Validating and measuring public open space is not a walk in the park

Daker, Mark; Pieters, Johannes; Coffee, Neil

doi:10.1080/07293682.2016.1139605

Cited by 10 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…The comprehensive Victorian Planning Authority Metropolitan Open Space Network walkable catchment layer [ 38 ] was used to determine if households were located within 400 m of open space in Melbourne with open space access points within this dataset specified by the provider at 30-m intervals. For Adelaide, data were sourced from a previous study [ 46 ] and 400-m pedestrian network service areas were created along park border points (50-m spacing). In both cities, the selected open space features outlined in Table 2 were rasterised to a 10-m × 10-m grid (cell defined as open space: 0 = no; 1 = yes).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Operationalising the 20-minute neighbourhood

Thornton

Schroers

Lamb

et al. 2022

Int J Behav Nutr Phys Act

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Background Recent rapid growth in urban areas and the desire to create liveable neighbourhoods has brought about a renewed interest in planning for compact cities, with concepts like the 20-minute neighbourhood (20MN) becoming more popular. A 20MN broadly reflects a neighbourhood that allows residents to meet their daily (non-work) needs within a short, non-motorised, trip from home. The 20MN concept underpins the key planning strategy of Australia’s second largest city, Melbourne, however the 20MN definition has not been operationalised. This study aimed to develop and operationalise a practical definition of the 20MN and apply this to two Australian state capital cities: Melbourne (Victoria) and Adelaide (South Australia). Methods Using the metropolitan boundaries for Melbourne and Adelaide, data were sourced for several layers related to five domains: 1) healthy food; 2) recreational resources; 3) community resources; 4) public open space; and 5) public transport. The number of layers and the access measures required for each domain differed. For example, the recreational resources domain only required a sport and fitness centre (gym) within a 1.5-km network path distance, whereas the public open space domain required a public open space within a 400-m distance along a pedestrian network and 8 ha of public open space area within a 1-km radius. Locations that met the access requirements for each of the five domains were defined as 20MNs. Results In Melbourne 5.5% and in Adelaide 7.6% of the population were considered to reside in a 20MN. Within areas classified as residential, the median number of people per square kilometre with a 20MN in Melbourne was 6429 and the median number of dwellings per square kilometre was 3211. In Adelaide’s 20MNs, both population density (3062) and dwelling density (1440) were lower than in Melbourne. Conclusions The challenge of operationalising a practical definition of the 20MN has been addressed by this study and applied to two Australian cities. The approach can be adapted to other contexts as a first step to assessing the presence of existing 20MNs and monitoring further implementation of this concept.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Operationalising the 20-minute neighbourhood

Thornton

Schroers

Lamb

et al. 2022

Int J Behav Nutr Phys Act

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“…The walkability index was constructed as the sum of deciles for dwelling density, road network density, and land use mix [51]. Availability of active public open space was defined as the count of active public open spaces (# parks) [52]. The retail food environment index, indicating the relative 'unhealthfulness' of the food environment, was expressed as the ratio of unhealthful food stores to healthful food stores, where unhealthful stores included major fastfood franchises and independent fast-food take-away stores, bakeries, sweet food retailers and convenience stores.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Are changes in depressive symptoms, general health and residential area socio-economic status associated with trajectories of waist circumference and body mass index?

et al. 2020

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This study sought to assess whether changes in depressive symptoms, general health, and area-level socioeconomic status (SES) were associated to changes over time in waist circumference and body mass index (BMI). Methods A total of 2871 adults (18 years or older), living in Adelaide (South Australia), were observed across three waves of data collection spanning ten years, with clinical measures of waist circumference, height and weight. Participants completed the Centre for Epidemiologic Studies Depression (CES-D) and Short Form 36 health questionnaires (SF-36 general health domain). An area-level SES measure, relative location factor, was derived from hedonic regression models using residential property features but blind to location. Growth curve models with latent variables were fitted to data. Results Waist circumference, BMI and depressive symptoms increased over time. General health and relative location factor decreased. Worsening general health and depressive symptoms predicted worsening waist circumference and BMI trajectories in covariate-adjusted models. Diminishing relative location factor was negatively associated with waist circumference and BMI trajectories in unadjusted models only.

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“…One study in Adelaide, South Australia, compared three public open space datasets and checked these against a planning standard for public open space supply (Daker et al ., ). That research highlighted important differences in the estimation of public open space across the study region and demonstrated that the choice of data source has the potential to inadvertently impact on findings and lead to incorrect policy recommendations.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…Comparison of 2011 Mesh Block representation of parkland compared with 2011 Spatial Epidemiology and Evaluation Research Group (Daker et al ., ), representation of public open space/parkland. ABS, Australian Bureau of Statistics; POS, public open space…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public open space exposure measures in Australian health research: a critical review of the literature

Lamb

Mavoa

Coffee

et al. 2019

Geographical Research

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Numerous studies have shown associations between public open space and a variety of health outcomes. Yet the extent to which firm conclusions and planning policy recommendations can be drawn from this body of work depends on how public open space availability has been measured and reported. Other researchers have highlighted potential issues with the way that public open space has been measured but have not systematically assessed the extent of this problem. This paper provides a comprehensive critical review of studies of public open space and health conducted in Australia to identify and compare public open space measurement and data treatment. Our analysis showed wide variation in how public open space was measured, as well as a lack of consistency in reporting public open space exposure measures and under-reporting of measurement methods. We find that such tendencies limit how much these studies can be compared and contrasted with each other. The corollary of that finding is that without more detailed reporting of exposure measures, it will be difficult to establish an evidence base that informs planning for healthy, liveable environments. In response, we develop and present a checklist for reporting public open space exposure to address this challenge.

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Validating and measuring public open space is not a walk in the park

Cited by 10 publications

References 12 publications

Operationalising the 20-minute neighbourhood

Operationalising the 20-minute neighbourhood

Are changes in depressive symptoms, general health and residential area socio-economic status associated with trajectories of waist circumference and body mass index?

Public open space exposure measures in Australian health research: a critical review of the literature

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