Dr Rui Wang

Rui Wang is a Research Associate in children’s mobilities. Her research explores children’s everyday mobility and play, in rapidly transforming urban environments, with particular focus on the challenges of creating child-friendly and inclusive spaces. She employs mixed-method approaches and spatial analysis to explore how intergenerational perceptions, policy frameworks, and urban design shape children’s mobilities, play opportunities, and overall wellbeing.

She completed her PhD in Landscape Architecture at the University of Sheffield, where her doctoral research investigated children’s outdoor play in high-density urban environments, focusing on how play opportunities are shaped by environmental factors, children’s characteristics, and family attitudes. Alongside her doctoral studies, she worked as a Research Assistant at Sheffield and contributed to child-friendly city policy guidelines in China, which have since been formally adopted by local governments.

As part of the Safe-SEND project, Rui’s current research investigates the independent mobility of children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). Her work seeks to identify and map real-world risks and everyday barriers faced by children with SEND and their families, to develop participatory mapping tools that empower families to report concerns, and to collaborate with stakeholders in shaping more inclusive and equitable approaches to active travel and road safety design and policy.

Ma, Y., Brindley, P., Wang, R., Lange, E. (2025) Discrepancies between perceived accessibility and spatial accessibility modelling: A case study of urban parks in Guangzhou, China. Transportation Research Part A, Policy and practice, 191, p.104292.

Brindley, P., Ma, Y., Wang, R., Martin, M., Woolley, H., (2025) To Play or Not to Play: Mapping Unequal Provision of Children’s Playgrounds. Land, 14(3), p.477.

Jia, S., Wang, X., Wang, R., Woolley, H., Yang, L. (2025) Research on evaluation system and renewal strategies of community informal children’s activity spaces friendly based on factor analysis. Cheng shi gui hua.(China City Planning Review), 34(1), pp. 31–40.