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Shaping Cities for Health: Complexity and the planning urban of environments in the 21st century Report of the UCL–Lancet Commission on Healthy Cities


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Wednesday 30 May 2012, 2.30–5.30pm, followed by a drinks reception

With almost 30 years experience from the Healthy Cities movement, we are increasingly aware of the features that transform a 'city' into a 'healthy city'. What is less well understood is how to deliver the potential health benefits and how to ensure that they reach all citizens in urban contexts across the world. This is an increasingly important task given that the majority of the world’s population already live in cities and that, with current high rates of urbanisation, many millions more will soon do so.

The UCL–Lancet Commission of Healthy Cities provides an analysis of how health outcomes are part of the complexity of urban processes, arguing against the assumption that urban health outcomes will improve with economic growth and demographic change. Instead, we highlight the role that urban planning can and should play in delivering health improvements through reshaping the urban fabric of our cities. We consider this through case studies of sanitation and wastewater management (Mumbai), urban mobility (Bogotá), building standards (London), the urban heat island effect (London) and urban agriculture (Havana and Accra). We follow this with a discussion of the implications of a complexity approach for planning of urban environments, emphasising project-based experimentation and evaluation leading to self-reflection and dialogue.

The UCL–Lancet Commission on Healthy Cities is a major inaugural project of Sustainable Cities, the second of UCL's four cross-disciplinary Grand Challenges addressing major societal issues of global relevance. The commission's authorship includes contributors from four of UCL's ten academic faculties, from the universities of Pelotas and Otago, and from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. The Healthy Cities report follows UCL's first Lancet Commission report, Managing the Health Effects of Climate Change, in May 2009.

Key Messages

• Cities are complex systems, so that health outcomes are emergent properties

• The urban advantage in health outcomes has to be actively promoted and maintained

• Inequalities in health outcomes should be recognised at the urban scale

• A linear or cyclical planning approach is insufficient in conditions of complexity

• Urban planning for health needs to emphasise experimentation through projects

• Evaluation leading to dialogue between stakeholders and self-reflection is essential

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Wednesday 30 May 2012, 2.30–5.30pm, followed by a drinks reception

• Introduction: Professor Richard Horton, Editor of The Lancet, and Professor David Price, UCL Vice-Provost (Research)

• Report and main findings: Yvonne Rydin, Professor of Planning, Environment & Public Policy (UCL Bartlett School of Planning), lead author

• Additional perspectives from co-authors: Paul Wilkinson, Professor in Environmental Epidemiology (London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine), and Nora Groce, Leonard Cheshire Chair of Disability & Inclusive Development at UCL

• Respondents: Phil Nedin, Arup Global Healthcare Business Leader, and Sir Andy Haines, Professor of Public Health & Primary Care (London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine)

• Q&A: Chaired by Professor Sir John Tooke, UCL Vice-Provost (Health)

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