Healthy Living & Place-Making - Lessons from Northstowe
The Healthy Living and Youth & Play Strategy combines a strategy to address the needs of children and young people with a healthy living strategy for the whole community.
We are delighted that our work in developing a Healthy Living and Youth & Play Strategy for Northstowe has been highlighted as a good practice case study by NHS England.
NHS England's Healthy New Towns programme worked with 10 demonstrator sites across England to explore how the development of new places could create healthier and connected communities with integrated and high-quality services.
Putting Health into Place distilled the learning from the programme into 10 principles to help in designing, delivering and managing healthy places. Principle 8 highlights how the masterplanning and design of spaces for play and leisure can be integrated with the enhancement and creation of green infrastructure, as exemplified by the Healthy Living and Youth & Play Strategy for Northstowe case study:
‘The Healthy Living and Youth & Play Strategy combines a strategy to address the needs of children and young people with a healthy living strategy for the whole community. It is based on evidence about local health and planning contexts and ends with an implementation plan. Its objectives include ensuring that outdoor play and recreation, and contact with nature, are part of everyday life through the seasons. It takes an imaginative, inspiring and nature-focused approach to encouraging physical activity, independence, social interaction, access to nature and community identity. Cycling and pedestrian pathways are included, as well as skateboard and scooter paths, landscaped with sensory and seasonal plants.'
Mike Goulding, Head of Strategic land at Homes England, said: 'Homes England wants Northstowe to be a healthy and fun place for people of all ages. The Healthy Living and Youth & Play Strategy is a major step towards this, enabling us to prioritise elements that are proven to improve health and wellbeing.'
www.england.nhs.uk/ourwork/innovation/healthy-new-towns/