Every week, we bring you the latest news in placemaking, landscape architecture, the nature-mental health link, and much more. Check back each week for new roundups and items.
Reconnecting with Nature – a Vital Key to Urban Health and Sustainability
“Most of us know that our health and wellbeing are intimately related to the environment in which we live…Yet in our increasingly urbanised world, degraded city environments, changes in our lifestyles and the pressures of work mean that many of us are spending longer indoors, living more sedentary lives. Add to this the general invisibility of the origins of key goods such as food and energy and it is probably fair to say that many urban dwellers are becoming increasingly disconnected from the natural world, and the pleasures associated with being outdoors. Figures from the World Health Organization show that physical inactivity is now the fourth leading risk factor for global mortality, causing an estimated 3.2 million deaths annually, and having major implications for the rise of non-communicable diseases such as cardiovascular disease, coronary heart disease, diabetes, and breast and colon cancer.”
Orlando: Healthy Trees, Healthy People
“Fall offers an excellent chance to pause and reflect on the many ways trees in our urban centers improve our lives… How does a healthy urban forest canopy contribute to quality of life? During the past five years, the health benefits that urban trees provide have been recognized across diverse disciplines, ranging from urban planning and economics, to human health and sociology. Researchers are finding a reduction in attention deficit disorder in children after they’ve spent time outdoors. College students with natural views out their dorm windows score better on tests. And Geoffrey Donovan, U.S. Forest Service research forester, found women living in homes surrounded by trees are less likely to deliver underweight babies. As such findings accumulate, many people now believe that trees should be considered part of the public health infrastructure.”
Urban Wildlife Refuges Highlight Nature That’s Closer Than You Think
“Even in the heart of a large city’s concrete buildings and rush of traffic, parks and green spaces provide high-quality habitat for amphibians, reptiles, fish, and especially birds… Audubon Greenwich is one of several partners working in New Haven, Connecticut, with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as part of its new Urban Wildlife Refuge Initiative. The initiative, which has also recognized seven other projects across the United States, seeks to show city residents the wildlife living right on their block while improving urban wildlife spaces…The USFWS hopes that if city dwellers can be enticed into local refuges, they will then want to explore farther afield.”
Nature Preschool Opens Young Minds to the Natural World
“Mother Nature may have begun her kaleidoscope of foliage but at The Schuylkill Center’s Nature Preschool, important planting has begun: nature education…The SCEE’s Nature Preschool, Pennsylvania’s First, opened on Sept. 2. It’s goal is to address the growing disconnect between children and nature by providing students with daily, immersive experiences in nature. There is a growing body of research in early childhood development revealing the critical connection between exposure to nature and the developing brain. Children who spend significant time immersed in nature tend to be less anxious and more focused, with fewer health issues and more emotionally resilient, than children who don’t.”
