News
Royal Town Planning Institute calls for health factors to be built
into town planning
29 June 2009
The Royal Town Planning Institute has called for planners to build on
the achievements of their Victorian forefathers who led the fight
against unhealthy living by utilising powers already at their disposal
to make our communities healthier and more sustainable.
The Health Care Commission recently warned that the NHS would
experience large deficits as the health needs of an increasingly elderly
population and increasing costs of healthcare exact their toll on
budgets.
Many of today’s increasingly common ailments such as obesity and
heart attacks are a result of how we live our lives, yet there already
exist various powers that town planners can use to make our
neighbourhoods places in which people’s health is promoted rather than
harmed.
However, there is still a problem of recognition of this fact by
spatial planners and health professionals. The RTPI has been engaged in
bridging the professional gap that has emerged between the health and
planning professions and it has issued a Good Practice Note
that represents the culmination of its efforts to date.
Key messages in the new guidance include:
- the importance of integrating public health and spatial planning
processes to enable planners and health professions to promote
health through the delivery of neighbourhoods by considering health
throughout the planning process from plan making to development
management;
- that spatial planning has a key role to play in shaping
environments which make it possible for people to make healthier
choices about exercise, local services, travel, food, nature and
leisure; and
- there are strong synergies between the measures used to mitigate
and adapt to climate change and those associated with addressing
health issues including promoting walking and cycling to reduce car
use and carbon emissions, building energy efficient homes to reduce
carbon emissions and reduce deaths from cold, and providing parks
and open spaces that help towns and cities to cool down, whilst also
providing space for leisure and exercise.
The Good Practice Note (GPN) is one of a series prepared by
the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI) primarily intended for planning
practitioners in the UK, however much of the generic advice may benefit
other professionals.
This guidance has been led by the RTPI Environmental Planning and
Protection Network (EPP). It is available to download, along with
supporting online resources and case studies at
www.rtpi.org.uk/item/1795/23/5/3
Additional resources are also available to EPP Network Members at
www.rtpi.org.uk/environment_planning_and_protection_network/
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