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- This research investigates public space within Bucharest’s socialist housing estates, examining the tension between the rigid spatial frameworks established during the socialist period and the informal, everyday practices that have emerged over time. These neighborhoods, which accommodate a significant portion of the city’s population, were conceived through standardized principles that prioritized efficiency, control, and functional zoning. While the built fabric remains structurally viable, the public spaces between buildings often appear fragmented, over-regulated, and dominated by vehicular infrastructure. At the same time, these environments reveal continuous processes of spatial negotiation. Residents appropriate, adapt, and subtly transform shared spaces through small-scale interventions, informal uses, and everyday rituals that challenge the original planning logic. These practices demonstrate an ongoing collective effort to humanize and diversify spaces that were initially conceived within a normative and highly controlled framework. The central hypothesis of this study is that these neighborhoods do not require radical transformation, but rather a strategic re-negotiation of public space. By softening boundaries, redefining movement patterns, and reinforcing spatial continuity particularly through pedestrian and green networks public space can shift from a residual and regulated condition to a relational and inclusive system. In this process, the architect assumes the role of mediator, working between inherited structures and contemporary forms of inhabitation to re-establish public space as a shared and adaptive environment. The study continues by deepening its understanding of the city’s broader context and historical evolution, with particular emphasis on the sociological dimension of collective housing environments. Beyond morphological analysis, attention is directed toward the communities inhabiting these neighborhoods, their generational structure, patterns of behavior, shared habits, and everyday rituals. Understanding how residents perceive, use, avoid, or appropriate public space becomes essential to formulating a thoughtful and grounded design approach. Public space is not treated as an abstract spatial category, but as a lived environment shaped by memory, social dynamics, and multigenerational coexistence. To reach a more precise and operative understanding of these conditions, the research focuses primarily on sectional analysis and the study of spatial networks. The section becomes a key analytical instrument for revealing relationships between built form, open space, light, and accessibility. Simultaneously, attention is given to circulation systems, movement patterns, and nodal points where spatial intensities emerge. By mapping networks and identifying points of convergence, interruption, or overlapping, the study seeks to clarify both the underlying morphology of the neighborhoods and the locations where targeted interventions can most effectively reconfigure public space.