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New research on the urban environment published by RICS

9 July 2018

Researchers from UCL IEDE and the Bartlett School of Planning have published a RICS Insight report on ‘Cities, health and well-being’.

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On 19 June Helen Pineo, recently appointed Lecturer in Sustainable and Healthy Built Environments at UCL IEDE, and Professor Yvonne Rydin from the Bartlett School of Planning presented their report in ‘Cities, health and well-being’ at the RICS Planning and Development Conference. The report summarises the existing literature and practice on incorporating a concern with health and well-being into panning built environments at the building, street, neighbourhood and city scale.

The urban environment has long been recognised as crucial to human health, but the last few years have seen a marked growth in the health and well-being agenda. This insight paper recognises the major contribution property professionals can make in establishing healthy, liveable places for all. The paper reviews the health impact of urban environments in low, middle and high income countries and summarises built environment policy and design approaches to create healthy places. It provides an overview of how sustainable and healthy building standards address health and wellbeing, including BREEAM, LEED, WELL and Fitwel. It includes international case studies of planning and property development projects. Finally it describes the funders and beneficiaries of healthy urban environments and summarises recent studies on the commercial value of healthy development.

The full report is available to read on the RICS website: http://www.rics.org/uk/knowledge/research/insights/cities-health-and-well-being/