Lapua is a city of circa 15 000 people in Ostrobothnia by the Lapua river. Greenspaces of the city are the responsibility of the parks department, under the technical center of the city. The parks department is run by the City Gardener, who commissioned this thesis.

The reason for the commissioning of this thesis are changes in city financing brought on by the general economic situation. As financing is diverted away from greenspace care, there is an opportunity to re-evaluate and re-plan greenspace care. The goal of the thesis is to provide City of Lapua with cost-effective methods for greenspace care, which can help maintain quality for the annually increasing greenspace care workloads at desired levels while maintaining quality of the greenspaces.

Knowledgebase for the thesis was gathered from literary and internet sources about greenspaces, their care, statistics about city finances and the relationship of people to their living environment. There are many research methods, in this thesis the methods of inclusion were workshops, i.e. future workshop. In support of the inclusion methods two inquiry forms were made, one for city’s residents and one for policy makers.

The workshops and inquiry forms were used to gather information about opportunities to develop methods of care for greenspaces. Most important points raised were increasing cooperation with other operators in the field, the importance of workplace well-being, cost effective care methods and making information more available.

Development ideas born were increasing cooperation with schools in the field, re-evaluation of greenspace care classes and using city planning to give more information of wishes on land use. As a result of this thesis, a cooperation scheme will be developed between the Lapua city and the school, which is believed to serve the interests of both parties in the future.