designers need to create healthier, more walkable, neighbourhoods
Designers and planners need to create healthier neighbourhoods
The charity Living Streets is campaigning for better designed streets that encourage people to walk more. Carrying out a street audit is one way of involving the local community in the process of designing both healthy and attractive streets, says Tom Franklin, director
Planning and transport policies are creating places that discourage physical activity and contribute to heart disease and rising obesity rates, according to a report released on 25 July (click here for more the report and more details on RUDI) by the National Heart Forum, Living Streets and the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE). The layout of towns, cities and buildings influence the amount of exercise which people take naturally in their daily lives.
The report, Building Health, provides a blueprint for action, including changing transport policies in which 'the car is king', and locating housing, shops and services to encourage walking and cycling. With three million new homes being built by 2020, planning and design decisions made now will affect the shape of communities and public health for decades to come. European cities such as Copenhagen have proved that it is possible to have thriving city centres which cater fully for pedestrians and cyclists, making healthy living seem the easy option.
Building Health:Creating and enhancing places for healthy, active lives, and the accompanying Blueprint for Action, addresses urban planning, building design, access to green space, and provision for walking and cycling. It looks in detail at what can be done to reverse the current trend toward an urban environment that discourages physical activity and instead create communities that emphasise quality of life.
For further information and to download the report, go the CABE website
Practical recommendations include:
- Applying a 'health check' on every investment programme, which include assessing the impact on levels of physical activity.
- Strengthening guidelines for key strategic planning documents such as Community Strategies, Local Transport Plans, Regional and Sub-Regional Spatial Strategies, Local Development Frameworks and Sustainability Appraisals to make health and physical activity a key goal alongside sustainable development.
- Integrating health promotion principles into the training of built environment professionals such as highways and transport engineers and town planners.
Tom Franklin, chief executive of Living Streets says, 'Living on a street that's attractive and safe to walk in, within a neighbourhood designed to make walking to local amenities easy, encourages activity in a way that other initiatives can't. Active lifestyles cannot be separated from the design of our streets, towns and cities - they are part of the bricks and mortar of our everyday lives.'
Living Streets is a national charity which campaigns for better streets and public spaces for people on foot. It was formed in 1929, as the Pedestrians Association. As well as working to influence policy on a national and local level, its practical work includes facilitating Community Street Audits (which engage with the people using streets to identify improvements) and providing training and consultancy to practitioners who design and manage streets.
Tom Franklin spoke on the importance of street audits at the recent Streetscape in Historic Towns conference, organised by the English Historic Towns Forum (EHTF) in Leicester on 6 July. He said that creating streets people wanted to walk in would encourage them to walk more and showed examples of recent streetscape work which showed scant regard for the needs or safety of pedestrians.
Are pavements smooth, even and well maintained? Are pavements free of temporary or permanent obstructions? he asked. The viewpoint of pedestrians is often overlooked, and new buildings often present uninviting bare walls to the person on the street. Lighting is an other often overlooked factor, he added, for example, a railway station may be lit at night, but pedestrians then are surrounded by darkness when they walk out onto the street.
The important role of street audits
One important way of designing better streets for people is to involve the public in street audits. Local people feel more involved in the design process, and there is greater community understanding of street scene issues, he said. He urged more planners and urban designers to carry out street audits.
Examples of audits carried out by Living Streets include:
A strategic review 'Walking in the City of Worcester' was carried out to guide future investment as part of the Choose How You Move project in Worcester, one of the Department for Transport's Sustainable Travel Towns. Living Streets also conducted a community street audit in a suburb of Worcester, which focused on routes to a local parade of shops, school, health centre and church. The audit brought together local people and stakeholders to identify existing problems and opportunities to improve the local environment.
Preston
Living Streets conducted an audit of routes between the University of Central Lancashire Campus and Preston City Centre as part of a CIVITAS funded project. The audit brought together staff, students and local residents and also involved the local primary school. The audit report has resulted in funding for improvements to the public and private realm thanks to the partnership approach adopted.
Bedlington
Living Streets carried out a community street audit with local people thanks to funding from the Wansbeck Initiative, the Local Strategic Partnership. As a result of the Community Street Audit improvements are taking place in Bedlington Town Centre including new seating, litter bins, signage, planters and improved pedestrian crossings to make the area even more attractive and safer for residents, visitors and shoppers. £450,000 is being invested in Street Pride in Wansbeck, which was developed after officers were trained by Living Streets. A £1M Townscape Heritage Initiative bid has been submitted to the Heritage Lottery Fund by Wansbeck District Council and the North of England Civic Trust.
