Creative mapping & community voices in Anglesey.

Places are more than their streets, buildings, and open spaces. They are shaped by the people who live in them, the paths they take, the stories they tell, and the green spaces they use every day. Recognising this, Public Map Platform / Llwyfan Map Cyhoeddus has been exploring new ways to integrate local voices into planning through creative, participatory mapping.

Their project Mapping Our Way Home: Young People Reimagining Anglesey invited children and young people to co-create maps of the island that reflect how they experience it. These maps go beyond routes and landmarks, capturing favourite spots, local stories, and spaces that matter for wellbeing, including parks, woodlands, and coastal areas.

The project also uses a network of bards and creative practitioners to facilitate engagement. By bringing storytelling, poetry, and art into the process, they help participants express what is meaningful about their surroundings in ways traditional surveys cannot. This approach ensures that community insights — especially from young people — are part of the conversation when planning decisions are made.

Creative mapping like this demonstrates the value of green and public spaces, not just as amenities, but as integral parts of how communities live and interact. By combining community voice, artistic practice, and spatial data, the project produces maps that are both informative and reflective of the people who use the space.

This work is a useful example of how participatory approaches can make planning more inclusive, grounded, and connected to everyday experience, helping to ensure that decisions about public and green spaces actually serve the communities who rely on them.