Mulugeta, Solomon (PhD)Ayenew, Gebeyehu2018-07-022023-11-192018-07-022023-11-192014-06http://etd.aau.edu.et/handle/12345678/5412It is obvious that many urban areas are predominantly covered by concretes and nature is becoming less accessible for the existing and the coming generation. The study of this research has focused on the plan, implementation & management and the extent to which residents’ utilize green areas, mainly focused on city parks using primary and secondary data. The City Government has planned to develop 40% of the city with greenery at the year 2003. But, till 2014, it is not successful to achieve its plan mainly due to lack of strong enforcement of the Local Development Plan (LDP) and poor land use management. The existing major green area components (forests and city parks) have a total size of 8229.7 hectare (15.24% of city`s area) with limited degree of development. The up keeping and management of green areas in general and city parks in particular is limited mainly due to Lack of experienced human resource. Lack of clear legislation & justice, less participation of the community, and lack of sufficient documentation related to green area development has also contributed for the conversion, damage and limited development of green areas. Even though residents are aware of about the importance of green areas, the facility of existing City parks is very poor and their location & size is less accessible. Thus, frequency of visiting parks is limited mainly due to unattractive facility of parks, shortage of time, distance and transport factors. Thus, the city government is expected to create a green frame at watershed level; sufficient and stable man power; strong planning, monitoring and Evaluation system; clear standard and naming; modern documentation and spatial Data (GIS); active community involvement; and sufficient facilities of parksenGeography and Environmental StudiesThesis