Abstract: The subject of the study is the urban environment. The urban environment in which a teenager grows up influences his socialization through the spatial, architectural, and functional characteristics of the city. The specificity of these characteristics may provide opportunities for the inclusion of a teenager in urban life and his active participation in it, or to act with the opposite effect.
In the article, the authors note a number of contradictions characterizing the implementation of the participation of a teenager in the life of the city. The main contradictions are connected with the willingness of a teenager to express his opinion, the willingness of adults to take this opinion seriously and the normative elaboration of the issue of children's participation in the life of the city.
Expert interviews were used as the main method of data collection. A total of 27 experts were interviewed. They asked questions about the possibilities and limitations of including teenagers in the co-participating design of the urban environment.
Experts note that children do not have their own spaces in the city, which complicates the process of personalization of urban space, its active development and, subsequently, transformation. Also in expert interviews, the problem is fixed, on the one hand, ignoring the child's opinion, on the other — expanding the practices of involving children in expressing their opinions.
The authors identify the practices of including children in the life of the city, characterizing the gradual nature of this process, which begins with the expression of an opinion with the transition to its accounting and then - the active participation of adolescents in the transformation of the urban environment.
Based on the analysis of expert interviews and scientific publications, the resources of participation of teenagers in the life of the city are described. These include: foreign experience, the activities of enthusiasts for the involvement of children and methodological developments.