Child Friendly Cities: Research with Children in Aktau: Final Aktau Report 2015

Aktau is the smallest of the four cities in the study. Located on the Caspian Sea in a geographically and historically unique area in the west of Kazakhstan. The city itself is quite young, set up predominantly to support uranium prospectors and oil workers in the 1960s, the apartment blocks are very soviet style with the city having very few planned or landscaped parks and play spaces. Overwhelming the children spoke of the sea front as the main feature of the town. A boulevard sweeps the coastline throughout the city and contains a significant paved area with lights, playground equipment, seats and small café’s scattered along it which children included in their drawings and discussions. While the apartment blocks themselves are quite run down and courtyards are often just dirt and dust, the young children particularly spoke mostly positively of their local environment. Many of the young children said they loved where they lived, were happy, and Amir aged 8 told us: “When I get back from school I help my mom. My mom sends me to the shop when there is no bread at home. I live a very joyful life. When I finish doing homework I go outside to play with my friends. I love my life”. Many children said they especially loved living close to the seafront. Bibizhan, aged 14 told us: “the seafront which was built recently, there are a lot of playgrounds there. Not only young people walk there, but also children with their parents. One can rent a bike and ride it there. In summer you can swim, the water is clean there” Many children also spoke about their family villages where their grandparents often still lived and where they visited. These villages were important because it is here where children said there was lots of grass and cattle. The main concerns children had though were consistent with living in a smaller regional city that was not close to one of the large modern cities like Astana or Almaty. Children were concerned they did not have educational opportunities they spoke a lot about going to university and having a better education. For the older teenagers there concerns were the lack of things to do, being bored and not having many youth spaces within the city. Having interesting places to enjoy, more greenery, parks and play spaces, amusement parks and shopping malls were all on the list of improvements. One child even mentioned that they wanted the chance to see concerts by famous musicians and another was concerned about young people and drug addiction. There were overall concerns about the quality of the environment due to the dirt, dust and water quality (the water is all desalinated water) and a couple of the older teenagers noted their concerns about the possibility of nuclear radiation from the old nuclear reactor that was on the outskirts of town.