Contents
Nearby nature and health benefits
01
Nearly forty years of research confirms that contact with nearby nature is profoundly important for human health and wellness.
From the earliest hours to the final days of our lives, studies show a surprising range of health benefits across the human life cycle. Examples include better child development, better work performance, faster healing in hospitals, and increased social capital in communities.
Given the evidence, agencies and organizations are working to create more greenspace in cities. Yet in some communities there is little land available for parks, or it is prohibitively expensive for public purchase. A growing trend is to think about all lands as potential greenspace using a co-design for co-benefits approach. Of course there should be large parks and open spaces, but even the smallest bit of nature can benefit people. For instance, bioswales and green streets are being installed to improve stormwater management; such spaces can also be designed to serve as micro-parks that offer respite and delight.
Research on nearby nature and human health
The TKF Foundation has prepared a series of research briefs that explain the human health benefits of time spent in urban nearby nature. These compelling documents explain the value of sacred experiences, and how nature helps reduce stress, improves mental health, is important for older adults’ quality of life, and the importance of environmental equality. The documents can be downloaded at: naturesacred.org/natures-impact/research-briefs.
Site design
02
The TKF Foundation has funded the design and construction of more than 130 urban gardens and parks across the U.S., called Open Spaces, Sacred Places (OSSP).
While nature and health advocates promote large parks for recreation and physical activity, these smaller, intimate greenspaces offer sanctuary, solace, and opportunities for mindful reflection. The Foundation asserts that such experiences of ‘civic sacred’ are essential to counter the challenges felt by urban residents in their busy lives. Each space has been designed by local community participants (with assistance from designers and landscape architects) and a pattern of design elements has emerged that are adaptable for use in any community.
The elements help to set the identity and character of a space, and include: portal, path, destination, and surround.
City systems
03
Historically, parks and gardens in many cities were not created with a big picture in mind. They may be bits of green scattered here and there.
The result is that greenspaces are often disconnected and lack a sense of coherence or connection across a city. Meanwhile, cities and urban neighborhoods have developed complex infrastructure and services systems, such as water management and transportation. Such lands, usually thought of as being dedicated to one use, may include opportunities to insert smaller parks and greenspaces, including OSSPs, making them multi-purpose. Thinking about a merge or co-design of purposes can tease out greater benefits from even the smallest of spaces.
Nearby nature: building networks
04
Cities are diverse and complex landscapes.
Some cities contain vacant or surplus properties suitable for smaller parks. Other cities have little vacant land or parcels, so co-design is needed to merge uses in innovative ways. Studies about nature and human benefit are now focusing on ‘dosage’ that is, the realization that ongoing contact with nature, multiple times a day or week, provides the greatest health benefit. Some doctors even give parks prescriptions to their patients.
City officials, planners, and community residents should think about how to stitch together existing greenspace and potential new sites to provide ongoing opportunities to experience ‘Vitamin N’. Having one park or greenspace near your home, office or school is certainly beneficial. Having a network of places in and around a community and city can make for more accessible, interesting and beneficial nature experiences.
In these pages you’ll find sketch level ideas about the distribution and spatial linkages of smaller parks - suggestions for how to plan for nearby urban nature benefits.
Spatial understanding
Quality design of individual sites is important. Planning that unifies sites into systems of green spaces provide more opportunities for access, enjoyment and benefit. These sketches suggest possible spatial linkages of smaller parks. Green indicates a smaller park and connectors (such as streetscapes or waterways). Grey symbolizes built elements such as a building, commercial development or parking lot.
4.a
Network density
Higher density of greenspaces is an important goal as a network of smaller gardens is planned and visualized. Having multiple parks and greenspaces in close proximity to one another helps visitors to envision the network, including points of access. Sites that are close together may encourage people to walk and explore across the system, activities that contribute to better mental and physical health.
Drop the Network Density sketch
Urban systems opportunities
05
Where would these systems of linked spaces be placed?
Most cities contain ample opportunity to integrate Open Spaces, Sacred Spaces (OSSPs) and smaller parks in general, into their existing community systems layouts. Here are suggestions and a variety of opportunities.
The elegance of systems
06
Psychologists have studied how people react to everyday environments. People are mentally and emotionally more comfortable when there is pattern in their surroundings.
Coherent layouts help us to predict and understand places, even those we have not visited before. Patterns also make wayfinding easier, as people use cues to navigate spaces and find what they want or need.
The urban environment is made up of interconnected systems which are built patterns that help cities run more efficiently and effectively. Planners and designers actively make decisions that can connect or disconnect buildings, streets, and parks. Deliberately considering the human health and well-being potential of the arrangement and connectedness of greenspace in our cities introduces patterns that improve people’s lives. A systems outlook in planning offers many advantages.
6.a
Systems are dynamic
Urban communities are not static places. They are living, changing, complex systems. The interplay of new policies, property owner decisions, everyday construction and development, and the movement of people and businesses changes communities. OSSP networks should be a part of these system changes, growing and adapting as a city changes.
Cities are never complete. As urban spaces and networks are reconstructed, revised, and maintained there are constant new opportunities to insert OSSP principles into development. Integration with ongoing design, construction, and mitigation activities makes it possible to encourage healing spaces across diverse types of urban areas.
6.b
Systems inherently contain OSSP opportunities
Existing systems in our cities are full of the components that could support systems of small parks. Transportation and utility corridors are built paths, within which parks and open spaces could become destinations. Existing urban structures, boundaries, walls, roads, and the edges of adjacent land uses can be modified to be portals and surrounds. By seeking out and building upon the inherent design elements of city systems, OSSPs can be integrated into the urban fabric more simply and seamlessly.
6.c
Community specific design
Though the city is dynamic, it contains existing, distinct communities and their cherished spaces. Processes of integration, including participatory design, is much better than imposing cookie-cutter designs that don’t respect current land uses or local values. Local assessments that include OSSP opportunities within underused lands, and evaluations of community values and needs can achieve new open spaces and have fewer unanticipated impacts. For instance, care must be taken to introduce OSSPs into communities in ways that limit the possibility of gentrification and displacement.
6.d
Environmental equity possibilities
Access to spaces that promote human health is a growing desire within urban communities. The goal of fair distribution of trees, parks, gardens, and urban greening is being pursued by many cities across the country. OSSP installations and principles are a particularly effective way to address this goal. Local government policies are driving efforts to identify communities and locations that encourage improved resident access to quality open spaces. The concept of networked systems of smaller parks, designed based on OSSP principles, would be an effective way to address both infrastructure and human health benefits in places where they are most needed.
Readings and resources
07
1
TKF Foundation, Nature Sacred Program research briefs and monographs: http://naturesacred.org/natures-impact/research-briefs/
2
Green Cities: Good Health research outreach web site at the University of Washington: www.greenhealth.washington.edu
3
Beatley, T. 2010. Biophilic Cities: Integrating Nature Into Urban Design and Planning. Island Press, Washington D.C.
4
Beatley, T. 2016. Handbook of Biophilic City Planning & Design. Island Press, Washington D.C.
5
Browning, W., C. Ryan, J. Clancy. 2014. 14 Patterns of Biophilic Design: Improving Health & Well-Being in the Built Environment. Terrapin Bright Green LLC, New York.
6
Dramstad, W.E., J.D. Olson, R.T. Forman. 1996. Landscape Ecology Principles in Landscape Architecture and Land-Use Planning. Harvard University Graduate School of Design, Island Press and the American Society of Landscape Architects.
7
Forman, R.T.T. 2014. Urban Ecology of Cities. Cambridge University Press, U.K.
8
Hester, R.T. 2010. Design for Ecological Democracy. The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA.
9
House, E., C. O’Connor, K. Wolf, J. Israel, T. Reynolds. 2016. Outside our Doors: the benefits of cities where people and nature thrive. The Nature Conservancy, Washington State Chapter, Seattle, WA.
10
Moseley, D., M. Marzano, J. Chetcuti, K. Watts. 2013. Green networks for people: Application of a functional approach to support the planning and management of greenspace. Landscape and Urban Planning 116, 1-12.
11
Wolf, K.L., A.S.T. Robbins. 2015. Metro nature, environmental health, and economic value. Environmental Health Perspectives 123, 5, 390-8.
12
Wolf, K.L., E. Housley. 2016. The Sacred and Nearby Nature in Cities. The TKF Foundation, Annapolis, MD.
About
Kathleen L. Wolf, Ph.D.
Dr. Wolf is a Research Social Scientist with the College of the Environment, University of Washington (Seattle) and serves as TKF Foundation’s Research Advisor for its Nature Sacred program. She is also a primary collaborator in the Green Cities Research Alliance, a research program about urban natural resources stewardship that is sponsored by the USDA Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station. Her studies are based on the principles of environmental psychology. Her research and scholarly works are an effort to better understand the human dimensions of urban forestry and urban ecosystems. Dr. Wolf’s professional mission is to discover, understand and communicate human behavior and benefits, as people experience nature in cities. She is also interested in how scientific information can be integrated into local government policy and planning. Dr. Wolf has presented her research throughout the United States, in Canada, Europe, Australia and Japan.
About
Weston Brinkley, M.U.P.
Weston brings success as a published author and professional speaker on urban environmental stewardship, citizen engagement, and the social dimensions of urban natural resources. His research includes work in volunteerism, natural resource economics, and urban environmental functions.
Weston provides over a decade of experience in the urban forestry and natural resource fields. His background includes work with all levels of government, non-profit, and for profit organizations. He has worked extensively with natural resource managers, urban forest scientists, policy makers, planners, educators, and a range of communities to develop a better understanding of the natural world in our cities.
Weston Brinkley is the principal and owner at Street Sounds Ecology, LLC, the Director of the Seattle Trails Alliance, and is Adjunct Faculty at Antioch University Seattle.