..by Laurence Carmichael
Laurence Carmichael (Head, WHOCC), Carl Petrokofsky (PHE), Elena Marco (Head, Department of Architecture and Built Environment), Michael Chang (TCPA/PHE), Helen Hoyle (Senior Lecturer in Healthy Built Environments), Rachael Marsh (Public Health Registrar), Liz Green (PHW), Paul Olomolaiye (Pro-Vice Chancellor and Executive Dean, Faculty of Environment and Technology), Louis Rice (Senior Lecturer in Architecture), Aude Bicquelet-Lock (RTPI) and Mark Drane (PhD student and architect).
At the end of January the WHO Collaborating Centre for Healthy Urban Environments (WHOCC) at UWE Bristol welcomed four new four visiting fellows and professors:
Dr Aude Bicquelet-Lock (Deputy Head of Policy and Research, Royal Town Planning Institute);
Liz Green FFPH, ACIEH (Principal Health Impact Assessment Development Officer, Research and International Development Directorate, Public Health Wales and also HIA Lead in the new WHOCC on investment for health and well-being);
Carl Petrokofsky FFPH (Public Health Specialist, Healthy Places team, Public Health England);
Michael Chang HMFPH, CMRTPI, MCMI (Lead on healthy Places at Town and Country Planning Association, recently appointed project manager to the Healthy Places team, Public Health England).
In addition, the WHOCC has recently welcomed Public Health Specialty Registrar Dr Rachael Marsh MFPH as a Public Health Practitioner in residence, who will contribute to WHOCC projects in collaboration with South Gloucestershire Council in 2019.
At the core of the next phase of work is cross fertilisation with these key organisations in the field.
Synergy between the new partners and creation of a shared knowledge base is an important aspect of future WHOCC activities to support the delivery of the Sustainable Development Goals, in particular SDG11 and support phase VII (2019-2024) of the WHO Healthy Cities programme. A meeting took place recently at UWE, Bristol to consider opportunities in joint research and capacity building. Projects are now under way for instance Health Impact Assessment guidance for planners, contribution to modules and joint publications but other plans considered too on how to best support capacity building in the WHO healthy Cities.
The WHO Collaborating Centre for Healthy Urban Environments (WHOCC) at UWE Bristol is part of a network of 800 institutions spread in 80 countries and collaborating with various WHO programmes. In the UK, it is the only WHOCC out of 58 and embedded in a Department of Architecture and Built Environment with strong links with public health academics and practitioners.
As a leading centre of expertise on healthy urban environments, the WHOCC champions health as a fundamental human right and offers an interdisciplinary hub of practice and research. Activities are practically oriented, from interdisciplinary research projects to capacity building of the future generation of practitioners with a focus on environment where people live, work, learn or play, be it at building, street, neighbourhood or city scale. Topics covered by academics associated with the WHOCC range from shaping sustainable neighbourhoods, improving air quality in urban centres, promoting active travel and sustainable local food systems, policy formulation to mainstream health within urban and transport planning. The synergy between environmental and human health and of social and cultural conditions needed for populations to thrive has also emerged as a core thinking in recent years.
Over the past four years, our international work has included supporting the WHO/UNECE Environment and Health Process: (http://www.euro.who.int/data/assets/pdffile/0020/341615/bookletdef.pdf?ua=1).
Nationally, the WHOCC briefed the House of Lords Select Committee before its enquiry resulting in the Building Better Places report: (https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201516/ldselect/ldbuilt/100/100.pdf ).
Members of our team have given oral evidence to parliamentary enquiries and supported the NHS England Healthy New Towns programme since its inception. UWE WHOCC academics have also developed practice-friendly tools assisting the development process, for instance a spatial planning tool identifying healthy planning features commissioned by Public Health England (www.gov.uk/government/publications/spatial-planning-for-health-evidence-review ) and a green infrastructure benchmark ( www.buildingwithnature.org.uk ) in collaboration with Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust. WHOCC Academics are also regularly asked to take part in project and conference steering and scientific committees and have develop strong regional and local networks, for instance working group on the development of a HIA guidance for planners, community engagement exercises and capacity building supporting local authorities.
In the future, the WHOCC will carry on supporting WHO Healthy Cities programme in
1. promoting the scientific underpinning of the built environment as a determinant of health, wellbeing and equity in the WHO Healthy Cities and
2. developing capacity building activities supporting mainstreaming of health in local urban planning and design policies.
The WHOCC has also entered a partnership agreement with the Cities and Health Journal to disseminate research findings and good practice in healthy built environment from around the WHO Europe region. Last but not least, WHOCC will play a major steering role in the 2020 AESOP Congress (www.aesop-planning.eu/en_GB/aesop-annual-congress) hosted by the University of the West of England, Bristol, a key event to place health and wellbeing at the core of planners’ agenda and share innovative practice from around the world.
For enquiries on the work of the WHOCC. Please contact Laurence Carmichael, laurence.carmichael@uwe.ac.uk @laurencecarmich @UWE_WHOCC
