.

Research questions and methods

What are the perceptions of Ursvik residents on integration with more vulnerable neighborhoods?

This research question aims at both achieving a picture of how Ursvik residents view their current and future community as descriptive research but also how they interpret the social and physical structures of their local environment as interpretive research. To study this question, a survey was conducted which asked residents of the two Riksbyggen’s properties about their views and experiences living in Ursvik and interacting with surrounding neighborhoods (see Appendix I). The hope for these surveys was that people would respond honestly about Ursvik becoming more integrated and how they wish to see the future of their neighborhood develop. Survey responses could give data on both how residents understand the city setting in which they live and how they envision the future of the community. The original hope for this project was to conduct a more deeper analysis of how residents perceive their neighborhood and integration but due to the administrative restraints of contacting the housing boards early on, legal restraints in that need approval for residents to be contacted directly, and time restraints to developing rapport with the participants, I was unable to conduct interviews or focus groups as I had originally hoped. The Department for Sustainable Development with which I partnered with at Riksbyggen does not communicate directly with housing owners, association, or even account managers on a regular basis, which made the process of finding the right contact person and then developing a method for communicating with residents, a lengthy and long-lasting process.

The plan for a survey was partly inspired by Sundbyberg municipality, as they had conducted a survey of the Ursvik area previously in 2015, and the responses from both surveys could provide comparable data. If the communities of Ursvik have been surveyed by Sundbyberg Municipality in the past, then this was perhaps the best form of contacting residents and creating some version of community dialogue.

This method allows the current residents to participate in planning practice by voicing their concerns through the survey. Although this research is mostly academic based, partnership

3 with Riksbyggen and communication with Sundbybergs stad could provide an opportunity for participation to lead to influence on future plans and development. Within this project it is important to include governance and participatory planning practices, in order to create more just and sustainable impact. Innes and Booher (2003) emphasize the importance for collaborative planning and dialogue for both theorists and practitioners working within community development planning. Creating a collective dialogue with local actors and residents enhances creative solutions and gives power to those influenced by planning policy and decisions.

How can social sustainability indicators function as a means to promote collaboration and integration?

Social sustainability indicators are a method in themselves that push practitioners to define their terms and targets for success. This research question analyzes this method of setting indicators to develop a critique or evaluation for how strategic and capable of making change the indicators actually are.

There is a sea of suggested indicators for sustainability that hope to either guide policy or planning, so much so that the term Indicator Industry has been used to describe the current production of indicator-based science (Hezri, 2004). The work done by Cecilia Wong (2015) on spatial planning indicators in the U.K. exemplifies an analysis of indicators to be used in spatial planning policy, in order to find the connections between inputs, outputs, and impacts. Extensive literature and policy reviews inform her evaluations on the methodology, classifications, and impacts of indicators as a planning tool.

In a similar fashion, I conducted a review and analysis of social sustainability indicators in order to conduct an analysis of those produced and used by Riksbyggen, starting with a review of possible indicators for social sustainability and those that apply for housing planning. Meetings with the sustainability specialist and the project leader for future projects in Ursvik, informed my discussion on how the indicators are used throughout the planning process. I then used this information and the discussion of indicator criteria from various literatures to help me review the indicators and suggest how the use of indicators can be advanced. The aim of the analysis was to review how the indicators set out by Riksbyggen can be achieved and function in the planning setting.

Observations of Riksbyggen’s internal working structure with sustainability aided in informing the analysis of how the indicators function in the planning process. This work might seem repetitive to the work done by researcher Björn Andersson (2013) from the University of Gothenburg for Riksbyggen’s project Positive Footprint Housing, in which he defined and developed indicators that Riksbyggen now uses today. However, my analysis looks more at the outputs and impacts of the indicators and how they connect to the original targets proposed. In addition to observations and meetings, a section of the survey used to measure resident perceptions included questions that aimed to measure the respective indicators. The results of the indicators as reported by residents inform the analysis of to what extent the indicators created the intended effect. The analysis takes more of a planning perspective beyond the scope of social work or cultural geography to look at how the architectural and planning processes work with the indicators for social sustainability.

What are the means by which Riksbyggen can overcome segregating barriers both physical structures and social cultural between Rinkeby and Ursvik?

4 With the knowledge collected from the first two research questions, an analysis of what means and steps could be taken in the future development of the Ursvik area was conducted. This method is supported by the methods of observational field visits to the Ursvik case area. These visits gave a silent knowledge or a self-perceived understanding of the impacts of structural barriers and structures on the lived experience of residents in the area. Discussions and informative interviews with planners from Sundbyberg municipality, Stockholm municipality, and Riksbyggen provides insight into the formation of plans and the impact the indicators had on planning for integrated communities. All actors, Riksbyggen as a housing developer, residents as citizen voices, and Sundbyberg as a government organization, have a collaborative stake and impact of new development in Ursvik. Analyzing different actors perceptions and working motivations will provide an understanding of how their use their collective power. An evaluation of the future plans and developments based on this information will create and opportunity to suggest improvements or recommendation for future developments. This is provided that the act of community and spatial planning is a method in itself to find restrictions and challenges that come with planning for integrated communities. At the beginning of this project, it was uncertain if Ursvik’s resident participation can have an impact, or if the social sustainability indicators are applicable to this case, or if the current plans are desirable. However, these challenges were discovered through the process of designing and evaluating future plans for the Ursvik area. Through these discoveries, suggestions for Riksbyggen’s ongoing projects can be made. Although Riksbyggen is not alone in creating a positive environment in the future Ursvik, they are part of a collaborative network of actors.

Ethics considerations As both a research and a planner I need to consider the ethical implications of my work as I do not operate in an isolated world and the effects of my research could have an impact on people’s understandings and further their everyday lives.

The research and planning methods conducted in this project harness both a combination of positivist and naturalist epistemology, which seems contradictory, but the research acknowledges the measurements of certain factual or real existence of knowledge but that also certain social concepts can be understood, rationalized, internalized and reproduced (Davoudi, 2012). As an example, I look at the existence of the structural facilities implemented by Riksbyggen, but also how residents interpret social concepts such as safety or cultural difference.

Understanding the position and location of the planner and in a way “writing the planner” provides a situation for ethical and theoretical dilemmas or conflicts to be recognized and expressed honestly (Beauregard, 1998, pp. 93). As a researcher, I bring with me my own understandings, interpretations, and reproductions of knowledge. My educational background in both in sociology and urban planning give me a specific context in which I interpret the world and social constructs. My national background as an American and my limited experience living in Sweden provides and limits my cultural knowledge and experiences. My proficiency in Swedish grants me access to speak with those working and living within the Swedish language, but my lack of fluency or nativity leaves a gap for where misunderstandings and misinterpretations could arise. I also recognize that working within a separate organization can lead to biases or tendencies to follow a certain mindset or belief. Ethical concerns of working for organizations with specific interests or profits at stake, as written about by Loh and Arroyo (2017), can be difficult for planners partnering in a private role to balance the needs of the company with the interests of the public. Beyond this, my

5 own personal biases and understandings can impact my research study. I recognize my personal subjectivity and aim to remain as open and honest as I can throughout the research process.

More concretely the ethical considerations of my research follow those of standard social research study by ensuring that participants are informed of my role, the research aim and use, and their rights to consent and anonymity. The survey was conducted in a way that followed these guidelines and oversight was performed by my advisors at both my university and private partner.

Background Research Social sustainability framework The foundation of this research is the notion that social sustainability is a crucial target to aim for as organizations hope to increase their positive impact and longevity. However, sustainability can feel like a ‘catch-all’ phrase; uses of the word range from the names of master’s programs to descriptions of food products, making its definition and framework important for the basis of this study. The strength of the term is both derived from its specific definition but also its broad scope and applicability. The term’s normative context provides a direction towards what is considered desired, but this desired future needs to be defined. The most common definition of sustainability and sustainable development is taken from the UN’s Brundtland Report from 1987 which states that: “Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (United Nations, 1987). This definition places a focus on inter-generational equity - providing for the needs of future generations.

Sustainability has since been reinterpreted, redefined, or specified to imply a multitude of versions of fair and just system for the future environment. Overtime, the understanding of sustainability has developed to encapsulate three-pillars: environmental, economic, and social, or otherwise known as Triple Bottom Line. Each pillar has a focus of specific key perspectives on goals and strategic actions that can either overlap or diverge from each other. Another approach developed by a British commission established the use of Egan’s Wheel as visual representation of factors within sustainable development (see Figure 2) (Manzi et al, 2010).

Social Sustainability has come to focus concentrations on the stability of social structures, taking a more anthropocentric approach to the longevity of resources and global impacts. The concern for social sustainability has mostly developed on a global scale to focus on solving issues considered to be “traditional” or “hard,” such as poverty, education, human rights, and gender equality. Whereas more “emerging” or “soft” considerations of social sustainability can include topics such as demographic change, Figure 2 Egan's Wheel for sustianable developmentsource: social mixing, health and safety, and well-being Manzi et. al., 2010 and happiness (Colantonio and Dixon, 2011).

6 From this general summary of social sustainability, main focuses have developed over years of study. Missimer et al. (2017) has developed a principle-based definition of social sustainability after reviewing literature that has aimed to define the topic. This study found that most all definitions include a sort of factor of trust or trustworthiness as a focus. This trust relies on the community and their governing body or organization and contains both the emotional factors that remain when individuals rely on certain community organizations for basic needs and services. Organizations must evaluate their ability to be trusted when looking at education of members, public contracts, governing practices, and moral integrity.

This research supports the claims that governance is crucial to socially sustainable development. Governance defined by Healey (2003, pp.104) is “the processes by which societies, and social groups, manage their collective affairs.” Governance as a practice gives more power of governing from governments back to communities, and for urban planning in particular this practice is established through collaborative planning methods. Including residents and community leaders in the planning process has now become a standard for social sustainability development for municipalities, but this action mostly involves the process and not the outcomes or targets of planning.

Common definitions of social sustainability goals or targets have become focused on reducing social inequalities, injustices, and exclusions. The most common approach to achieving this has been through social integration and social mixing. Manzi et al. (2010) explains that social mixing through the promotion of mixed-income communities limits neighborhood effects, helps residents develop their social capital, and engenders respect amongst community residents. These three main benefits of social mixing help alleviate the effects of residential segregation that has developed in many urban areas.

Residential segregation Residential Segregation can be defined as “residential separation of different groups from a broader population within cities” (Leal, 2012, pp. 94). Residential segregation as a social theoretical concept implies that there are both individual factors that decipher where a person resides based on their cultural preferences and also structural influences that predetermine the choices of where one can choose to live, such as market forces, policy initiatives, neighborhood planning regulations, and general inequality (Leal, 2012). When structural influences guide certain minorities or marginalized communities into isolated and disconnected residential areas, questions of social justice, upward mobility, and diversity become more important to ask.

More studies have shown that the individual factors that influence residential location are minimal compared to the structural forces that limit options for people, especially for immigrants and minorities. Liedholm’s (1984) study of Turkish immigrant groups in Västerås found that while resident’s social capital benefited from having culturally-similar residents nearby, residents expressed their desire not to be isolated together as a culturally homogenous group in one area. The preference to be both close to their homeland cultures is matched by the desire to be integrated into Swedish society. CRUSH (The Critical Urban Sustainability Hub) (2016) points out in their book 13 Myter om Bostadsfrågor (translated: 13 Myths about Housing Issues) that residential segregation caused by immigrants’ individual choices to live close together is a myth that has been reproduced in news and media. Their research points to historical and political mechanisms driving the market forces to reduce housing choices to those with already low opportunities and social capital in the housing market. These forces drive the concentration of immigrant communities into specific neighborhoods.

7 As economist, Stefan Fölster (2017) explains in his book Den Inkluderande Staden, residential segregation is more than just geographical separation. Isolating certain cultures into neighborhoods creates negative neighborhood effects, such as poor grade schools, less access to work opportunities, and more exposure to crime. The process of school segregation is exacerbated by the reform for school choice, Friskolereformen, which allows parents to send their children to schools of their choice instead of the neighborhood school (Böhlmark, et al., 2015). Beyond school segregation, the negative neighborhood effects are best measured through the research conducted on children’s success levels based on varying neighborhoods their families moved in to. Consistent research cited in his book shows that children under the age of 13 years are more susceptible to neighborhood effects. Young children that were moved into and raised in segregated or vulnerable neighborhoods often grow up to have a lower level of education and a lower income than their counterparts that were moved into and raised in affluent or diverse neighborhoods. The larger economic impact of this is that children that grow up with negative neighborhood effects and choose to stay in the neighborhood make less earnings to contribute to municipal tax and therefore the municipality might have to spend more on social services. This process makes it more economically advantageous to invest in integration projects, as it will increase the future tax income for the municipality and it will decrease the amount needed to be spent on social services.

After a discussion Fölster’s report more thoroughly at a seminar hosted by Riksbyggen (2018, b), it became clearer that to understand neighborhood effects in the terms of segregation, one must review both the social aspects of power and justice in and inflicted on the community, in addition to the physical and structural features of the neighborhood. The emphasis here was that we cannot solve social problems with only structural ones; crime cannot be solved by just adding better lit streets. It is also critical to discuss the matter of vulnerable neighborhoods not as threat or a problem that needs to be solved, but as a dynamic community of people that strive to be defined by more than just their neighborhood.

Further, a report produced by the Urban Institute by Turner and Rawlings (2009) collects studies on neighborhood diversification programs in the United States and found that neighborhood diversity not only has economic benefits for both minorities and white residents, but also that it has an impact on how residents view their neighbors and cultures that are different from their own. Residents are more likely to be open to new cultures and diversity after living in a more integrated community than before in a segregated neighborhood. Children that attend more diverse schools are more open to new ideas and intellectual thought. The effects of integration can be seen as changing deep rooted beliefs or even misconceptions different cultural groups have about one another.

Residential integration On the opposite end of residential segregation would be the concept of residential integration, another concept which can also be difficult to define and measure. An attempt at defining residential integration by Sin and Krysan (2015) reviews literature on the concept between the years of 1950-2013. The definitions of residential integration included a general theme of racial heterogeneity amongst residents of a defined neighborhood. This definition can be extended to look at the heterogeneity of other factors such as income or religion, however the idea remains that integration includes a diversity of people living within a defined geographical space. It is pointed out in the discussion that more dimensions of the definition were added to include interactions between cultural groups. The dimension of social interactions and communications between groups can be more difficult to measure and track,

8 especially now with the development of new online community platforms that connect neighbors in their virtual communities.

Harris Beider’s book Race, Housing, and Communities (2012) reviews the policies and spatial planning for minority communities in the UK over time. His research makes the claim that it is quite difficult for cultural groups to live ‘parallel lives’ in a specific neighborhood, as interactions occur through retail, children’s’ schooling, and community events. Beider adds that community cohesion can be supported by reducing feelings of isolation and alienation amongst cultures in a neighborhood by providing public services and needs that are mutually accessible to all groups (Beider, 2012, pp. 32). This is supported by emphasis in Turner and Rawlings (2009) report for affordable businesses and services that bring accessibility to those who would not normally enter a more affluent community. Integrated communities need to have services that residents have the purchasing power to support, meaning that diversifying the range of shops, boutiques, and restaurants will help a support a diversity of residents feel comfortable in their neighborhood. ). In his doctoral thesis, Mo Sarraf (2015) discusses how a diversity of urban space and services in residential areas allows for a diversity of cultures to use the space and increase their visibility, making for more multicultural neighborhoods. This notion is not new, Jane Jacobs, often seen as the mother of urban planning, promoted diversity of building ages and renovations so to retain affordable places of business, which would in turn support a diversity of incomes and cultural groups (Jacobs, 1961).

It is important to note that diversity as a measurement of integration can be very difficult to define and use concretely. Studies of diversity in U.S. cities often look at racial makeup as the defining characteristic of diversity (Edsall, 2015). This not might be an acceptable measure for Swedish cases, in that there is not the legacy of racial tensions much like in the U.S. case of segregation through Jim Crow Laws. An alternative is looking at ethnic or cultural background makeup, but this still would not apply well to the case in Rinkeby, Ursvik, Rissne, and Hallonebergen, as the ethnic makeup for neighborhoods like Rinkeby, Rissne, and Hallonbergen is quite diverse with cultural backgrounds from all over the world and rarely do these neighborhoods considered segregated have an ethnic majority (Stockholms Stad, 2016, b). When looking at integration and how diversity is defined for this specific case study, it focuses understanding on income status and immigrant status. Immigrant’s vulnerable status as having less security in society, whether it be for legal and administrative status, job opportunities, or within the housing market, has a larger impact when segregated and isolated (Andersson et. al., 2010). The goal of diversity, and larger residential integration, would focus on a mixing of income statuses and of immigrant/native born status.

Those critical to residential integration argue that neighborhoods are in a contestant state of tipping more white or black and that the space in between is not a state of being but a transition period. More so in the US, community leaders often fear that the promoting residential integration could hit a tipping point, causing a white flight situation (Edsall, 2015). This situation could apply to the Swedish setting in that that the more immigrants that move into a neighborhood could case native born Swedes to perceive the neighborhood as less safe, welcoming, or affluent and therefore move causing more native born residents to feel the same and move. This situation of immigrants tipping neighborhoods to be more segregated is discussed in Ann Rodenstedt’s (2014) research in Malmö, where she looks at how native born Swedes segregate themselves from more diverse neighborhoods, causing further segregation. Debates on whether cities in the U.S. and Sweden are becoming more integrated

9 or more segregated prove that the conversation cannot be determined exactly one way or another. However, it is important to understand the multidimensionality and complexity of residential integration when reviewing the status of social sustainability in neighborhoods.

The Swedish housing market In Swedish cities specifically, segregation has been a topic of interest as the country overtime has opened its borders to immigrant populations. Unlike many US cities, high housing standards and well-maintained residences in the inner city have deterred the evolution of inner-city slums. However, as housing prices decrease the farther distance away from the city core, more neighborhoods with low cost housing are developed and these suburban areas are where immigrants and low-income families tend to live. This process is exacerbated by concentrations of similar types of housing tenures in the same areas. In the Swedish housing market, there are three main types of housing tenure: rental apartments, co-owned apartments or row houses, and privately-owned homes or villas (see Table 1). Overtime as cities develop these three types of tenures have become concentrated in neighborhoods causing housing segmentation, where residents of one type of housing tenure become segregated spatially in the neighborhood. Due to immigrants’ lack of social capital they are determined to start their housing career in the rental market before they can maintain the resources and capital to own property, which helps to explain the segregation of immigrant neighborhoods (Lindén and Lindberg, 1991).

Table 1Types of Swedish Housing

Swedish name Hyresrätt Bostadsrätt Egna hem Owned through a Ownership type Rental unit Owned independently collective Apartments, row Housing type Apartments Row houses, villas houses

Fragmentation of city governing can intensify this situation further. As municipalities differ the planning regulation, political standings, and economic conditions differ quite a lot, making the border are between two municipalities an emphasis of administrative segregation. More affluent municipalities can afford more benefits and services to its residents and less affluent municipalities the opposite. This process can make the facilities in segregated schools more unequal causing larger neighborhood effects. Fölster (2017) found that municipalities invest less and less often in their border areas, as the investment can have a pay off on surrounding municipalities. This process makes the administrative border also one with low investment. Stockholm city is one of the more fragmented cities in Sweden, with 25 different municipalities within the county area (Bäck, 2002). Each municipality has its own right to plan its area on its own and usually has a specific planning and political process for that municipal office, making it difficult to mandate and coordinate collaboration of planning border areas.

During the 1990s, the housing market underwent deregulation as neo-liberal market forces were trusted to maintain the housing balance. This in turn created more income inequality and segmentation of the housing market which helps drive segregation (Scarpa, 2015). National policy and regulation has a large effect on the segregation of Swedish cities and communities. The prime example is the initiative of school choice increasing the segregation and quality gap amongst Swedish schools (Böhlmark, 2015). However, national policy’s reach only extends so far; as the municipal planning of housing and neighborhood design is controlled by local planners’ due to the Municipal Planning Monopoly that dictates that only

10 the local municipal authorities can control the planning process (Andersson et al, 2010). Municipal planners in the efforts for more socially sustainable governance practice and collaborative planning include both current local residents and housing developers into the planning conversation of what type of housing gets built and where. In theory, this could give local residents impacted by segregation a louder voice and housing developers less power to develop only high-profit homes, but in practice the local home owners often have a louder voice over what they do or do not want built in their neighborhoods and out of fear of lower property values, the opinion is usually against building more mixed-income or mixed-tenured housing (Bergsten and Holmqvist, 2013).

The Million Homes Project The challenges municipal planners can face when including local residents in planning discussions often stem from negative opinions and attitudes towards segregated neighborhoods that are based off more of a reputation in the media than actual threats to their communities. This typically occurs in neighborhoods that were developed as part of The Million Homes Project. The Million Homes Project in the 60s and 70s was a way to increase housing stock for a rapidly growing urban population while at the same time increase standards of living (see Figure 3). Care and consideration for urban planning standards were adopted by many plans in order to create a new modern suburb. However, over time these project areas become immigrant dense neighborhoods due to their location and low rent, slowly secluded quite neighborhoods became more segregated and isolated suburbs. Many other European cities had developed similar style neighborhoods (high-rise, affordable, immigrant dense neighborhoods) during the same period but they have since been demolished due to lack of proper maintenance and similar issues of segregation (Hall and Vidén, 2005).

Figure 3 Aerial photo of Rinkeby, Stockholm source: Pscheidl el. al., 2013 Molina et. al. (2005) discusses the challenge of Million Home Project’s reputations within her research with social structures and mass media. In the 1990s the discourse of the Million Homes Project shifted from residents as the victims of the bad housing market, to the residents being the problem themselves. Beyond the myth that these neighborhoods are self- segregating are myths about diversity and poor social values are reproduced and stigmatized in mass media. Million Homes Project suburbs get the focus of being concentrated with homogenous groups, when often the ethnic makeup of the neighborhood is rich in diversity compared to other typical high-income Swedish neighborhoods. Million Home Project neighborhoods are also affected by a type of cultural racism, which Molina describes as an

11 “us versus them” mentality that establishes borders over perceived cultural differences. Reproductions of negative stereotypes of Million Homes Project areas can have a large impact on people’s attitudes towards integration and social mixing, making a municipal planners role more difficult in reducing residential segregation.

Research on residential segregation in Malmö paints a clear picture of this phenomenon. Rodenstedt (2014) asked residents of a predominantly Swedish-born and affluent community on where they feel comfortable living and visiting and where they do not feel comfortable. The research found that most of these residents would not like to live or visit neighborhoods that they perceive to be segregated and predominantly immigrant based. They hold the biases that are based off media and assumptions that these neighborhoods exist in ‘another world’ vastly different from their own. There exists the idea that one visiting a segregated neighborhood would make one feel like an immigrant in their own country. However, this bias is self-producing in that segregation in this study was mostly the cause of villa owners sectioning their neighborhoods off and privatizing their neighborhoods through gates and isolating housing practices.

The role of housing developers Although municipalities have the monopoly over the planning process in each municipality’s administrative areas, through my personal experience exploring how the planning process works I have come to understand that the responsibility for creating better residential areas often gets put on the shoulders of housing developers. Housing companies in Sweden mostly build, sell, and manage collective apartments or rental apartments. The municipality’s exploitations unit has the final say over what requirements housing companies must meet before the municipality sells its property over to housing developers. However, the level of power here differs by housing company and by municipality making the process of neighborhood planning quite complicated. Municipalities might not take responsibility for housing development as it is the role of the developing company, but the company might not take responsibility as the municipality sets certain requirements for development. For housing development to counter balance the housing crisis and residential segregation in Swedish cities it is ever crucial for actors to collaborate on common goals stated in both company goals and municipal visions.

Not only is interesting to look at residential integration and development from a housing developers perspective, it is also interesting to look at the perspective of those who live in collective housing properties or bostadsrättföreningar. These properties specifically in Ursvik are diverse in style, family size, and price range (Riksbyggen, 2016, a). The hope is that respondent’s perceptions match this diversity to provide an interesting and accurate view into how Riksbyggen residents perceive integration. Residents in a collective housing development might also provide a perspective that is somewhere in between the apartment renter and the home owner, in that they collectively own the housing development.

Social sustainability for Riksbyggen Riksbyggen is a private company the builds, manages, and renovates housing in Sweden. Most all of the housing managed by Riksbyggen is in the form of bostadsrättsföreningar, often referred to as a brf, which are apartments that are owned through a collective housing association. Riksbyggen oversees over 180,000 cooperative apartments in 2,700 housing associations. Although a majority of their work is focused on cooperative housing, they still manage a share of apartment rentals. In 2016, Riksbyggen managed almost 100,000 rental apartments as a share of their total business (Riksbyggen, 2017).

12 Much like the growing interest in sustainability sciences, private business is growing interest in how to increase their longevity and minimize their impacts. Riksbyggen’s sustainability initiatives were sparked by a collaborative project for sustainable development in 2011 with a project called Positive Footprint Housing. The project is an ongoing collaboration between Riksbyggen, Johanneberg Science Park, Chalmers University, The University of Gothenberg, Göteborg Energi, Göteborgs stad och RISE – Research Institutes of Sweden. The aim of the project is to find sustainable solutions for housing and communities through collaborative planning. A focus on social sustainability in particular has taken form in the research done by Björn Andersson (2013), a social work researcher at the University of Gothenburg. His collaboration in the project has produced a report of social sustainability definitions and actions that can help aid housing companies work with social sustainability. This report allowed for Riksbyggen to adopt their own working definitions and action plan for social sustainability efforts (Riksbyggen, 2016, b).

Both Andersson’s report and Riksbyggen’s (2013) report for Gothenburg’s social sustainability acknowledge the importance of governance, trust, and diversity as factors of social sustainability. This follows the definitions and important factors that have been written about by researchers in the fields of social work, urban sociology, and urban planning.

The current sustainability tool, hållbarhetsverktyg, functions as a way for Riksbyggen’s sustainability specialists to plan sustainable initiatives and programs into new building projects. Within this tool, exists indicators and measures for different aspects of sustainability; four of them focused on social sustainability, and more that include ecosystem services analysis, mobility measures, energy consumption, and the sustainability of building materials. The social sustainability based indicators attempt to measure to what extent Riksbyggen: provides an opportunity for residents to have an impact, creates mutual benefits, creates safe and secure living environments, and develops communities (Riksbyggen, 2018, c). With these as measures, Riksbyggen’s specialists can evaluate to what extent actions accomplish these indicators by assigning a project a grade from either good, better, best. Actions can include a combination of different efforts including creating conditions for young adults to enter the housing market, incorporating dialogue with future residents in the planning process, setting space for meeting places and common rooms, and designing flexible floorplans that have variation in apartment sizes (Riksbyggen, 2018, d). For the company, it is important that their housing plans meet the qualifications for sustainable housing for many reasons. Riksbyggen has dedicated their company values to contributing to a better environment and society. A focus on sustainability is reinforced by company core values that focus on sustainable practices. It is also incredible important to the business side of the company, in order to attain more land and building contracts, as well as to stay ahead of competitors. The bar for positive sustainable impacts is constantly being raised and broadened to include more innovative and social aspects, by both competitors and municipalities. Social sustainable housing also allows for strengthened longevity of communities and housing areas.

Riksbyggen’s reports emphasize the importance of being a cooperative company, meaning that housing associations own a share in Riksbyggen’s housing stock. This cooperative ownership allows for more democratic practices and open communication throughout the company. It also means that housing associations can operate quite independently from Riksbyggen. Account managers meet with the housing boards to discuss economic decisions and housing improvements at board meetings and through collective action, but the housing associations boards have finals say. Tenants who own apartments and live in Riksbyggen

13 buildings have the opportunity to attend meetings, vote for board members, and discuss possibilities for change amongst their associations freely. Riksbyggen takes pride in these independent operations of housing associations but also sets goals for helping them through various workshops and networking forms to collaborate further.

As a research, I have to acknowledge that access into Riksbyggen’s working community and office setting allows me to come to research conclusions I might not have been able to conclude if not give access to this form of social group. In a way, my research to find solutions for the company allows me to observe working processes in an ethnographic perspective, observing communications, power relations, and having the ability to ask open questions gives me an inside perspective. This perspective also gives me a form of bias. I understand that my role as a researcher is impacted by my social and professional relationships with peers and colleagues. I will attempt to the best of my ability to stay objective or display my subjective biases throughout my learning process and analysis.

Ursvik Case Description Historical overview The area of Ursvik just north of Stockholm has a rich and unique background. Traces of the area’s history date as far back to the Bronze Age. A stone artifact located in the forest north of Ursvik marks the site of sacrifice and worship that occurred between 1700 BC and 500 BC (Stora Ursvik KB, 2017). The municipality of Sundbyberg, which Ursvik is a part of, has also traced Viking artifacts that indicate migrations and inhabitants throughout the area. It wasn’t until 1327 that the municipality of Sundbyberg was described in text, listing the farms of the area (Sundbyberg Stadsmuseum, 2016). Due to the area’s rich land and forest, the area prospered as a community of small farms. The farms of Stora and Lilla Ursvik were overseen by the noble Oxenstierna family, with direct commands from King Gustav Vasa. The area functioned as a farmstead and a stop along routes that traveled north from Stockholm city (Stora Ursvik KB, 2017).

In 1906 the first real industry came to Ursvik when Graham Brothers set up shop building elevators and lifts for the buildings in and around Stockholm (Stora Ursvik KB, 2017). This industry combined with the urban development in central Sundbyberg, promoted by Sundbyberg’s founder AP Löfström, made the area a prosperous city environment with close connections to Stockholm city during the 20th century (Sundbyberg Stadsmuseum, 2016).

The early farms in Ursvik were taken over by the Swedish government during this time in the early 20th century. The area was set aside to be used by the Swedish National Defense and Research Institute (FOI) for military training and research that had outgrown the facilities in Ladugårdsgärdet, Östermalm. The military site became crucial to the government for research into nuclear weapons, underwater technology, combat simulation and defense analysis. The site is most known for being the first to detect nuclear radiation that had blown over from Eastern Europe, shedding light on the disastrous Chernobyl accident in the then Soviet Union (Stora Ursvik KB, 2018).

In 2001 the FOI left the area and sold the land sparking the opportunity for new city development. Remnants of the area’s military past still remain as old train tracks through the forest mark the site where transportation of military goods were moved in and out of the facilities. Currently these tracks are used as part of a running and cycling trail within the forest paths (Stora Ursvik KB, 2017). As modern development of housing, office, and

14 commercial space occurs, it will be interesting to see how Ursvik’s heritage and cultural past influence the future landscape.

Ursvik today Ursvik is the residential and forested area located in the northern part of Sundbyberg municipality. Sundbyberg municipality handles the administrative and political governing of the Ursvik area, but as new development is planned to take place, the collective company combining private development investors and the public officials called Stora Ursvik KB has been created to oversee the building progress over the next 15 to 20 years. The Ursvik area is separated out into two parts: Stora Ursvik and Lilla Ursvik. Lilla Ursvik consists mostly of single family houses built from the 1930s onward till today. Stora Ursvik comprises the new land to be developed as well as existing apartment buildings and homes. Most of the new development will be located on the western edge of Stora Ursvik. The Sundbyberg’s overview plan from 2012 estimated that Stora Ursvik’s population would increase from 1,143 residents to 10,484 by the year 2020.

Ursvik’s culture and recreational activities embrace the lush natural environment and green space in the northern part of the city. An ultra-marathon takes place in Ursvik’s forest trails every march, cross-country ski trails weave in during the winter, and forest raves and parties pop up during summer nights. Ursvik’s motionsområdet provides a space for various recreational activities, including an outdoor gym, trails to designated silent areas, a sauna with family changing rooms, and sport fields where the local football team, Ursvik IK, plays. In addition to an extensive amount of outdoor activities, Sweden’s first and largest parkour hall in Ursvik provides the opportunity for kids and adults to try and train in parkour exercises indoors. Beyond sporting sites, Ursvik is speckled with cultural heritage sites, such as the old farm house of Stora Ursvik’s farm, the old mill used in the early 20th century that stands on Kvarnkullen, the sacrifice stone in the forest that remains from the Bronze Age, and the abandoned train tracks from previous military activities. With an explosion of development and new residents will new activities and cultural sites grow, and perhaps a future culture house for Ursvik to call its own.

The future Ursvik The western edge of Stora Ursvik has a lot in store within the next 20 years. The area has been partitioned up into different blocks where either housing developers will build apartment blocks or commercial developers will build for assortments of restaurants, shops, and boutiques. The final goal for development is 7,000 new dwellings, 3,000 new work places, and 15,000 residents. Sundbyberg has a service plan in place to provide schools, elderly homes, fire stations, and other public services in the area (Sundbybergs stad, 2015, a). Ursvik Allé will function as the main street of the town, with Ursvik Torg functioning as a central meeting place. Enköpingsvägen which runs along the southern border of Ursvik will be transitioned from a large motorway into a more accessible city street. Today, there is only one mode of public transportation into the center of Ursvik, the 504 bus, but there are plans by SL for a new tvärbana that will stop in Ursvik along the E18 on its way from Bromma to Kista This rail system will be made accessible by the neighboring community of Rinkeby by a pedestrian bridge that just opened this year. A larger bridge for buses, pedestrians, and cyclists will connect Ursvik Allé and Rinkeby Allé once building construction is complete. A new bus route from Ursvik to Kista will also be introduced in order to strengthen connections to the northern neighbor (Stockholms Läns Landsting, 2018).

15 Green space is planned to follow along the E18 highway in part to block noise and air pollution, as well as an activity wall along the highway that will help block noise and air pollution. The wall is planned to be concrete and to have varying heights along the parks edge. Activities such as rock climbing, skate park, and an ice skating rink in winter along the wall and park will help bring people to the area and function as an active meeting place. Maps of activities that will be offered as well as important ecosystem functions have been created by the Ursvik planning program produced by Sundbyberg municipality (see Figure 4) (Sundbybergs stad, 2015, a). This document follows the goals set out by Sundbyberg’s overview plan produced in 2012 that emphasized a focus on all three pillars of sustainability. Social sustainability being seen as an important factor to fight pockets of poverty, address public health concerns, as well as promote diverse and cohesive communities (Sundbybergs stad, 2018. However, both the Sundbyberg overview plan and the Ursvik project program leave Figure 4 Rendering of city plans for Ursvik done by Strategisk Arkitektur connections to Rinkeby open for more source: Sunbdbybergs Stad, 2015 field and social research.

The plan program for Ursvik is also supported by a goal document that outlines focus areas of sustainability and their respective goals for development. There are not specific focus areas for the social environment of the new plan but goals in various focus areas look at community aspects. The focus area that summarizes plan participation includes a goal for social sustainability that aims at inclusive citizen participation and governance situations. This document is further analyzed in the indicator review as the goals can be interpreted as indicators for project success (Sundbybergs stad, 2015, b).

Järva 2030 The City of Stockholm has seen massive changes over the past couple decades, as both infrastructure development has increased and a growing population and immigrant settlement have strengthened the demand for more housing and services. After the completion of developments in the Southern district and construction of the neighborhood area of Hammarby Sjöstad, Stockholm City realized it needed to expand development outward to create sustainable city space for a rapidly growing city. In 2007, the City of Stockholm and the Regional Development for Stockholm region (RUFS) produced Stockholm Vision 2030 and initiated discussions for RUFS 2050. These plans focus on Stockholm regional cores that are well connected to Stockholm city center, that would provide centers of housing and services for people in and around Stockholm city (Stockholms stad, 2007). One of which

16 cores that Stockholm has decided to focus on is the Järva area which encapsulates 5 city parts is one regional development vision. The Järva project is especially interesting because it aims to increase the living standards and opportunities in neighborhoods that are considered some of the most vulnerable in Sweden. Million Project Homes areas in the Järva development are presupposed by their negative reputations for high crime and poor education. The Vision Järva 2030 seeks to lift the areas possibilities by implementing more diverse city development as well as increased social services (Stockholms stad, 2009).

The project has gotten some controversial feedback at it has taken a long time for the city to offer actual plans and solutions, and it has taken in different extents of participatory feedback throughout the project. The original proposal for the Järvalyftet program that was designed to improve the Järva neighborhoods was published in 2007 but the actual building start was not until years later. Over these years the program was collecting different participant feedback and revising plans to then be reviewed again. Svenska Bostäder is the housing company responsible for most of the development within Stockholms stads portion of the project. Throughout their research with citizens in the area, architects, project leaders, and even politicians faced difficulties in connecting with communities and facilitating meaningful discussions. (Sax, 2013)

The significance of the Järva development and the Järva 2030 program is that this development includes neighborhood areas of: Akalla, Hjulsta, Tensta, Husby, Kista, Rinkeby, and Ursvik. These neighborhood areas are mostly part of Stockholms stad but the project also includes municipalities from Sundbybergs stad, Solna stad, Solluntuna kommun, and Järfälla kommun (see Figure 5). This project had high hopes of bringing together municipal leaders to work on a collective future, however this is an ambitious feat as the challenges of coordinating agreements over municipal borders can be tedious and time consuming (Fölster, 2017). In a discussion with a Stockholms stad city planner on the agreement of the bridge from Rinkeby to Ursvik, it was explained that it took political negotiations to find a solution of how the tvärbana and the bridge would be paid for, in which Stockholm had to pay 75% of the bridge for access to the tvärbana in Ursvik.

Figure 5Map of Järvalyftet area bordered in red source: Fölster, 2017

17 Study Visit The first site visit conducted gave information and impressions that can only be discovered when physically present in the area. This allowed a context for the neighborhood and surrounding areas to be established. Within this context can more methods be conducted that build on the empirical findings from observing neighborhood with very little outside impressions. Once an original site visit was conducted more trips to the study area were made, but this summary documents original impressions and observations.

Rinkeby I started the field visit by taking the 540 bus towards Tensta Centrum and I got off at Rinkeby Centrum. The bus ride mostly contained a mixture of school kids and elderly people. When the bus stopped at Hallonberg Station, the bus picked up a lot of people that then got off at various stops around Rinkeby. The bus enters Rinkeby along the outside and then through one road that intersects the neighborhood. Rinkeby seems to be surrounded by large highways on three sides forcing the bus to enter and exit the highway to get to the neighborhood.

Rinkeby Torg was full of people and movement. There were moms with children, elderly people, as well as middle aged people doing errands and meeting others in the square. There were a couple stands where people were selling used goods. As I exited the square on the opposite side to a parking lot, a family was loading trays of food into a car for what seemed like an upcoming family or community event. The people around Rinkeby were more ethnically diverse and more foreign languages were being spoken. As I walked away from the square there was more construction and construction workers present. Rinkeby Allé has future plans as a city street that is more pedestrian and cycle friendly. However, in the current state it is quite difficult to navigate pedestrian walkways through construction barriers (see Figure 6).

Figure 6 Photo of Rinkeby and construction on the outer edge of the neighborhood along Ursviks Alle. Taken 2018 The housing in the area seemed to be quite mixed. Some buildings looked quite run down, with chipping paint, old windows, and unkept balconies. Some buildings looked like they had been recently renovated with newer windows and balconies. I did not find a spatial pattern to which buildings looked newer and which looked older.

18 Rinkeby Allé then ends at a petrol station where cars and taxis were flowing through. Construction vehicles also used the area around the gas station to park or fuel up. Behind the petrol station is a bridge that leads to Ursvik. This bridge was closed off and looks currently under construction. The bridge was wide and had the beginnings of what would be a road, with a median, sidewalk with pedestrian barricades, and drive direction signs. The bridge will connect to Ursvik Allé in the final stage of construction.

As I walked south towards the walking bridge, construction continued building presumably what will be new residential buildings that will be the front face of Rinkeby. It was quite easy to access the walking bridge that crosses the E18 motorway. There are stairs up to it and a cycle ramp as well. The bridge is split with a painted bicycle lane. Once on the bridge the walls on either side are quite high, but open so you do not feel trapped but also do not feel like you are crossing a major motorway. The end view towards Ursvik from the walking bridge is the forested hill with the old mill on top, making it quite scenic. The bridge was quite populated, as I counted ten people that I passed, from women running errands, couples on a walk, a mother with a child, a jogger, and a cyclist (see Figure 7).

Figure 7 Photo of pedestrian bridge walking from Rinkeby to Ursvik. Taken 2018 Once I crossed the bridge, I walked through a patch of what felt like park and green space and then the path moved further south and then over a second pedestrian bridge that crossed a small road used for construction vehicles. This bridge was smaller and cycling on the bridge was forbidden for safety reasons, which a sign at the entrance of the bridge communicated.

Ursvik Once over the second pedestrian bridge I entered Ursvik. The area between where the motorway is and where the housing starts feels really big. There is also construction in this area and plans for park/greenspace along the highway, so perhaps this space will not feel so empty after construction. One of the constructions sites had a clear sign that advertised Riksbyggen’s next brf development.

19 The first building I came upon in Ursvik was a Riksbyggen housing development. It consisted of four buildings in a square, with open space in the middle with a center community room. The center space was open for anyone to walk through. Each building seemed to have a different style to it with different types of apartments. The outer building along Ursvik Allé had space for shops on the ground floor, one of which is currently a dress shop. The new development continues on for a couple more blocks with varying and unique architecture. Most buildings are in square blocks with 4 edge buildings and an inner square. A shared space road walking north leads the local school. The area was mostly quite with a couple kids leaving school and parents walking kids home (see Figure 8). The new development along Ursvik Allé was along two city blocks before reaching a hill with more construction on top. Walking along the hill the housing turns into more row houses and villas. There are a couple streets with large villas that are all the same model with large gardens that stretch quite far before reaching the edge of Stora Ursvik. On the northeast corner of Stora Ursvik there is a bus stop for the bus that runs through Ursvik with a couple shops and restaurants.

Figure 8Photo of brf Jubilaren from Ursviks Alle with Rinkeby pictured in the background. Taken 2018 Hallonberg and on I got on the 504 bus that runs through Ursvik to Sundbyberg Station. In between Lilla and Stora Ursvik there is one industrial building currently in operation. The area of Lilla Ursvik was mostly older villas with gardens. At the far end of Lilla Ursvik is Ursvik’s sports and recreation facilities, motionsgård. Around this end there a couple more businesses and office space. The 504 bus then drives down to Hallonberg Station, before going through the villa area of Duvbo, then on to the urban area of Sundbyberg. Hallonberg Station is very diverse as people gather here from a variety of the surrounding neighborhoods. It seemed like a unique mix of high and low income, foreign and Swedish born, and young and old. There are large office buildings in this area with some apartment buildings.

Duvbo was a large residential area with big, beautiful, old homes with gardens. There was a lot of green space with parks and winding roads. There was no clear block structure or city street. From this area this bus heads into Sundbyberg centrum, which is very urbanized with a diversity of architecture and building uses. This area feels as if it could be there center of

20 Stockholm, or any larger urban area. From this point, I took the commuter train back to the inner-city Stockholm which took about 5 minutes.

Impressions From this field visit I understand the structures and context of the area so much more than I would have gotten from just texts and documents. I can fully grasp the social differences between the Million Homes Projects and the new development. I can feel the structural shifts moving from a developing city, to row houses, to large villas, and then back to established urban districts. Right now, the construction along the edge of Rinkeby and throughout Ursvik creates places with less people and movement. It felt very dead and deserted in Ursvik and the development felt very out of place, partly because it is isolated by construction. Perhaps as the area becomes established and more people move in, it will feel more lively and dense.

The row and villa houses in Stora Ursvik felt very surreal, as they were all the exact same design along long stretches of roads. It felt almost fake and lacking context, as if it was dropped there by accident.

Hallonberg had the highest context for social mixing. Many people moving through the space going and coming from a diversity of neighborhoods. The structures were old, large, and industrial feeling, but perhaps with updates here could provide more possibilities for people to stay and meet.

The highways were large and segregating. Enköpingsvägen is planned to be turned into a city street, but today it is a large motorway that cuts through Sundbyberg municipality. The E18 cuts through the construction and greenspace, and it’s exits and entrances weave through the landscape. The view from either side of the highway, is just of massive empty space on either side. The hope is that with development these spaces become less of empty space and more of urban environment (see Figure 9). The challenge will be to make the greenspace along the highways active spaces for people to use, and not just ecosystems unto their own.

Figure 9Photo of newly constructed bridge connecting Rinkeby and Ursvik. Taken 2018 After this original study visit, I had the opportunity to tour the area and visit residents and board members a few more times. My continual returns support some of the original findings

21 of the first study visits. Right now, Ursvik can be quite difficult to get to from the city center directly. Busses from Rissne and Hallonbergen stops make tours around but can be crowded with commuters during mornings and evenings. The physical structures differ in age based on area, in that Rinkeby has older buildings and the Rissne and Hallonbergen have somewhere in between to the new development in Ursvik. Construction in Hallonbergen, Rinkeby, and Ursvik make walking around inconvenient and not very pleasant; having sidewalks start and end, walking around large construction zones, avoiding large machinery. Overall these areas do feel segregated into distinct neighborhoods and development does not transition amongst new areas well.

Meeting with Sundbybergs stad An informational meeting with Sundbyberg municipality was conducted with the project leader for the Ursvik project area to talk about the development plans for Ursvik as well as the progress of the ongoing project (Elmqvist, pers com, 2018). This meeting established an understanding for how the municipality coordinates planning tasks and the role in which they take in the planning process. The project leaders seemed to work with the plans and providing documents and suggestions for politicains on the city council to make the final say. This meant also that there was no direct collaboration or discussions amongst the project leaders at Sundbybergs stad and Stockholms stad. The extent of dialogue amongst the cities was over the bridges that were agreed upon to be built after some political debates and discussions, between politicians from either municipality.

It was also interesting to understand how Sundbybergs stad worked with participant dialog and communication of new plans. It was explained that the municipality has worked with children, elderly, and disabled to get target feedback on their perceptions of new plans, that the municipality has had booths at a yearly festival that shows new plans for the area, and that a detailed plan for a local park had used feedback from Rinkeby and Rissne neighborhoods, to get an idea of how bordering residents would want to use the park. The municipality has received general feedback on integration with surrounding neighborhoods that can be positive, in that residents think a more integrated neighborhood would be good for society, but also a large portion of feedback received by the municipality is negative regarding integration, meaning that residents think integration is dangerous or undesirable for the neighborhood (see Appendix I).

Further discussion of structural plans led to the motivations of structural changes in the detailed plans: private gardens as a means for children to have more access to green space, minimizing the plans for a central culture house because it was seen as lacking direct purpose or specific activities and that the land would be better used for housing and sporting facilities, the activity wall and how it needs to be seen not as a border wall but as an activity wall for both Rinkeby and Ursvik residents, and the need for more social connections over the bridge but with no direct plan of doing this.

It was expressed that the municipality could be interested in private builder’s effort to contribute to the entire area instead of their own buildings or properties. The municipality had previously organized for building companies to do this for development in Hallonbergen, but have not been able to do the same collaboration in Ursvik, for the mere reason that the municipality just has not had a chance to work on it yet, but that they hoped for progress in the future. Another opportunity for collaboration would be amongst different interest groups or associations in Ursvik, much the interest group of housing association board members and

22 housing developers in Järva, Fastighetsägare i Järva (Fastighetsägare i Järva, 2018). It was expressed that local businesses, the daily news, the Stora Ursvik website, and some community members help make the area more connected. But from the municipality’s knowledge, these actors do not meet actively beyond the Facebook groups for the Ursvik area to connect online.

Impressions The next steps in the municipality’s planning office’s work is now focused on creating detailed plans for specific parts of western Ursvik development and continuing working on the potentials for public spaces, parks and schools. The project leader I spoke with seemed skeptic of the impact that the city plans could have, in that private builders owned most of the land and that politicians had a very specific goal for the area making it difficult to push certain agendas. However, she was also skeptic of Riksbyggen’s impact as they will only own three housing developments amongst this massive project area. It was almost discouraging but also very informative that Linda, and the city planning office saw their jobs mostly as balancing interests instead of creating positive change. I also got the impression that the municipality does not conduct as much participant and resident based research as they express in their planning documents. They focus on target groups, like children, elderly, and the disabled, but recent general feedback felt vary lacking and undocumented. This made it difficult for me to question the motivations behind certain attributes of the plans. The answers were almost always for one environmental reason or another with very little discussion of residents’ opinions or social impacts. For instance, the wall will block sound, the private gardens give children access to beneficial green space, elderly homes will be secluded in calming natural environments, public green space will have activities so it is used more dynamically, but all these aspects of the plans focus on environmental concerns without evaluations of the societal impacts.

Meeting with Stockholms stad In order to compare how Sundbybergs stad and Stockholms stad viewed the development plans for the border area in between Ursvik and Rinkeby, I planned a second informational interview with Stockholms stad (Lundevall, pers com, 2018). Much like my meeting with Sundbyberg, the discussion surrounded collaborative work with different groups, as well as public participation and perceptions.

The starting motivations for Stockholms stad’s formation of Järva Vision 2030 was that Stockholms stad had just completed its development work in Söderort and felt that it was time to move development to the western and northern parts of the city. The tvärbana that links Hammarby to Alvik would guide development up the western and northern parts of the city as building of the second stretch of track would continue all the way north to Kista. This provided the perfect opportunity to look at ways of uplifting outdated and vulnerable million homes program neighborhoods. The tvärbana was originally meant to stop on the Rinkeby side of the E18 before heading north to Kista, but due to physical restraints and the protected reserve in Jävafältet, the tvärbana would be built to go through Stora Ursvik with a connected bridge.

It was shared that through political discussions between the two municipalities the bridge was agreed upon. Stockholms stad ended up paying for 75% of the building of the bridge while Sundbybergs stad paid for the remaining 25%. This discussion was at the same time as Sundbyberg was developing the plans for Stora Ursvik. It was explained that building

23 companies were skeptical of the impacts the bridge would have their development and the value of their property, which put pressure on the politicians.

The detailed plans for new development were discussed in that Rinkeby Allé will become an axis on which city activity will function more as an urban core, with a diversity of activities and businesses. There is a mosque planned for the center of the development, but if the community cannot raise the funds to pay for the building, it will have to be changed into a different plan. Entrances of buildings will be connected directly to the street, giving more life to the city street than there was before. This main axel will then draw people in towards the city center and subway stop.

In regards to the challenge of facing resistance from building companies or politicians to build new developments and connections to Ursvik, it was explained that the collaboration between the building company, Svenska Bostäder (SB), and Stockholms stad is fairly open. As for tensions or reservations on behalf of residents currently living in Rinkeby, it was explained that after a large display of the new plans in Rinkeby Torg, that Stockholms stad had only gotten positive feedback from Rinkeby residents who participated. There were not any fears of gentrification or rent increases on behalf of residents that were expressed to the municipality during these project displays. New development will be more expensive than the current housing in Rinkeby, but the municipality was sure it should not affect the rents of those currently living in Rinkeby. Overall, the residents and builders were described as excited to have new urban form and city development in Rinkeby, as well as connections to surrounding areas. The bridge to Ursvik will be the first direct street connection Rinkeby has with another neighborhood, so that is exciting in itself.

A possibility of segregation, if not gentrification in the area, could play out in a way where SB could develop only rental apartments or cooperative apartments, creating a divide between the Rinkeby’s existing houses or between Ursvik’s new developments. It was explained that in the detailed plan, the city cannot specify which type of tenure the housing must be, and the exploitation unit is in charge of deciding which housing company gets which property, so those decisions rely mostly with SB. Although the housing companies have the most say in what type of housing they will build, Stockholms stad’s city planners were impressed that more housing companies have been interested in diversifying their housing stock and mixing housing types within a small area. Adding more cooperative apartments in Rinkeby will be good for the Rinkeby residents that are gaining more experience in the housing market and have a growing income and family, they will have the opportunity to advance their housing situation without having to move out of Rinkeby, which was previously the case. This is important for lifting the level of economic diversity of the area without forcing people to move out.

Impressions Stockholms stad was open to talking with me and discussing the upcoming plans for Rinkeby. It was interesting to understand what city planners think about the area along the E18 motorway and if more could be done in the area. It was explained that the gas station that is on that property now has a long contract for the property, and that the area probably won’t be developed. It was expressed that the wall that Sundbyberg is building along the highway will not make too much of a large impact, so long as entrance from the bridge is open to many activities and public space. There was more concern expressed with connections between Rinkeby and the villa area, Bromsten. The city wants to make better connections but does not want the current residents to move out, there will be ongoing discussions of what the

24 tipping point will be for this neighborhood, and how Stockholms stad should handle the connections there. Rinkeby is quite segregated from all four sides, with the most connected side being the new bridge to Stora Ursvik. My impression was that Stockholms stad is quite satisfied with the results of the planning process between Rinkeby and Ursvik, and hopes that Sundbyberg will make their side of the development attractive and welcoming to Rinkeby residents.

Survey Results The survey for this research asked various questions on housing, perceptions of integration, impacts of social sustainability indicators, and suggestions for future planning, in order to answer the research questions (see Appendix II). The survey was distributed through mail to the 281 residents who live in brf Gläntan and brf Jubilaren. Residents had two weeks to respond either by mail or online. A total of 35 responses were received, which amounts to around a 12.5% response rate (1 out of 8 apartment units responded). This low response rate might reflect a number of things: that residents are less concerned with social sustainability in the area, that residents’ responses were from those passionate about a certain situation, or that the survey was not easily accessible or promoted over a long enough time span. Nonetheless, the survey responses still give a unique and interesting perspective. The survey data is viewed as a representing qualitative data and treated as short interviews of Riksbyggen residents in Ursvik.

Summary Of respondents 71% live in brf Gläntan and 29% live in brf Jubilaren. The average number of years living in Ursvik is 2.5 years. The most common areas of previous residence is Solna and other parts of Sundbyberg with 6 respondents listing Solna and 6 respondents listing another neighborhood in Sundbyberg as their previous residences. Neighborhoods from Stockholm inner city were listed 3 times, Kista was listed 2 times, and Spångna was listed 2 times. 31% of residents live alone, 26% live as pairs of 2, and 43% are families with 3 or more in their home. All of the respondents own their apartment.

Results on integration perceptions Of all respondents 49% answered positively about the bridge to Ursvik, 30% answered that they were unsure of how they felt about the bridge, and 21% answered negatively. But many feel split, that the bridge will provide better connections but are worried about increased crime.

“Positive with better communication. At the same time it opens ways for crime to come to Ursvik. Basing this on that one all too often hear police sirens, unfortunately.”

“Good, it is substandard today with detours.”

”Bad. Do not want the Rissne, Rinkeby, Hallonbergen problem to come to Ursvik”

Of respondents, 46% answered that they visit Rissne, Rinkeby, or Hallonbergen every day, 29% answered a few time a week, 20% answered a few times a month and 6% answered sometimes a year. No respondents answered that they visit these areas almost never. For listed reasons for visiting Rissne, Rinkeby, or Hallonbergen, 63% listed their reason as public transportation, 26% listed service, 9% to visit family or friends, and 6% listed other various activities. 45% of respondents answered that they do not believe they will visit these

25 neighborhoods more in the future, and listed better safety, services, and connections as things that would motivate them to visit more in the future.

“I think that it is a worrying area, all those three areas.”

“Have no connections to these areas. Maybe if there were more cultural activities. Visit the library and Hallonbergen today.” Of all respondents 28% answered that they will visit these areas more in the future and 24% said maybe. Reasons for using these areas more in the future are public transportation and grocery stores.

“Subway and food stores.”

Results on social sustainability indicators Of all respondents on the question of if they know their neighbors it was split evenly in thirds with, 32% of respondents answered that they know their neighbors, 34% answered that they recognize their neighbors, and 34% responded that they do not know their neighbors. When asked about the importance of living in a diverse community 85% of respondents answered that they think it is important, and 15% responded that it is not so important.

“It is always better if there is variation. Older, children, and youth have different needs and we need each other’s differences.”

“Integration is always good. Otherwise we will not develop.”

”Sweden is the worst at integration which makes diversity unfortunately not positive, but rather increases social problems.”

On the ability to impact their housing environment, 51% believe they have the possibility to do so, 37% responded that they were unsure, and 11% answered that they did not have the possibility. Most cited the housing association and the housing board as reasons they feel like they have an opportunity to make an impact.

“The board works and listens well to the residents.”

As for the sharing economy, only 15% of respondents said they share or exchange goods or services in their housing association. Those respondents added that they mostly use the sharing economy to borrow tools from neighbors. Of the 85% of respondents who do not participate in the sharing economy by borrowing or exchanging services, most responded positively to the idea.

”Would happily have a service with drilling help and other small fixes. A cleaning aid for hire could also be of interest”

“It is a good solution for economy and environment.”

As for safety and security, 88% of respondents answered that they feel safe in Ursvik and 12% felt that they did not feel safe. Of the respondents that felt safe, many cited how calm the area was and their neighbors as for reasons they feel safe. Of respondents that felt unsafe

26 many cited crime or police presence as the reason why and noted that they do not fel safe especially walking around at night.

“Quite calm, good neighbors and we have not been disturbed.”

“Hear often police sirens. I feel not safe but still not unsafe.”

Suggestions for future development and living environment When giving suggestions for the future of the Ursvik area residents said better public transportation or connections 17 times, more grocery stores and services was mentioned 9 times, and 3 times respondents cited better connections to the natural environment.

“A good square with attractive stores and a smoother walkway to Willy’s. Do not take away too many trees and neither build houses too close to each other.”

“A grocery store is needed! Maybe an ICA store. Water feature or something. Nice with birds. A movie theater. A bridge or tunnel so that one could go to Willy’s from Ursvik, or a crossing.”

Suggestions for the housing area were less common with only 10 respondents giving suggestions. These suggestions mostly surrounded a need for picking up litter in the area, better accessibility measures, and more community activities.

“More community initiatives like gardening, Valborg celebration, and litter clean up days.” “… there is a stairway of max 10 steps before the garage door and a ramp is missing, which leads to that we need to go outside or by another stair way with the stroller. We want a ramp.”

As for diversity of organizations represented in the respondents, 34% answered that they belonged to a sporting association, 10% to a lifestyle of hobby association, 7% to a business/economic association, 7% to an interest group, and 3% to a religious group. 43% responded that they were not involved in any other associations beyond their housing association.

Survey demographics Of respondents 51% were women and 49% were men. 57% of respondents are Swedish born with Swedish born parents, 17% respondents are first generation in that they were born in Sweden to foreign born parents, and 26% were foreign born. A majority of respondents were between ages 31-50 with a 54% response. The next highest age group was 51-70 with a 29% response, and only 17% were between ages 18-30.

Comparisons to Sundbybergs survey results Two of the questions in the survey conducted with Ursvik residents of Riksbyggen buildings were inspired from a survey conducted by Sundbybergs stad in 2015 on Ursvik development and marketing. The question “Do you feel safe in Ursvik?” had similar results to the survey conducted in this project. Around 83% of respondents in Sundbybergs stad’s survey responded that they feel safe in Ursvik as compared to the 88% in the survey conducted for Riksbyggen residents. Similar concepts for safety were cited including calm, good neighbors, families with children.

27 The second similar question was about bridge connections to Rissne, Hallonbergen, and Rinkeby and residents think of it. Sundbybergs stad’s results had 50% of respondents answer positively, 10% unsure, and 40% answer negatively. In the survey conducted with Riksbyggen residents less responded negatively with only 21% instead of 40% and more people were unsure with 30% answering neither positively nor negatively instead of only 10%. Many responses look like the ones highlighted in Sundbybergs stad’s survey, where resident consider both the negative effects like crime or lowered property values but also weigh that with the positive use value of close connections to service and public transport as well as positive ideals of integration in society. This conflict between positives and negatives can be read most clearly in unsure answers like:

“Spontaneously (the bridge) feels worrying given the developments we see in the surrounding areas, but when reviewing detailed plans it feels that the municipality has taken a high stance to minimize the risks of connections.”

And

“(the bridge is) both good and bad. It will be easier to get around by bicycle. Bad if it brings disorderly gangs here.” Analysis From these responses I cannot make conclusions about all Riksbyggen’s residents in Ursvik, but I can highlight interesting findings. The largest conclusion is that most residents feel nerves or anxiety about connecting to Rinkeby. The largest reason for this by far is safety concerns and fears of criminal activity, both real and perceived. No one discussed actual crime statistics, but only cited their perceptions of fear from sirens, police lights, and police activity in the area. One respondent suggested that police patrol the area more often. Many noted that they do not feel safe walking around at night and that the bridge from Rinkeby will enhance criminal activity in the area. There are a minor number of respondents who noted a fear of connecting as it would lower property values or the quality of the neighborhood. These respondents who said this also acknowledge they own personal interest in the quality of the neighborhood and that they think for the general population integration will be good for society.

There is a very clear trend where most everyone said that diversity in communities is an important aspect of society but also that they are concerned about the integration of their neighborhood. The perceptions of Ursvik based of the responses are that it is a quiet, calm, and family oriented neighborhood. A majority (67%) responded that they know or recognize their neighbors, and many felt that their neighbors had a positive contribution to their neighborhood when describing why their neighborhood felt safe. From these results it seems that many believe integration of society is important, but in their neighborhood it poses a threat to their neighborhood and safety. These perceptions could be explained by the reputations of the surrounding areas. A negative perception of Rissne, Rinkeby, and Hallonbergen was expressed throughout the survey, citing how it felt unsafe and worn down. These neighborhoods are very diverse but they do come with their own problems. Not only is Rinkeby considered especially vulnerable, and Rissne/Hallonbergen vulnerable, by the Swedish Police, Polismyndigheten (2017) the perceptions of these neighborhoods of being high crime neighborhoods is promoted in media and news outlets often. It is quite possible that Ursvik residents would want to separate themselves from these areas instead of integrating and connecting.

28 As for connecting to surrounding areas for the sake of better services is the most common positive reaction to future building. If a bridge, tunnel, or walkway leads to efficient public transportation, quality grocery stores, public services, or shops and entertainment, Ursvik respondents are less likely to oppose connections. People who attach a use-value to the surrounding neighborhoods have a more positive view of connecting bridges. Building up more services in the current and surrounding areas that residents could attach uses to could help lift these areas together more than promoting integration for merely social causes. Building up services within the neighborhood was cited often as a way to improve the neighborhood or services was noted as something missing in the neighborhood currently. One respondent said “It is calm and quiet in the building and area, maybe a bit too calm.” Here another dissonance can be found, in that many respondents want more business and services with more people in the area, however the reason they think the neighborhood is nice is because it is calm and residential. One respondent noted that the area is changing in a different direction than she had expected. She thought the neighborhood would remain low rise residential houses but as it grows it becomes more dense and urban, which she expressed a dislike for. It will be difficult for the city to promote safe spaces as they connect the neighborhoods together if the area remains strictly residential and devoid of businesses and services. This finding is highlighted by the response “I would feel safer with more people moving through the neighborhood. Especially so with better roads to Rissne.” The neighborhood will either become more unsafe overtime or more busy overtime, making for little compromise for those who want to retain the safe and calm disconnected neighborhood they have now.

Perceptions from housing board members After a meeting with three housing board members both from brf Gläntan and brf Jubilaren, these findings were strengthened. A large portion of the meeting was spent discussing crimes or rumored crimes that had occurred in the neighborhood. They were concerned about the surrounding neighborhoods’ decline to more dangerous and more run down places. They discussed how their perceptions of Rissne and Hallonbergen specifically have become worse over time. There is anxiety that more crime will come the more connected they are, but there is also hope future development will help. They discussed with great excitement opportunities for new parks and possibilities for types of businesses they would like to see in the neighborhood. Rumors of a systembolaget (state-run liquor store) being located in the central square of Ursvik were welcomed with excitement. Complaints of not enough grocery stores and restaurants were expressed, especially with disappointment to the closing of the local sushi place was talked about.

Concerns about traffic and public transportation were also discussed, connections to surrounding neighborhoods were only welcomed when it meant a nice new road or tram would be located conveniently close by. Residents want an easier way to commute in and out of the city and to neighborhoods with nice shops and entertainment. The accessibility to Solna, Sundbyberg central, and Stockholm city center were all expected.

The rest of the discussion with board members was about improvements to the housing environment in their housing association. There is a concern with trash and litter that blows into the inner garden of the housing buildings. There was a concern with safety as some doors needed to be replaced to make sure unwanted strangers could not sneak into the building. Environmental changes with solar panels, water and energy monitors, and recycling rooms were also of concern to the boards. It was interesting to see they had a high motivation for improving the housing environment.

29 From this board meeting, findings of anticipated crime with neighborhood connections, fear of lowered safety, and the need for transportation and services while retaining the quality of the neighborhood were all emphasized.

Indicator Review Introduction of indicators as a tool Indicators function as a tool for evaluation in diverse situations. Indicators act as a way of international standardization, so that comparisons can be made on how well or bad a country is doing in certain aspects of citizens’ lives. Indicators act as a trend analysis for researchers, measuring where levels of a specific aspect are at and how they go up or down over time. Indicators act as a way for institutions to set goals, deciding what is important for measurement and how this measurement should change over time. Indicators act as a policy guideline, guiding the decisions of leaders to make change to affect the outcomes indicators have measured. All these functions of indicators are necessary to a diversity of different disciplines: policy, economy, environment, health, crime, and any discipline that relates to sustainability or societies well-being. The widespread use of indicators as a tool for setting goals, measuring success, and creating a foundation for decision and policy making has been propelled forward through international political support. The Brundtland Report by the World Commission on Environment and Development was the first to define the concept of Sustainable Development in 1987. In 1992, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development set in Rio de Janeiro established Agenda 21 prompting the need to “develop the concept of indicators of sustainable development in order to identify such indicators” (UNCED, 1992, 40.6). Since that time, international regulating bodies have set their own indicators for sustainable development (see Table 2) which in turn aids cities and municipalities to create their own indicators (Shen, et al., 2011). The massive number of indicators for use by international political organizations, national governments, environmental agencies, municipalities, private businesses, and various regulating institutions has been coined the “Industry of Indicators,” suggesting that the process of forming indicators is an industry of its own (King et al., 2000).

Table 2 List of international organizations and their respective indicator lists source: Shen et. al., 2011

Organization Date Indicator List Indicators of sustainable development: Guidelines and The United Nations 2007 methodologies

Urban indicator guidelines The UN Habitat 2004

Global city indicator program report The World Bank 2008

Urban sustainability indicators The European Foundation 1998

Building Environmental Quality Evaluation for The European Commission on Science, 2000 Sustainability through Time Network (BEQUEST) Research and Development

The European Commission on Energy A European thematic network on construction and Environment and Sustainable 2004 City Related Sustainability Indicators Development

Beyond the overwhelming sheer number of indicators in use, there is criticism that indicators in the planning context do not measure what they are set out to. Helen Briassoulis (2001) took a critical stance early on in the use of indicators in the planning field. Indicators for

30 planning can be ill-defined in spatial context and do not set the limits of the system, which creates confusion when measuring targets. It becomes the case that when indicators are pre- set with assumed causal relationships and without theoretical foundation, the results become lost in the mix of where indicators overlap and diverge. Brissoulis suggests that planners need to recognize where there are synergies and inconsistencies amongst indicators, what are the defined contexts and boundaries of indicators, and what is the theoretical reasoning behind the causal relationships.

Criticisms of indictors use in planning have evolved into indicator frameworks for reviews and analysis of indicators. The commonly used framework for understanding and reviewing environmental indicators comes from the pressure-state-response classifications that defines the process of indicator use as being either in the state of environmental pressures, then being in a state which indicators measure, and then enforcing a necessary response on behalf of institutions or actors (Hammond, 1995). This popular framework however can be difficult to track in more social-ecological systems that encompass factors beyond the natural environment. In their foundational book on sustainability indicators, Bell and Moore (2008) question how social institutions such as cities or social networks could use indicators to measure their effects, as they saw social factors such as governance, health, education, and safety to be too subjective for the use of indicators as a method. However, overtime indicators have been better adapted to fit the needs of social-ecological systems as researchers recognizes the interdependencies of both social and ecological factors within the monitoring of systems (Haider, et al., 2015).

Beyond established frameworks, defined sets of standards for indicators ask the questions of if indicators are simple, measurable, feasible, flexible, dynamic, user-inspired, general, indicative, sensitive, robust, democratic, long-term, or relevant enough (Hezri, 2004; Flint, 2013; Garrett & Latawiec, 2015). With so many different standards for measuring the effectiveness of indicators, it may seem almost irrelevant to try as it may never live up to the needs of standardization. However, it is important to consider that perhaps there is not one measure of how ‘good’ or ‘bad’ an indicator is and that sets of indicators are specific to contexts of their space and time. In the introduction to the book Sustainability Indicators in Practice (Garrett & Latawiec, 2015) it is emphasized how, contrary to belief, indicators should be subjective and context specific and reviewed mostly based on how well they work for the specific need.

Indicators for community development Within the field of community development indicators are part of project assessments, where indicators are set at the beginning of a community development project, and the targets measured throughout the process of the project provide information on how well the project lives up to the goals set by the indicators. Community development indicators look at more small-scale projects and the effects that local governing structures can have on communities (Flint, 2013). Many municipalities use community development project assessments and indicators as a tool for understanding their impact, and while the indicators they use can be applied to other municipalities and projects, there is a lack of comparison both because there is no platform for comparing municipal indicators and because it can be difficult to rule out context specific biases. A project conducted attempting to compare indicators from nine OCED (The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) cities found that there is very low comparative bias and collaboration on indicator development and that the use of indicators works best when adapted over time (Shen, et al., 2011).

31 Indicators for the built environment The diversity of indicator use is represented not only in organizational diversity but also in a wide range of scales: International, national, municipal, specific projects, and down to specific buildings. Institutions for monitoring indicators of sustainable buildings or built environment projects have been created to serve as a toolkit for project developers to use as a reference. Often the institutions can award grades or levels of sustainability based on the defined set of indicators. Just as indicators should be context specific, multiple organizations and their respective toolkits exist to account for regional variation differences (see Table 3).

A framework of building assessments done by these institutions found that indicators used can be defined in three categories: procedure indicators, feature indicators, and performance indicators. Procedure indicators are more preventative in nature, they measure if there is a procedure in place to continue measurement of a certain building aspect. Feature indicators check to make sure that certain sustainability features are included in the design of the building or project. Performance indicators measure how certain aspects of the building are actually performing over time. The aim of including all three of these indicators being measured is so that the projects can be examined more throughout the lifetime of the building (Wallhagen, et al., 2013). A critique of this framework and the institutions that use it is that most of the credits awarded rely mostly on procedure or feature indicators that are established in the beginning of building project and that less credits are awarded in the process of follow up measurements of performance indicators are maintaining sustainable levels (Wangel, et al., 2016).

Table 3 List of organizations with built environment indicator toolkits source: European Comission, 2015

Organization Toolkit Website

Building Research Establishment Environmental BREEAM Communities https://www.breeam.com/communitiesmanual/ Assessment Methodology (BREEAM) http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTURBANDE Eco2 Cities Initiative World Bank VELOPMENT/Resources/336387-

1270074782769/Eco2CitiesBookWeb.pdf Eurostat Sustainable Eurostat http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/sdi/ Development Indicators

http://www.oecd.org/regional/green-growth-in- OECD Green Cities Program cities.htm Leadership in Energy https://www.usgbc.org/articles/getting-know-leed- U.S. Green Building Council and Environmental neighborhood-development Design (LEED) Green Building Council of Green Star https://new.gbca.org.au/green-star/ Australia

Swedish Green Building https://www.sgbc.se/indikatorer-i-miljobyggnad-3- Miljöbyggnad Council 0

UN Human Settlements Urban Indicators https://unhabitat.org/urban-indicators-guidelines/ Program Guidelines

32 CityLab and GRI These certification organizations have been in the process of developing and adapting toolkits that go beyond one building or building project. Toolkits like BREEAM communities for LEED Neighborhood Design attempt to grade a larger neighborhood project on their sustainability goals. The Swedish Green Building Council (SGBC) has continued this work by extending their certification systems beyond the building scale and into larger community development. The SGBC CityLab is a collaborative group of municipalities, developers, and academics that work on standards for sustainability for urban design. SGBC’s recent Action Guide (2018) is the first document from SGBC that has defined indicators to steer larger city development projects. This Action Guide has 17 focus areas with 20 indicators with each indicator including an assessment criteria and a suggestion for reviewing the assessment criteria. There are no specific areas for just social sustainability, however there is one focus area called “Cultural Environment” which includes indicators that measure the local economy, and to what degree the project contributes to a circular or sharing economy (SGBC, 2018, pp.39-40). The significance of this indicator list is that it is location specific to Sweden and has been developed by and for Swedish municipalities and building developers, but also that Riksbyggen has used this Action Guide for a couple of more recent projects in 2016 and plans to become certified by CityLab according to the Action Guide’s guidelines.

In addition to advancing sustainability efforts by following CityLab’s guide, Riksbyggen is working on reporting their sustainability impact through the Global Reporting Innitative (GRI). GRI is an independent organization that measures the sustainability and impacts of businesses’ and institutions. The aim of sustainability reporting is to hold companies and institutions accountable for their global impacts, as well as have a standard and open reporting system for companies around the world (GRI, 2018). The reporting of Riksbyggen’s impact through GRI can not only inform the public on their standards but also help the company grow by learning what they need to improve on. Although, this is a very big and positive step towards furthering sustainability, it might not have the reach to review Riksbyggen’s more local impact on social sustainability in neighborhoods or measure social integration.

Reviewing indicators The focus of reviewing Riksbyggen’s sustainability impact will be on the working indicators in use today that are followed through the hållbarhetsverktyg conducted by sustainability specialists. Riksbyggen’s scale of development combines indicators from both the community level scale and the building level scale, in that their developments consider the impact of the building features but also the social and ecological impacts on the wider community and neighborhood system. A review of how well these indicators are suited to the project in Ursvik and function as a means for integration, and larger social sustainability will be evaluated. Although no hållbarhetsverktyg was completed during the development of the Ursvik housing projects, the use of Ursvik as a case study allows for the indicators to be understood with in a specific context of space and time. The housing developments being reviewed were perhaps still planned with similar considerations for sustainability in mind and perhaps the need of these indicators will be clear where they were missed. The hope is that the results from the indicator review can lead to larger understandings of how Riksbyggen’s indicators impact developments. The review of Riksbyggen’s indicators for social sustainability is based on literary review over relevant research of indicators and their uses. Information has been attained by books, academic journals, institutional reports, Riksbyggen’s governing and working documents, observations of meetings and discussions, and various development plans and websites.

33 Riksbyggen’s Sustainability Indicators Riksbyggen as a housing developer is on the forefront of sustainability research as their dedication to increasing standards requires constant research and review on the behalf of the sustainability unit. This process of finding better solutions and testing and implementing them in practice is ongoing. The indicators for social sustainability are quite new and are still being tested in practice. Throughout my experience in discussions and meetings, I have come to understand that these indicators are still being reviewed for the correct impact and terminology, with sustainability specialists perfecting the language used in documents and the understanding to which the indicators are measured. There is a lot of room for review and adjustments as the practical use of the indicators advances.

In the current practice the indicators are reviewed in the planning stage where the buildings have been planned and reviewed by architects and consultants and handed over to the project leaders. The project leader then establishes a meeting with a sustainability specialist who will be able to go through the hållbarhetsverktyg with the project manager more one on one. The first part of the process is reviewing how the building contributes to ecosystems service. A document with all the possible services considered is then edited to have a yes or no answer if the project contributes in a positive way to the specific service with a space to comment on how it contributes, if the answer is yes. The next step is to go through the standards of Miljöbyggnad. Riksbyggen aims to have all buildings and renovations certified as silver under the SGBCs guidelines. This process is conducted with a second document that contains all the requirements by the Miljöbyggnad 3.0 170510 certification and if the building receives a bronze, silver, or gold in that category, then the building gets a good, better, or best ranking respectively in the specialist’s document. Specific categories are used again as indicators for materials used, energy, and indoor environmental quality.

Table 4 Riksbyggen's indicators for social sustainability source: Riksbyggen 2018

Indicator Description Examples of a project feature The Housing association is led in an active, clear, humble, and democratic way. There is a dedicated meeting to There is an activity plan for social and discuss opportunities for residents economic exchange and gives conditions for to get involved in Riksbyggen’s working proactively. work through Intresseföreningar. There is good communication within housing Ability to influence associations creates commitment and social There are education sessions presence. scheduled for residents to learn about a specific subject related to All members know how to influence their their housing. i.e. sustainable accommodation and feel that they can do so energy use, recycling programs. in an easy way.

Common spaces are included in the building plans, such as sauna There are meeting places or common spaces rooms, multi-purpose rooms, for a variety of occasions and activities bicycle share rooms. There is a possibility to share or change Create common utility things with each other – sharing economy. There are sharing-economy

services for example: a car-share There are platforms to exchange services service, bike rental location, tool with one another. loan shelf.

The area around housing is safe and secure. Create safe and secure The plans were developed living environments People feel safe in their housing according to BoTrygg 05 environment. Handbook for safety planning.

34 The project includes tenure types Meeting local needs for social sustainability that are missing from the through different community options. community.

Develop society Meeting educational needs, considerations The project includes opportunities

for elderly/children, participate in what the for young adults to enter the local municipality needs. housing market.

Once those two previous sets of indicators have been assigned a score, the project leader and specialist move on to indicators that are a bit more specified by Riksbyggen’s own established standards.

The section on social sustainability includes four indicators and each indicator is given a score of good, better, best; a good being if there are no specific features in the project that contribute to the indicator, better being if there is one feature in the project that contribute, and best if there are more than one features in the project that contributes (see Table 4). These features could be actions and activities that are scheduled for the brf once it opens and people move in, such as educational seminars for housing associations or car share information. These features could also be purely set in design, such as setting aside a common space room or designing according to the BoTrygg05 handbook. Once the social sustainability indicators are measured, there is a section for mobility which looks at how to facilitate residents transportation needs so they do not need to own their own car. The next step looks at how the building is planned according to requirements Riksbyggen has set for themselves in terms of planning documents for waste, safety, building code, and more.

Once each indicator is given a good, better, or best rating then the hållbarhetsverktyg assigns that category a rating based off awarded points in each category and a summary report is created along with a spider diagram showing where the project ranks in each category (see Figure 10). This system is pretty typical as most indicator summaries provide a table of scores and a spider table to highlight categories of high standards and categories that could use more thought.

Figure 10 Image from an example of Riksbyggen’s hållbarhetsverktyg source: Riksbyggen 2018

35 As for the hållbarhetsverktyg for the projects in Ursvik, there has not been one completed because the projects were developed before the implementation of this tool and the new Ursvik development is still in the early stages of development. After speaking with the project leader for the new development in Ursvik, it was clear that her role was to mostly oversee the expenses and financing of the project. The planning and development of the project was the responsibility of architects, sustainability managers, engineers, and city planners that had been hired from consultant companies for specific projects. The project leader is in charge of managing these consultants for each specific project. The project leader I spoke with was fairly new in her role and had not had much experience with the Ursvik development yet but was open and excited to work with the account manager for the existing housing developments to get feedback on the housing environment.

Although there is no hållbarhetsverktyg reported for brf Jubilaren and Gläntan that are the current housing developments in Ursvik, there are some features of these developments that were included with social sustainability in mind. Both buildings have an open and public garden space at the center of the quad-like property, they both have a common room available to book for meetings, parties, and other various activities, they have a blended apartment size design in that a diversity of family types could live in the same housing association, and space for local business was included in the sections of development that faces the anticipated city street. These features help create open and safe environments for both their housing associations and their neighborhood in general.

Resident feedback on indicators

Ability to impact The overall experience extracted from residents’ responses were that if they wanted to participate actively with the housing association that they would have the opportunity to do so. Their ability to influence their housing environment sits with the housing board and the openness of their work. However, during a meeting with board members they expressed some disappointment with lack of enthusiasm from housing association members to participate in meetings and work the board tries to do. They noted that their relationship with Riksbyggen is quite good and they hope to continue a partnership with Riksbyggen. They expressed satisfaction with Riksbyggen’s support and said that they would welcome more help if offered to better organize themselves for positive impacts. Another interesting finding from speaking with the board was that they have a strong desire to organize with other housing association boards in the area outside of Riksbyggen’s buildings and to collaborate more amongst the two Riksbyggen boards. They believed this collaboration could lead to better and more innovative solutions to problems of renovations, environmental aspects of the buildings, and community events for their associations. They also hoped collaboration could help in preventing crime, in that they could form a type of neighborhood watch together.

Create a common utility The responses to the survey provided feedback that there is not much activity going on within the housing association that contributes to a common utility. This finding is not shocking as no particular function for this activity was established in the planning for these housing developments. Even so a high desire for a sharing service was expressed. Most all noted that if there was a convenient way to loan tools or various other services that they would happily participate. This finding indicates that the indicator is actually a desirable one by residents and that perhaps if there was a system put in place there would be a chance it would be used. This could provide space for not only community collaboration but for other various environmental and economic benefits for residents.

36 Create safe and secure housing environments This indicator for social sustainability seems to be the most important to this area. Residents reported feeling safe and secure but also that they have fears the neighborhood will become less safe overtime. Much of the meeting with the housing board was spent discussing crime and building security. Suggestions from the current housing association for better doors and security management would be helpful to use for the next housing development in Ursvik. Measurements for security and safety on the party of the municipality should be considered more for the future development of detailed plans on behalf of Sundbybergs stad. The findings for this indicator is that a focus on safety is important for overall social sustainability but means of measuring it should be established to make sure there is not decline in the future and that follow up measurements are set.

Develop society Neighborhoods needs expressed in the survey results mostly revolve around safety, communication/transportation, and service. Public services like needs for schools, elderly homes, or accessibility measures for the disabled have not been expressed or emphasized in particular. When discussing needs with the board, they were supportive having more of these things close by, they perceived schools and elderly homes to be beneficial to the neighborhood but not missing in particular. If Riksbyggen wanted to invest in social needs needed in the Ursvik area, it would be best spent in space for community business or services, as well as more green space and active areas. Of all the associations respondents were involved in, the most popular by far was sporting association. There could be a need for more sporting facilities to support these interests. There was no strong need expressed by respondents to have more religious or community spaces for their associations to meet locally in Ursvik.

Indicators for Sundbybergs stad Beyond the indicators for Riksbyggen, this project also takes place in the newly planned neighborhood of Västra Ursvik which falls under the administration of Sundbybergs stad’s city planning and exploitation units. Beyond the program plan and the structural plan that were, a goal document was written to set strict goals and visions for the new neighborhood. This goal document does not function in the same was as a typical indicator, in that it does not set up a measuring system and a process in which to evaluate the goals, but it does set a standard for what the city would like to see from development.

Included in the goal document are seven focus areas, each with specific goals. The focus area of Participation and Diversity includes a goal for collaboration for social sustainability. This goal includes:

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Table 5 Goal for social sustainability from Sundbybergs stad's goal document for Ursvik source: Sundbybergs stad 2015

Goal Collaboration for Social Sustainability B The establishment of a development group for neighborhood collaboration between Ursvik, Rinkeby, Rissne, and Hallonbergen for common issues and initiatives. The group invites for example, field secretaries, sporting and other associations, as well as the local police.

Early establishment of a platform for idea-meetings with residents and businesses in Ursvik, Rissne, and Rinkeby about public space. Suggestions for locations of participant design and programming include city parks, pocket parks, connections to Rissne, the activity wall and bridge to Rinkeby.

Encouragement of various forms of dialogue and user initiatives within the neighborhood, such as concepts for honored commitment to property management, care of gardens, cleaning and wash rooms. Create the possibility of user agreement with the municipality for public places, parks and streets.

Create projects for artistic design for public space, propose involvement of artists with local and international backgrounds, and do so in collaboration with the Marabou Park.

These goals have a strong focus on democratic participation and open suggestions on the part of the residents in surrounding neighborhoods in order to incorporate and integrate a diversity of ideas and opinions (see Table 5). However, as mentioned this is only a guiding document and no real initiative to measure the level of success that Sundbybergs stad has had with these goals is planned as follow up.

Indicator analysis From my research of social sustainability indicators both established by Sundbybergs stad and also Riksbyggen, it can be concluded that the indicators set high and accurate aims for measuring the establishment of socially sustainable neighborhoods, but are often lacking a follow up measurement in order to track on going progress or impact of the indicators. The actions taken to establish social sustainability measures in the housing developments could have long-lasting impacts and are important for residents, but they lack a follow up measure to ensure this is done.

The indicators for Sundbybergs stad focus more on the planning process and community engagement in the municipality; whereas Riksbyggen’s indicators are focused more on the establishment of housing developments. Neither recognizes the long lasting nature of city development and the need for future measurements. This follows an argument established by Alazar Ejigu(2015) in his doctoral studies, that cities are often viewed by developers and municipalities as products to be purchased. Once the apartment is sold and people move in, there is no longer a product to sell. Riksbyggen, unlike some housing companies, does retain a management role over time and the housing association can decide whether or not to keep or terminate this relationship. Having this relationship weakened or preserving the idea that housing is a one-time product could be dangerous, as Ejigu finds, cities are more in the state of a constant process, changing and evolving overtime. The neighborhood could be in the process of becoming more segregated, more unsafe, or more undesirable and housing developers, consultant companies, municipalities are responsible for stopping and reversing negative processes.

The use of indicators for social sustainability as part of a product establishment-type planning also leaves little room for citizen dialogue or community participation in ongoing city development. Both Riksbyggen and Sundbybergs stad have an indicator that establishes a forum for community members or housing association members to gather and discuss

38 improvements in their environments, but the strength of these participation methods are not measured beyond the establishment. A loss of ongoing feedback and the expectation of self - governance does not align with one of the major goals of social sustainability: a trusting relationship between institution and community (Missimer et al., 2017).

Actions for community relations could look more like indicators for community development which are context specific and develop neighborhood goals or projects. In this case, Riksbyggen could identify Ursvik as a neighborhood that needs more projects or goals for safety and collaboration and develop indicators for this neighborhood, such as percentage of residents that report they feel safe or number of reported crime incidents. Other neighborhoods might be in need of other context specific goals, projects, and indicators. The trouble with this suggestion is that there would be more personnel responsible for managing community development projects, other than the sustainability specialist at Riksbyggen headquarters.

As for the indicators impact on integration and community diversification, there is no direct impact or actions to do so. Through more involved residents in the housing association, increased safety and community ties, and participation in the neighborhood development there are possibilities to make a larger impact on integration advancements, but because the indicators only establish these things as housing features and there is no system for follow up, raising targets on existing housing, and continual action for sustainability it would be difficult to promote integration or prevent segregation.

Planning Method In the hopes of fully understanding the how the neighborhood of Ursvik will evolve and grow in the upcoming years and in an attempt to find focal points of development and planning solutions, I analyze the planning documents and suggestions established by Sundbybergs stad and Stora Ursvik KB. Through this process I find where there are gaps what was aimed for and what was realized in the process. My suggestions for future development establish a possible alternative based on planning theory and current city visions. This method takes a broader view of neighborhood development, beyond that of any single building developer, but still has implications for Riksbyggen’s future projects in western Ursvik.

Analysis of Sundbyberg’s planning Sundbybergs stad’s planning process started around 2001 when the land area of western Ursvik was acquired from the FOI, or the Swedish Defense Research Agency (Stora Ursvik KB, 2017). Since this time analysis on the development area and how to plan for sustainable growth has been conducted. The municipality has consulted various environmental agencies and architecture firms to come up with the best working plans for the area. Strategisk Arkitektur has produced the most feasible plan documents that establish grounds for the ongoing detailed plans. The plan program and the structure plan for the western Ursvik neighborhood, take from the various environmental reports and the planning work done by Stratigisk Arkitektur to set the ground work for how the area will look and function.

39 The detailed plans for the last three sections of development are ongoing, so there is room for suggestions and change in the plans, however with the information from the plan program, the preliminary detailed plans available for review, and a meeting with a city planner from Sundbybergs stad, pieces of the plan can be put together to get an idea of how the area will be developed.

The ongoing detailed plans include the western activity wall and park, new housing blocks, a city park in the south, and a center square (see Figure 11). The idea for the area is to have all three parts of life included in the plan, space for housing, space for work places, and place for services. This follows New Urbanism planning design in that it considers a diversity of all parts of life within a dense urban form so that use of the environment is efficient and figure 11The ongoing detailed plans for Western Ursvik convenient for everyday life. The vision source: Sunbybergs Stad 2015 exemplifies this as it states in the goal document that the new development should be for “Ursvik for the whole life” in that one could live their life wholly in Ursvik or with Ursvik services (Sundbybergs stad, 2015, a, pp. 6).

Figure 12 Idea of dense and diverse urban space for Ursvik made by Strategisk Arkitektur source: Sundbybergs stad, 2015 The plan program provides ideas and suggestions for detailed plans. A clear focus on outdoor activities and recreation is clear as the emphasis on active green space along the highway and within the park ideally provide space for meeting neighbors and the gathering of social groups. A focus on the entry from Rinkeby to Ursvik is an original consideration

40 (Sundbybergs stad, 2015, a). The suggestion for making a welcoming and safe entry is a business park type building, a football field, central square, a school, an elderly home, and a community center all within a couple blocks within each other. This mixture of uses of urban space would invite people with different needs and interests to cohabit the entry way to Ursvik. This would also lead to more safe spaces in that more people using the public urban space would mean more ‘eyes on the street.’ An idea of this ideal situation is included in Figure 12, where space for outdoor recreational activities overlaps with public urban space, and various services as a central square and tvärbana are pictured in the background.

This welcoming entrance to Ursvik would also help alleviate the barrier of the highway and the activity wall in that it would provide not only a reason for Rinkeby residents to come visit Ursvik, but it would also provide an open and inclusive space where a diversity of people would feel comfortable.

However, as plans are in the process of being developed things have got shifted around. In a meeting with a city planner from Sundbybergs stad, changes were discussed (Elmqvist, pers com, 2018). There is no plan for the business center, the football field became part of the activity park, the school will be included in a private inner garden so as to have more available safe green space for children, the elderly home has been moved north to a more secluded and less busy part of the city, and the idea for a community center has been discouraged as politicians believe it will sit empty. Some of these changes can be seen in Figure 13 which maps out an updated idea for new development. From this map, and further Figure 12 Most updated version of detailed plans for discussions I have designed a map that outlines western Ursvik development source: Sundbybergs stad, uses of urban space in Ursvik (see Figure 14). 2018

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Figure 13 Map of Western Ursvik rendered from planning documents This map outlines connections to other neighborhoods in orange, these roads could be walking and cycling and some include car and bus traffic. The yellow line is the plans for the new tvärbana that will run from Bromma to Kista, with stops in central Ursvik and northern Ursvik, as indicated by the blue locations. Here once can see that services are quite spread out or nonexistent. In the preliminary detailed plans, it describes space for business such as shops or office spaces in the bottom floor along the street of residential buildings. Buildings that are dedicated only to commercial space are highlighted in yellow and buildings dedicated to only office space are highlighted in orange. In the new plans, there are no buildings that are exclusively commercial or corporate, and the ones pictured are existing buildings. The blue buildings are those dedicated to schools, either kindergartens or grade schools. The school planned for the entrance to Ursvik has moved into a more private location as a part of the residential inner garden. Elderly homes highlighted in purple are also moved away from the city center to a location in northern Ursvik closer to more secluded forested green space. The central square remains where the plans originally located it, however the cultural or

42 community center is now planned to be residential space with opportunity for businesses in the bottom floor.

Riksbyggen’s residential buildings are highlighted in red, the existing brf Jubilaren och Brg Gläntan are in bright red and the future development in a more muted red. The existing housing developments have an open inner garden, but after discussing with the project leader on the future Ursvik developments, the inner garden in the next brf will most likely remain a private space (Wahlberg, pers com, 2018). Riksbyggen’s future building could have an impact on how the space in this new city center could look and feel for both Ursvik residents and visitors who come by tvärbana or over the bridge.

These changes to the plans might leave the inner part of Ursvik quite empty during the day. Leaving space for business only in the bottom floor of some residential buildings provides space for businesses and services, but this might only be enough for the local pizza shop, Asian take-out restaurant, convent corner store, and a couple odds and ends shops which are typical for residential neighborhoods in Stockholm. This lack of larger service might allow residents in the space to use these services at times when they are home, however it does not provide enough services to bring people to use these businesses if they are not living in Ursvik. Doing so defeats the purpose of creating safe spaces through more ‘eyes on the street.’ If residents are only there in the evenings walking home from work, it leaves streets empty during the day, quite an average day for the current neighborhood.

Moving types of people that would normally be around in the day time out of the city center or out of the private eye can also cause certain emptiness in the urban space. An elderly home towards the center and would allow older residents to have more access to public transportation and services that could be located in the center of Ursvik. Older residents are also available during the day and have social activities during typical working hours, providing more human traffic in the neighborhood. The same goes with schools, students and classes use the city space during the daytime and working hours, adding a lively energy that would not be there if they were tucked away to their own private playground.

Draining the public and private services out of the main street and square of Ursvik for space for residential buildings not only drains the public street traffic, but creates a more dangerous and unwelcoming environment. It makes people who do not live in the neighborhood feel uncomfortable visiting, beyond the unnecessary journey there. It strengthens the barriers that are currently instead of breaking them down. It seems that if there is a major highway, a wall, and only residential houses on the other side, it would leave an unwelcoming tone.

Recommendations for future development When looking at how to develop this area that aligns with social sustainable goals for integration, safety, and accessibility most changes reverted back to the original plans (see Figure 15). A city block of office space will bring in commuters and workers up to Ursvik to work, they will liven up the space around lunch time and will require to others to travel there for meetings and visits. A commercial center next to the central square will provide space for entertainment and food stores; a suggestion that come up a few times in the survey as a recommendation was access to a larger food store and more shops and entertainment opportunities. This would also allow residents and visitors to spend more time in Ursvik instead of commuting out and past their neighboring areas on the motorway. The hope for this space would to be to combine a diversity of businesses in one center along the square,

43 much like the urban centers in Stockholm’s inner city that combine a movie theater, library, food market or grocery store, and other various shops and restaurants.

Figure 14 Map of suggested planning for future developments in Ursvik Including space for a diversity of sizes and spaces for businesses in the area will encourage a diversity of businesses. It is important for planning for integration to include businesses that would allow those with lower purchasing power to have an opportunity to interact in these spaces. Included in If one cannot afford to do high end shopping in a neighborhood, they will not go, but when there is many different types of shops and businesses the hope is that it attracts many different types of people (Turner and Rawlings, 2009). Accessibility to service not only includes proximity but also comfort, time, and affordability. Making sure spaces are open for people to feel comfortable using them, spaces are open to the times of day they need to be used, and that they are affordable for people to uses all contribute to if one can access that space. This accessibility allows a diversity of people to use the urban space, creating a sort of visibility of multiculturalism Sarraf (2015). Increasing the visibility of other types of

44 residents and participants in the area due to overlapping uses of space, perhaps some cultural barriers and negative perceptions can be broken.

Including business space such as commercial and office buildings poses the challenge of filling these spaces to capacity, so as not to have empty urban space. Right now the situation for business space seems bleak as the large bank Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken (SEB) has recently moved out of the Ursvik Entré business center, and there are rumors of restaurants going out of business in Ursvik. However, Sundbybergs stad has one of the lowest rates of vacancy for business space, next to Solna stad, and has a growing demand for office space (Nordqvist and Åhs, 2015). The Ursvik area will soon be better connected to the tvärbana making it better connected to Stockholm city. Including this type of urban space will help Sundbybergs stad maintain their reputation for being a mixed used and dense municipality.

Another small center has been added in the northern tvärbana stop to allow for another urban core along the main commuter transportation track. A building for commercial, office, and elderly homes have been included to make sure there are people using this space actively.

The housing block on the entrance to Ursvik has been opened up to include space for recreational activities like in the original plan. Riksbyggen’s planned building can then be more open to activities and meeting places. Private space has been included for the kindergarten, however the hopes of locating it near the activity park would lead to daytime use of this park instead of the private garden.

Beyond the suggestions for diversity of services in Ursvik, it will be important for surrounding areas to increase connectivity to Ursvik both structurally and culturally. Better and walkable bridges will allow residents to optimize access to the services they currently use as well as motivate residents to visit areas they do not normally use. Putting in more services that Ursvik residents might use in surrounding neighborhoods would increase the use-value of that neighborhoods and cause more residents to visit these areas. Services like sporting facilities, parks, and running tracks that extend into neighboring areas would be the first suggestion, as a large portion of survey respondents reported participating in sporting associations. Having overlapping sports teams and active green space might bring together residents that would not normally go out of their way to meet.

The suggestions provided evolve from an analysis of current plans, literary research on urban planning tradition and community integration, and the influence of New Urbanism design. In Ulrika Sax’s chapter in Kista: Den Tulande Stad (2013), on what is considered the new ideal of what a good city is, she outlines that the current planning practice is to build dense inner- city style housing blocks with varying services and public transport within a walking distance. This follows the City of Stockholm’s overview plan from 2010 which focuses development on the promenadstad or the walkable city (Stockholms stad, 2010). The concept mostly follows a trend for better space efficiency so as not to create urban sprawl into the natural environment. Dense cities allow for people to move and access services without the need of a car for short distance trips, making peoples everyday lives not only more convenient but reduces their CO2 emissions (Calthorpe, 1993). However, the benefits of New Urbanism design often get lost in translation. In new development, the city can often feel inauthentic and lacking historical character, much like notorious development of Seaside, Florida. The theory is also critiqued for not functioning in practice. When applied to suburban development it loses the connection to services and diversity and builds instead just higher density suburbs (Talen, 2000).

45 This similar critique was made in the Seminar hosted by Riksbyggen Den Inkluderande Stad, where many pointed out that inclusion and integration cannot be solved by just building dense inner-city blocks. The inner-city of Stockholm is desirable in that it is the most expensive part of the city to live, but perhaps it is not desirable for just it’s density but also the accessibility to services. Developing dense suburbs disconnected from service, public transport, and surrounding neighborhoods follows the patterns of Million Homes Programs that are so highly critiqued for their segregation. To make sure that the same process of segregation does not follow for the next generation of urban development the focus on accessibility, diversity, and city connections must remain a strong focus. This point is emphasized in the goup Yimby’s (Yes in my Backyard) critique of Järva 2030 by Andrew Gardebring (2008). The groups focus is to promote New Urbanism ideals in the upcoming developments in and arounds Stockholm. When the Vision Järva 2030 came out, the group noticed right away that there is a focus on increasing residential space without the complimentary increase in services and transport networks. The vision sets space for diversity but mostly in architectural styles. The group criticizes this mentioning that perhaps building more new housing might just give each neighborhood a face lift but it does not change the cycle of planning mono-functional suburbs.

Riksbyggen’s role in impacting the larger community development is not big in that they will only develop on more housing block in the western part of the new development. However, the project leader for this new development could advocate for making sure that the new development remains open as an entrance to the neighborhood, includes a diversity of blended residential and business space, and attempt to collaborate with the municipality and other building actors to advance the neighborhood needs for more services and accessibility. The housing association members (pers com, 2018) discussed their desire to be better connected to other housing associations in the area, with this research project being the first opportunity for board members from different associations to meet. This could be an opportunity for Riksbyggen to establish a platform or association of housing board members and other housing developers in the area of Usvik, much like the one established in the Stockholm sections of Järva Fastighetsägare I Järva. This opportunity could also be supported simply through making sure that Ursvik housing associations are invited to meet with other Riksbyggen associations through their establishment of an interest group. Being involved in these interest groups allows enthusiastic housing board members to meet and share ideas across Riksbyggen’s brfs.

Political implications With these findings one must consider, what is causing the development to lose focus, to stray off the track of goals, or who is responsible for promoting a better development. As mentioned earlier it is difficult to pin down exactly who is responsible for guiding development. City planners, exploitation units, property developers, and politicians all have an influence in the development of new neighborhoods. Municipal politicians who sit on the city council board have a say in which plans get approved and which do not. Their power resides in their democratic election every four years within the municipality. This can be challenging as ongoing development can Figure 15 Photo of poster from Mikeal T Erikson (M) running for City Council 2018 posted in Western Ursvik. Taken: 2018 46 stretch longer or over political terms served by city council members.

The city council for Sundbybergs stad has been changed a couple times over this planning and construction period of Ursvik. In 2014, a vote for a more conservative council led to the resignation of Social Democrat politician Jonas Nygren in 2015 (Tidningen Fastighetsaktien, 2015). Nygren now works for Hyresgästföreningar, or the Rental Tenants Association, and sits on the Delegation Against Segregation addressing challenges affecting Stockholm housing politics. The now blue/green coalition of the Central Party and the Moderates lead the city council and their planning decisions, which could have caused the shift in focus of the urban development in Ursvik over the past few years. The Moderate party, and council leader, Mikael T Eriksson (see Figure 16), is up for reelection this year, and perhaps these political votes on behalf of residents has a major impact in how the next detail plans will be design and established.

Discussion Through various methods ranging from site visits, informational meetings, a survey of residents, applying planning practices, and observing everyday workings of Riksbyggen, conclusions can be drawn that attempt to answer the research questions. I found that perceptions of Ursvik residents of more vulnerable neighboring areas are negative ends, with fear of crime and feelings of it being run-down. These perceptions though are challenged by the same opinions of residents that more integration and development could be a positive change in the neighborhood. I found that indicators for social sustainability are important for residents and future integration in that there is a feeling of ability to impact, there is an interest in community sharing of goods and services, there is a high concern for safety, and there is ambition for integration. However, because these indicators are not measured over time as the housing association matures, there is little opportunity to reevaluate current standings, raise targets, and implement new actions. Through testing planning theories to this case, I found that Sundbybergs stad could be doing more to keep detailed plains consistent to overview plans, structure plans, and goal documents. I found that for Riksbyggen there seems to be little impact on overcoming structural and cultural boundaries, but that by keeping their buildings open, welcoming, and diverse they can contribute to better integrated spaces. Beyond finding answers to the research questions I found other various interesting conclusions. There seems to be a lack of sustainability thinking that seeps down into the everyday lives of community residents. The city is treated more as a product instead of a continual process. Perceptions of safety are the most important considerations for creating more integrated neighborhoods. These broader findings might have more of an impact on how urban planning in Sweden can advance to more socially sustainable and better connected residential areas.

Trickle down of social sustainability When originally planning methods to research perceptions of integration by Ursvik residents in Riksbyggen developments, the hope was to do more in-depth studies through interviews and group sessions to also find group dynamics. I was hoping to have a deeper connection with residents to allow for open discussions and dialogue. I quickly learned that Riksbyggen’s department for sustainable development had very little contact with residents. Their work was mostly done on the larger institutional level and at meetings with interest- based housing associations that participated in sustainability workshops.

When discussing sustainability, and specifically social sustainability with the customer relations manager for Ursvik buildings, it felt like there was little knowledge or dedication to

47 sustainability indicators or social sustainability. The project leaders have a better sense of these issues as they go through the hållbarhetsverktyg with sustainability specialists, but most of their knowledge, research, and planning has been conducted by consultants, who are hired very much on a project-to project basis, only being hired for one project at a time. Finding one person responsible for specific housing projects impacts can be quite difficult. This leads to a lack of sustainability that makes its way down from the sustainability department to people’s everyday lives. Large and idealistic goals do not trickle down through the institution to the residents in a clear flow of information or decision making process.

This is obviously a difficult task as there is not one position in charge of making sure every housing association is operating in a sustainable way or remaining involved in social sustainability topics. This position would be quite difficult to fill and operate. But perhaps as the social sustainability indicators become more established, they will become more pervasive in working culture. More positions from the project leader to the customer relations manager might have tasks on reporting for social sustainability measures and progress. This might make a larger impact on the participation of residents and the effect of indicators on residents.

A similar finding was found for Sundbybergs stad’s working process with sustainability topics. The city’s overview plan, the Ursvik plan program, the Ursvik structural plan, the goal document are all well researched analyses of sustainability and solutions for social sustainability in the Ursvik area. Social consequences analyses have been done for children and for people with disabilities which contribute to a more well-rounded dialogue and include insecure populations. However, the group for neighborhood collaboration has not been established a citizen planning meeting has not been conducted since the original establishment of original plans. When reviewing the detailed plans that the municipality has most recently published, it feels like some of the goals for social sustainability have been lost in the process. Very little considerations for diversity, density, and accessibility have trickled down into the detailed plans. Perhaps a change in political input or institutional bureaucracy has played a part, but the lack of social sustainability actions in the current development is apparent.

For ongoing progress of indicators for social sustainability the next step will be to understand how the goals can trickle down to the resident- or citizen-level better and how institutions can organize or adopt systems for on-the-ground sustainability measures.

The city as a process Part of the challenge to ongoing social sustainability work is finding ways to keep continual relations with residents and citizens in order to find accurate measurements and follow-up of indicators progress. This is obviously difficult. Keeping track of water or energy use, recycling numbers or mobility measures can be quite easy to record and check, as opposed to retaining a strong institutional-resident relationship for openness and trust, in order to track social sustainability progress. But this on-going relationship is quite important when viewing the city as more than just a product to be sold, but more as community in a maturing process. Riksbyggen sells housing, but they also retain a standard for sustainability and for housing management. Maintaining active, safe, and attractive neighborhoods could help Riksbyggen hold to its own high standards and reputations for good housing developments.

The same finding is true for Sundbybergs stad. Much of the work is packaged into the final structural and detailed plans but little work seems to be established for ongoing community

48 relations for when development ends. What is the plan for city safety, community engagement, and education of citizens on future planning developments? This question, I could not find results to support.

The more urban planners look for ways to measure sustainability and to include social sustainability into the discussion in a concrete way, the more there is a need for looking at what is happening in the neighborhoods and what direction is it going in. If these aspects are not followed up on, not reevaluated, and not acted on it can be difficult to prevent segregation the future of the neighborhood.

Perceptions of safety for the sake of residential integration The last major conclusion from the results is that perceptions of safety largely motivate views on neighborhood development and integration. Trygghet or safety is becoming a hot topic as it is being discussed by every political candidate and party campaigning in this election year. It is on posters, it is topics of seminars, and it was the most common word used in survey responses. It seems rarely discussed in crime numbers, gang activities, or dangerous situations. In news and in discussions reference to anecdotal crimes and presence of police is noted as the reasons for unsafety or neighborhood security. Solutions to this feeling of being unsafe or insecure cannot be more disconnection and segregation amongst neighborhoods. A downward spiral of having fear for the ‘other’ will not stop criminality. Although this research does not analyze the crime statistics in the area, it looks more at what social and structural actions are being done to reduce crime and promote safety, but from this research it feels like no solutions are being put forward that go beyond increased police presence and building new housing. These solutions feel outdated in terms of bettering legacies of million homes program neighborhoods and softening barriers between neighborhoods.

Conclusion Through the research conducted with Riksbyggen’s residents of Ursvik, social sustainability indicators, and planning practices and documents, findings on the research questions have been uncovered. Resident’s perceptions on integration mostly are based on perceptions of crime and criminal activity in the area. A fear of a loss of safety creates the hesitation to integrating with more vulnerable neighborhoods. A use-value on businesses, services, and public transportations increases resident’s interests in integration and planning methods for connecting neighborhoods. Residents who responded to the survey showed particular interests in food and grocery stores, child care and doctors, sporting facilities, and subway stops. Incorporating more of these valued features in the present neighborhood of Ursvik, as well as connecting the neighborhood to these features in surrounding areas will help residents feel less isolated and integrate the neighborhoods together. Having methods for integrating the neighborhoods is crucially important to avoiding a process in which Ursvik becomes isolated, segregated, and unsafe over time, much like the process of Million Homes Projects. Methods of increased police presence and building fresh, new residencies have shown to have little impact on Million Homes Project neighborhoods, so offering them as solutions now to Ursvik and surrounding neighborhoods is a hallow pursuit.

Riksbyggen’s indicators for social sustainability seemed of high interest of residents and appropriately analyze the sustainability of housing developments in the production stage. With a process of ongoing evaluation and a better communication of social sustainability goals to those that work more hands-on with resident satisfaction could increase the impact of their work, such as increased collaboration for better impacts, participation in community

49 sharing programs, better safety and security tactics, and more methods for advancing communities in the long term. Riksbyggen has clearly established high goals through their indicators for social sustainability but in the coming times it will be interesting to see how they achieve these goals through ongoing evaluation and development of indicators.

Tactics that Riksbyggen could use in terms of planning for ongoing development in the neighborhoods, would be retaining a focus on accessibility and connections to local business, services, and public transportation, focus on creating open and welcoming entrance spaces to Ursvik, and promoting active spaces for safe and secure streets. Activities for community development and neighborhood specific targets could help focus projects and indicators. Collaboration with current Ursvik residents and Sundbybergs stad and supporting collaboration amongst housing boards could only create positive networks for tracking the cities ongoing process and projects.

Going forward it will take time for social sustainability concepts to be more adopted into companies’ cultures and trickle down to peoples’ everyday lives. The process of using social sustainability indicators will hopefully be adopted by more institutions to both be used in the establishment of city properties, but also in the ongoing process of city advancement. Collaboration amongst actors in city development will only help this maturing process as new ideas and feedback is brought to the table. Concrete measures for social sustainability allow institutions to feel more comfortable working with their social impacts as well as develop more open and connected city developments.

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Personal Communications

Elmqvist, L. City Planner and Project Leader at Sunbybergs stad. In person meeting. 2018- 03-02.

Lundevall, P. City Planner at Stockholms stad for Rinkeby. In person meeting. 2018-03-09.

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Housing association members. In person meeting. 2018-05-03.

56 Appendix I – Sundbybergs stad varumärkesundersökning 2015

57 Appendix II – Survey Document

Ge feedback om din boendemiljö!

Hej,

Jag heter Kristen och jag läser hållbar samhällsplanering och stadsutformning på KTH. Jag skriver min mastersuppsats om hur Riksbyggen, som ett bostadsföretag, kan planera för ökad social hållbarhet. I det här brevet finns en kort enkät som tar ca 5-10 minuter att svara på, när du är klar lägg vänligen enkäten i styrelsens brevlåda med det medföljande kuvertet. Det finns också en version av enkäten på nätet som du kan ta istället om det är mer bekvämt för dig. Du är välkommen att svara på enkäten på nätet på det språk som passar dig bäst (svenska, engelska, eller arabiska). Alla frågor är frivilliga och ditt deltagande är anonymt. Ditt deltagande kan komma att påverka din boendemiljö och du ha möjligheten att vinna två SF biocheckar.

Om du har några frågor eller skulle vilja bli kontaktad när resultaten är färdiga är du välkommen att skicka ett email till [email protected].

Tack på förhand! Kristen Koehler

▪ Enkät länk: https://goo.gl/forms/y6m1YTkfhFsjejOK2

Give feedback on your housing environment!

Hi,

My name is Kristen and I am a student at KTH studying Sustainable Urban Planning and Design. I am writing my master’s thesis on how Riksbyggen, a housing company, can plan for increased social sustainability. Included in this letter is a short survey that takes about 5-10 minutes to answer, when you have completed the survey kindly return it to the boards mailbox with the envelop provided. There is also an online version of the survey available which you can take instead if it is more convenient for you. You are welcome to answer the survey in whichever language you feel most comfortable (Swedish, English, or Arabic), the English and Arabic versions are only available online. All questions are voluntary and anonymous. Your participation could help impact your housing environment and you have the possibility of winning two SF movie passes.

If you have any questions or would like to be contacted when the results are ready, feel free to send me an email at [email protected].

Thanks in advance! Kristen Koehler

▪ Survey link: https://goo.gl/forms/y6m1YTkfhFsjejOK2 اعطي رأيك حول بئتك السكنية!

مرحبا

58 اسمي كريستن و انا ادرس شهادة الماجستير في تخطيط المدن المستديمة في الجامعة الملكية في ستوكهولم. انا اعمل على رسالة الماجستير مع شركة السكن Riksbyggen التي تعمل على تنمية الجانب االجتماعي في المنطقة. في هذا الظرف توجد استمارة من األسئلة , تستغرق 5 الى 10 دقاقئق من وقتك لالجابة على األسئلة. عند اتمامك لجميع األجابات يرجى وظع األستمارة مع الظرف المرفق في صندوق بريد مكتب الرابطة السكنية Bostadsrättförening styrelsen هنالك نفس األستمارة ولكن اونالين على شبكة االنترنيت متوفرة بثالثة لغات )السويدية, االنجليزية, العربية(. يمكنك االجابة عليها في حالة عدم رغبتك في ارسال االجوبة عن طريق البريد. كل األسئلة اختيارية و غير اجبارية. هوية المرسل ستكون مخفية. اشتراكك و االجابة على األسئلة سوف يحسن الكثير من الحالة االجتماعية و التعايشية في المنطقة. و ايظا يمكنك الفوز ببطاقتين لحظور السينما.

يمكنكم مراسلتي على العنوان التالي لألسئلة او لمعرفة نتائج األستفتاء [email protected]

شكرا جزيال على مشاركتكم تحياتي كرستن Kristen Koehler الرابط باللغة العربية ▪ https://goo.gl/forms/y6m1YTkfhFsjejOK2

59 Enkät

1. I vilken bostadsrättförening bor du? a. Brf Gläntan b. Brf Jubilaren

2. Hur länge har du bott i din lägenhet?

3. Var eller vilket område bodde du innan du flyttade till Ursvik?

4. Du: a. Äger din egen lägenhet. b. Hyr din lägenhet i andra hand

5. Hur många personer bor i din lägenhet?

6. Sundbybergs Stad har planerat att koppla samman Ursvik med bostadsområdena runtomkring (Rissne, Rinkeby, och Hallonbergen) med broar, gång-och cykelvägar m.m. Vad tycker du om det?

7. Hur ofta besöker du Rissne, Rinkeby, eller Hallonbergen? a. Varje dag b. Någon gång i veckan c. Någon gång i månaden d. Någon om varje år e. Aldrig

8. I vilket syfte besöker du dessa områden? Markera rutorna som gäller. o Servicen (affären, vårdcentral) o Aktiviteter (fritidsaktiviteter) o Besöker familj, vänner eller bekanta o Kollektivtrafik o Annan orsak: ______

9. Tror du att du kommer att besöka Rissne, Rinkeby och Hallonbergen mer i framtiden?

a. Ja, varför då?

b. Nej, varför då?

c. Kanske. Vad skulle krävas för att du skulle besöka områdena oftare?

10. Tycker du att du känner eller har bra relationer med dina grannar som bor i din förening? a. Ja, jag känner och har bra relationer med mina grannar. b. Jag känner till mina grannar. c. Nej, jag känner inte mina grannar.

11. Tycker du att det är viktigt att ha mångfald (kultur, ålder, utbildning, etc.) i ditt bostadsområde?

60 a. Ja, jag tycker att det är viktigt. Varför då?

b. Jag tycker att det inte är så viktigt. Varför inte?

12. Känner du att du kan påverka din boendemiljö om du vill? a. Ja. På vilken sätt?

a. Nej, varför då?

b. Jag vet inte.

13. Brukar du dela/utbyta varor eller tjänster med andra i din förening (t.ex. bil, sälja eller köpa andra-hand, låna verktyg)? a. Ja, vilka varor eller tjänster?

b. Nej. Skulle du vilja göra så mer i framtiden?

14. Känner du dig trygg i Ursvik? a. Ja, jag känner mig trygg i Ursvik. Vad får dig att känna dig trygg?

b. Nej, jag inte känner mig trygg i Ursvik. Vad i Ursvik gör att du inte känner dig trygg?

15. Har du förslag till vad du vill se för framtidsutveckling i hela Ursviksområdet?

16. Har du förslag för hur du skulle vilja förbättra din boendemiljö?

17. Tillhör du en förening utanför din bostadsrättsförening? Markera rutorna som gäller. o Ingen o Idrott o Affärs/Ekonomisk o Politisk o Religiös o Intresse o Livsstil/Hobby o Andra:

18. Jag identifierar mig själv som: a. Man b. Kvinna c. Varken man eller kvinna

19. Jag är född: a. I Sverige med svenska födda föräldrar b. I Sverige med föräldrar som är födda utomlands c. I annat land

20. Jag är: a. 18–30 b. 31–50

61 c. 51 – 70 d. 71 eller äldre

Om du vill vara med i utlottningen av SF biocheckar vänligen skriv namn och kontaktuppgifter nedan. Dina uppgifter kommer inte att sammankopplas med enkäten eller resultatet och kommer endast användas för att kontakta dig vid eventuell vinst.

Tack så mycket!

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