The 10-Minute Walk, [1] also known as the 10-Minute Walk to a Park, is a parks-advocacy movement led by The Trust for Public Land to ensure that everyone in the United States lives within a ten-minute walk to a high-quality park or green space. [2] [3] [4] [5]
More than 300 mayors of large and small cities across the United States have committed to the goal, including the mayors of the four largest cities in the U.S.: New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Houston. [1] Urban parks are increasingly seen by those in municipal government as a solution to many inner-city challenges. [6] This initiative seeks to provide physical and mental health benefits, opportunities for physical activity, proximity to nature, neighborhood and community revitalization, and environmental benefits for citizens through the creation of urban parks. [7] [8] [9] Health studies demonstrate that an increase in exercise, including walking alone, may foster longevity in older adults. [10] [11]
The effort was adopted as a resolution at the 85th annual United States Conference of Mayors (USCM) convention in 2017 as a goal for cities to increase parks and green space as a civic responsibility. [12] The concept has been supported by several community-based nonprofit organizations: the National Recreation and Park Association (NRPA), [13] the Urban Land Institute (ULI), [14] and Fields in Trust in the UK. [15] A ten-minute walk is considered to be one-half-mile (0.80 km), which is the distance the National Park Service (NPS) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) uses when they link park access and public health. [16] The first city in the U.S. to achieve a 10-Minute Walk to a park for every resident was San Francisco. [17] [18]
The term built environment refers to human-made conditions and is often used in architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, public health, sociology, and anthropology, among others. These curated spaces provide the setting for human activity and were created to fulfill human desires and needs. The term can refer to a plethora of components including the traditionally associated buildings, cities, public infrastructure, transportation, open space, as well as more conceptual components like farmlands, dammed rivers, wildlife management, and even domesticated animals.
Urban sprawl is defined as "the spreading of urban developments on undeveloped land near a more or less densely populated city". Urban sprawl has been described as the unrestricted growth in many urban areas of housing, commercial development, and roads over large expanses of land, with little concern for very dense urban planning. Sometimes the urban areas described as the most "sprawling" are the most densely populated. In addition to describing a special form of urbanization, the term also relates to the social and environmental consequences associated with this development. In modern times some suburban areas described as "sprawl" have less detached housing and higher density than the nearby core city. Medieval suburbs suffered from the loss of protection of city walls, before the advent of industrial warfare. Modern disadvantages and costs include increased travel time, transport costs, pollution, and destruction of the countryside. The revenue for building and maintaining urban infrastructure in these areas are gained mostly through property and sales taxes. As most jobs in the US are now located in suburbs generating much of the revenue, although a lack of growth will require higher tax rates.
Preventive healthcare, or prophylaxis, is the application of healthcare measures to prevent diseases. Disease and disability are affected by environmental factors, genetic predisposition, disease agents, and lifestyle choices, and are dynamic processes that begin before individuals realize they are affected. Disease prevention relies on anticipatory actions that can be categorized as primal, primary, secondary, and tertiary prevention.
A pocket park is a small park accessible to the general public. While the locations, elements, and uses of pocket parks vary considerably, the common defining characteristic of a pocket park is its small size. Typically, a pocket park occupies one to three municipal lots and is smaller than 0.5 hectares in size.
Physical fitness is maintained by a range of physical activities. Physical activity is defined by the World Health Organization as "any bodily movement produced by skeletal muscles that requires energy expenditure." Human factors and social influences are important in starting and maintaining such activities. Social environments can influence motivation and persistence, through pressures towards social conformity.
The Trust for Public Land is a U.S. nonprofit organization with a mission to "create parks and protect land for people, ensuring healthy, livable communities for generations to come". Since its founding in 1972, the Trust for Public Land has completed 5,000 park-creation and land conservation projects across the United States, protected over 3 million acres, and helped pass more than 500 ballot measures—creating $70 billion in voter-approved public funding for parks and open spaces. The Trust for Public Land also researches and publishes authoritative data about parks, open space, conservation finance, and urban climate change adaptation. Headquartered in San Francisco, the organization is among the largest U.S. conservation nonprofits, with approximately 30 field offices across the U.S., including a federal affairs function in Washington, D.C.
Complete streets is a transportation policy and design approach that requires streets to be planned, designed, operated and maintained to enable safe, convenient and comfortable travel and access for users of all ages and abilities regardless of their mode of transportation. Complete Streets allow for safe travel by those walking, cycling, driving automobiles, riding public transportation, or delivering goods.
In urban planning, walkability is the accessibility of amenities by foot. It is based on the idea that urban spaces should be more than just transport corridors designed for maximum vehicle throughput. Instead, it should be relatively complete livable spaces that serve a variety of uses, users, and transportation modes and reduce the need for cars for travel.
In land-use planning, urban green space is open-space areas reserved for parks and other "green spaces", including plant life, water features - also referred to as blue spaces - and other kinds of natural environment. Most urban open spaces are green spaces, but occasionally include other kinds of open areas. The landscape of urban open spaces can range from playing fields to highly maintained environments to relatively natural landscapes.
Montreal has a developed transport infrastructure network, which includes well-developed air, road, rail, and maritime links to the rest of Canada, as well as the United States and the rest of the world. Local public transport includes a metro system, buses, ferry services and cycling infrastructure.
Active mobility, soft mobility, active travel, active transport or active transportation is the transport of people or goods, through non-motorized means, based around human physical activity. The best-known forms of active mobility are walking and cycling, though other modes include running, rowing, skateboarding, kick scooters and roller skates. Due to its prevalence, cycling is sometimes considered separately from the other forms of active mobility.
Healthy community design is planning and designing communities that make it easier for people to live healthy lives. Healthy community design offers important benefits:
Peter Gösta Schantz, born on 28 April 1954 in Stockholm, Sweden, graduated as doctor in medical sciences at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm in 1986, became professor in human movement sciences at Mid-Sweden University in Östersund, Jämtland, in 2008, and professor in human biology, including the multidisciplinary field of movement, health and environment, at the Swedish School of Sport and Health Sciences, GIH, in Stockholm, Sweden, in 2013.
An adult-gerontology nurse practitioner (AGNP) is a nurse practitioner that specializes in continuing and comprehensive healthcare for adults across the lifespan from adolescence to old age.
A System for Observing Play and Recreation in Communities (SOPARC) is a reliable and valid observation tool for assessing park and recreation areas, including park users’ physical activity levels, gender, age, and ethnicity groupings. It also collects information on park characteristics including accessibility, usability, supervision, and organization. The use of SOPARC in park monitoring would allow for more consistent and comprehensive monitoring of parks. The summary data (e.g. the number of park users, demographics, frequency by activity types) obtained using SOPARC is easily understood by practitioners, policymakers, and the public. SOPARC has been adapted to numerous studies to understand the role of park conditions on park use, compare park data, and inform park system planning and programming.
Active design is a set of building and planning principles that promote physical activity. Active design in a building, landscape or city design integrates physical activity into the occupants' everyday routines, such as walking to the store or making a photocopy. Active design involves urban planners, architects, transportation engineers, public health professionals, community leaders and other professionals in building places that encourage physical activity as an integral part of life. While not an inherent part of active design, most designers employing "active design" are also concerned with the productive life of their buildings and their building's ecological footprint.
Open spaces in urban environments, such as parks, playgrounds, and natural areas, can provide many health, cultural, recreational, and economic benefits to the communities nearby. However, access to open spaces can be unequal for people of different incomes. In California's two largest metropolitan regions, Los Angeles County in Southern California and the Bay Area in Northern California, access to green space and natural areas varies with the predominant races and classes of the communities. This also holds true in San Diego County in Southern California. Both expanding urbanization and diminishing funding for open space tend to widen these gaps in accessibility. Because open space is associated with various mental and physical benefits, a lack of access to it can pose health consequences. However, more research is needed to determine whether such environmental inequalities translate into long-term health inequalities, and, if so, how.
Adrian Benepe was the 14th Commissioner of the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, serving in that role from February 4, 2002, to August 29, 2012, under Mayor Michael Bloomberg. During his tenure, he oversaw 7,000 parks' staff, the expenditure of over $3 billion in funding park maintenance, the expansion of new parks across New York City, and the inclusion of schoolyards for public access after school.
Blue space in urban planning and design comprises all the areas dominated by surface waterbodies or watercourses. In conjunction with greenspace, it may help in reducing the risks of heat-related illness from high urban temperatures . Substantial urban waterbodies naturally exist as integral features of the geography of many cities because of their historical development, for example the River Thames in London.
The 15-minute city is an urban planning concept in which most daily necessities and services, such as work, shopping, education, healthcare, and leisure can be easily reached by a 15-minute walk, bike ride, or public transit ride from any point in the city. This approach aims to reduce car dependency, promote healthy and sustainable living, and improve wellbeing and quality of life for city dwellers.