http://www.theatlanticcities.com/neighborhoods/2013/12/much-what-we-know-about-public-health-and-urban-planning-wrong/7886/
Hello Everyone:
I can see the 5,000 page view mark off in the horizon, can you? We're getting really close to our goal, so now is not the time to slack off reading. I'm still writing and I need you to keep reading. While you're at it make sure you check out Road Recovery
(http://www.roadrecovery.org), the National Trust for Historic Preservation
(http://www.preservationnation.org), and your local food bank. These organizations could really use your support this time of the year. Please do what you can, thanks.
 |
New York City
commons.wikimedia.org |
Is there a link between the way our cities are planned and public health? If there is a link between the two, how much do we think we know about the connection between urban planning and public. In a post for
The Atlantic Cities, "We Don't Know Nearly As Much About the Link Between Public Health and Urban Planning As We Think We Do," Emily Bader reveals that what we think we know about the way our cities affect our health isn't nearly as much as we think we do.
 |
Chicago Skyline
commons.wikimedia.org |
In the mid-nineteenth century, how we lived affected the way we got sick. It was also the moment in history when scientists and civic officials first discovered the connection between overcrowded, unsanitary housing and cholera, tuberculosis, and yellow fever. In the mid-nineteenth century, urban planning and public health were, for all intents and purposes, one and the same. Since then, the two fields have moved off in different directions. However, there is a growing concern that communities we've already built-with highways, where few people walk, lack of food access, et cetera-are moving us towards obesity, heart disease, and asthma. According to this rationale, good architecture and planning should encourage us to walk more. It has the potential to mitigate pollution and highlight the specific need for amenities such as parks and bicycle lanes in communities with the worst health outcomes.
 |
Denver, Colorado
acg.org |
A new decade-long project from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Center for Advanced Urbanism and the American Institute of Architects is predicated on this idea. Robert Ivy, the chief executive officer of the AIA wrote in the introduction to the study, "The State of Health + Urbanism" from MIT:
When Americans think of health, we instinctively see in our mind's eye the medical profession and the hospitals and clinics in which they treat illness. We usually do not think of architects and other design professionals. But what if we invited designers to help us reinvent aspects of preventative medicine? What if we adopted design strategies that lead to a less sedentary lifestyles?
 |
Downtown Los Angeles
urbanone.com |
This is one of the most compelling challenges facing planners and architects in the twenty-first century. The connection between urban planning, architecture and healthier lifestyles is not exactly something that is new for this century, it's just getting more attention as global urban populations grow. The MIT study reports breaks down many of the assumptions that have become part of the way we think about the link between health and cities-walkable cities are healthier than auto-centric suburbs, car are the primary cause of spreading waistlines, too much fast food and not enough fresh fruit is the cause for inner-city obesity. The MIT study points out that American life expectancy has increased at the same time as the proliferation of the car since 1950. Granted many inner cities actually have higher obesity rates than the suburbs and inner-ring suburbs have some better health outcomes. However there is no evidence to suggest that sprawl causes obesity. In fact, there is some research that suggests that people who are
already obese, chose to live in urban sprawl.
The sounds almost contradictory, no evidence to suggest that sprawl causes obesity, yet already obese people live in urban sprawl. It makes no sense to yours truly and leads me to wonder if Emily Badger actually read and interpreted that portion of the MIT study correctly. I'm not suggesting that obese people move from of sprawling locations and to more walkable cities, what I am suggesting is that I don't think living in a spread out community was necessarily a choice. I think part of it has to do with circumstance. Choice of where to live is part of the situation but growth and expansion of a community is a factor of the organic development of a place. Some of the determinants of sprawl include: demographics, job/entrepreneurial opportunities, education opportunities, availability of land, location, transportation, cultural and social institutions. Whether or nor they happen to be in close proximity to a person's residence is random. Further, it is up to the individual to decide whether he/she opts to take advantage of a local park or not. Thus, I don't think that Ms. Badger fully clarified her statement, "There's no evidence to suggest that sprawl causes obesity, although there is some research arguing that people who
already are obese opt to live in sprawling places."
 |
Downtown Baltimore
robertmcclintock.com |
Emily Badger reports, "Evidence of direct causation is scant [presumably sprawl causes obesity] throughout this entire field (in part because the determinants of what makes us healthy are so complicated)." This implies that sprawl may be a factor in the rate of obesity but not the only factor. She also criticizes the data on food-deserts, calling it "particularly weak, as is research showing that ubiquitous fast food causes diabetes." Let's clarify something here, One fast food meal, once in an odd while does not cause diabetes. Daily consumption of fast food coupled with a sedentary lifestyle, stress, and lack of can lead to diabetes and other chronic diseases.
 |
The St. Louis Arch with the city in the background
en.wikipedia.org |
Further, the MIT study critiques a number of current projects in eight American cities that appear to be predicated on the assumptions stated above. The report questions the strategy used in the city of Los Angeles, California to build more transit-oriented development. While it doesn't question the city's need for more transit (it most certainly does), what the report points is that in creating more TODs, the program could actually result in moving people into more polluted transportation corridors-trading one health problem for another. Another issue the report has is the city of Chicago, Illinois' plan to build seventeen more grocery corridors in low-income areas. On the surface, it sounds like a great idea but the MIT study dismisses it "...as an oversimplified solution to intractable obesity that will do little to dent it." That sounds harsh. A new grocery corridor should be part of a multi-pronged approach to combating "intractable obesity." The people who assembled this report should realize that sometimes the "oversimplified solution" can work.
 |
Cleveland, Ohio
en.wikipedia.org |
The MIT study also takes aim at the city of Atlanta, Georgia's BeltLine project "...for failing to consider the increased traffic pollution that people using its trails and parks would be exposed to." What would the writers of this report have people do? Not use the trails and parks. That makes (no) sense, the writers of the report seem to encourage the building of more green space, as long as people don't us it. The study concludes, " In order for the BeltLine to function as a 'green lung'...vast new green space will be needed around the old rail line. That is economically and politically unfeasible in an area of higher density and land locked real estate."
 |
Boston, Massachusetts
braco.net |
Emily Badger reports, "A recurring thread throughout the report is one of humility: We don't as much as we think we, and there are certainly no silver-bullet design solutions for systemic public health problems." That is a point your truly could definitely agree with yet, from the tone of some the report's critiques one would think that the study's authors have all answers. Quoting MIT's Alan Berger, Casey Lance Brown, and Aparna Keshaviah:
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends a minimum of 150 minutes of aerobic activity each week. That regimen will not be met through increase stair climbing instead of elevators and slightly more walking between parking lots and office buildings. These examples point to the need for reliable, meaningful research on ways to have design more effectively impact urban health.
Well, yes, of course just climbing stairs instead of taking the elevator or walking a greater distance from the car to the office isn't going to meaningfully impact public health. Instead of a humble tone in the report, I would suggest a lot hand wringing by the team.
It's not to say that urban planners and public health officials should not stop trying to find solutions to ongoing issues. In the eight case studies cited by the report, the authors also offered recommendations for alternatives to the BeltLine or how Chicago could consider its health inequities beyond food deserts. Ms. Badger suggests that now would be a good time to stop and assess what we can prove before we toss out the old idea that cities are unhealthy and replace it with new ideas such putting hiking trail everywhere, including near a freeway. Is there a connection between the way our cities are planned and public health? The solution lies in a multi-faceted approach that incorporates good and smart design and policy.
Google+ and Instagram
No comments:
Post a Comment