Public open space, physical activity, urban design and public health: Concepts, methods and research agenda

Abstract

Public open spaces such as parks and green spaces are key built environment elements within neighbourhoods for encouraging a variety of physical activity behaviours. Over the past decade, there has been a burgeoning number of active living research studies examining the influence of public open space on physical activity. However, the evidence shows mixed associations between different aspects of public open space (e.g., proximity, size, quality) and physical activity. These inconsistencies hinder the development of specific evidence-based guidelines for urban designers and policy-makers for (re)designing public open space to encourage physical activity. This paper aims to move this research agenda forward, by identifying key conceptual and methodological issues that may contribute to inconsistencies in research examining relations between public open space and physical activity.

Neighbourhood built environment characteristics associated with different types of physical activity in Canadian adults

“…One explanation for this could be that recreational and nonrecreational destinations compete for geographical space and so the more recreational facilities there are, the fewer utilitarian destinations there can be to walk to. Despite evidence suggesting the importance of parks in supporting physical activity, 42,43,44 we found no significant positive associations between the proportion of green space and any of our physical activity outcomes. Surprisingly, we found a higher proportion of green space area within a neighbourhood to be associated with a lower likelihood of participating in neighbourhood-based vigorous-intensity physical activity.…”

Blue space geographies: Enabling health in place

“…Exposure to green space has been identified as a factor reducing health inequalities in the UK (Mitchell and Popham, 2007). Physical activity within green spaces has been investigated as a possible mechanism behind the relationship between access to green space and salutogenic effects (Maas et al, 2006(Maas et al, , 2008Macintyre et al, 2008;Coombes et al, 2010;Koohsari et al, 2015;Hunter et al, 2015;Buck et al, 2015). In contrast, outside of environmental psychology, the health-related value of blue space and the role of physical activity within blue spaces have attracted much less attention to date (Herzog, 1984).…”

Caractéristiques de l’environnement bâti du quartier associées à différents types d’activité physique chez les adultes canadiens

“…Une des explications à cette situation pourrait être que les destinations récréatives et non récréatives sont en concurrence sur le plan de l'espace géo-graphique, ce qui fait que plus le nombre d'installations récréatives est élevé, moins il y a d'espace pour les destinations utilitaires où il est possible de se rendre à pied. Malgré les données prouvant l'importance des parcs pour favoriser l'activité physique 42,43,44 , nous n'avons trouvé aucune association positive significative entre la proportion d'espaces verts et l'un ou l'autre de nos résultats quant à l'activité physique. Étonnamment, nous avons trouvé qu'une proportion élevée d'espaces verts dans un quartier était associée à une plus faible possibilité de participation à une activité physique d'intensité élevée et axée sur le quartier.…”