This study is based on an earlier interdisciplinary study made by Redbo et al., (2000), Extensive cattle production systems ? out wintering, which lasted over two winters, 97/98 and 98/99, with two groups of heifers indoors and two groups of heifers outdoors raised in different environments, indoors or outdoors during their second winter. Both indoor and outdoor heifer groups were fed grass silage ad libitum throughout the experimental period that lasted from October until May. The objective of this study was to evaluate the long term effects of being raised in these two environments. This study includes data collected during the period lasting from the start of the experiment of Redbo et al., (2000) until the heifers had calved a second time and the results mainly deal with the performance of the animals after the experiment during their first two calvings and their first lactation.

In Automatic Milking Systems (AMS), cows are kept in a free stall barn equipped with one or several milking units (MU). The cows? activities in the system are called cow traffic. There are three types of cow traffic systems: guided, partly-guided and free. Free systems have no gates, allowing the cows access to the feeding and resting areas at any time.

This paper constitiutes graduate work at the Swedish University of Agriculture Science, the Department of Urban and Rural Development, Ultuna. The main objective of this work has been, in part, using the municipality of Runby as an example, to test different inventory and analysis methods directed towards a sociotopic usage perspective. A secondary objective has been, based on knowledge obtained from current research results concerning the usage of green areas, to transfer the analysis results to a proposal for a free space planning over Runby. People living in the countryside often have good access to nature as well as access to a garden of their own. In the city, however, there are considerably less people that have access to a private outdoor spaces so the parks become a type of public living room for all the inhabitants. Through the lack of private green spaces and through the anonymity of the city, an inviting atmosphere is created towards spending time in the park.