There are growing numbers of people around the world interested in making a difference. They work within their local  communities, often as volunteers, to bring people together, to improve human health and well-being, and at the same time respect the environment on which we all depend. 

The TED talk by Pam Warhurst describes how she and a small group of friends created an urban food growing initiative in Todmorden, England. They worked with local farms to boost supply of goods to the town. They worked with local schools to bring agriculture into the classroom, and the classroom out into the local economy, onto the former wasteland to create urban agriculture.

On my study tour of Berlin last week I visited urban farms where people, young and old, and across all cultural groups can come together to grow fruit and vegetables and rear animals for food. In areas with the most social deprivation access to cheap fresh food has transformed local health outcomes. Interestingly, the stressed execs also profess to benefit from access to the urban food growing initiatives. While they may not work in the gardens they love visiting, and spend time regularly to check on the progress of young animals, new crops, and see how the people, their new friends, are getting on. 

The urban farm has brought people together in an unexpected way. Although initially devised as a project for the more vulnerable members of the community, in fact it has become a win:win situation for all. The reduced carbon footprint from local food growing helps mitigate climate change. Human health and well-being is intrinsically linked to the ecological health of our planet and our local environment. Biophilic cities offer a way to connect people to nature and living things in a way we have missed out on for 2-3 generations. We are hard-wired to respond to nature. We need to boost our green infrastructure as we build resilient communities. Long lived shade trees planted around the farm add to the green capital of the neighbourhood, reduce the urban heat island effect, help absorb and slow storm water runoff, while sequestering carbon and providing valuable central city habitat for a range of invertebrates and birds.

Last weekend I was fortunate to be invited to address the Rotary District Conference in Methven, New Zealand. I talked to the 300 + assembled members about design for health and well-being. The group was mixed in terms of age, sex and profession. Some were farmers, there were also business people, people in manufacturing  in tourism, doctors, architects, engineers, accountants, retailers and wholesalers. A really diverse group. What they share in common is a desire to serve their communities and make the world a better place. So it was natural that I offer some ideas for how they could collaborate with the people on the ground, engage their communities, and put their considerable talents and energy to good use.

Rotary International worked to eradicate polio. They work on programmes that affect the health and well-being of people in many different ways. Health and well-being through environmental, economic and social enhancement is central to the ethos of Greenstone Design. How we achieve that, on limited budgets and often in tight time frames requires us to get creative. When we're not creating sensory- rich gardens we like to create spaces for play.

Natural play is a wonderful thing. It takes very little by way of manufactured resources but requires us to allow a little mess and creativity. Central to enjoying a sense of well-being is being able to play, freely, to explore, to create, challenge ourselves, try out new things, test our confidence and make new friends in safe surroundings. There is a wonderful short video showcasing the collaborative design process.

I'm heading off to Moscow, Russia, next week to design a natural playground. We were fortunate to win the design competition with our concept for nature play, set within a massive manufactured space. I will post photos when I have some. The client is a large international school that caters for 3-19 year olds. Our design aims to improve the cognitive functioning of the children, counter any potential for depression by being an expressive space where children are encouraged to engage with nature on a daily basis. It also acknowledges our biophilia, our in-built love of living things. It's a fun project that allows me to play; at this stage with ideas, and in a few months, alongside the children in their new natural play space.

It doesn't seem almost 4 months since my last blog. Time has raced by as I get deeper into writing the book. This week I have been researching green (living) roofs alongside parks and gardens for their potential impact on human health and well-being.

Guess what? Research from all around the world supports the view that landscape in general, and gardens in particular, can have a marked positive impact on our mental and physical health. Depression and other mental health issues are most easily helped through regular activity and exercise outdoors. Our biophilia, or our innate love of living things, means that by reconnecting with nature we can inexpensively and cost-effectively manage health and well-being.

Children have a right to play and to live and develop to their full capacity, enshrined in the UN Rights of the Child Articles 6 and 31. With home gardens becoming smaller, and more people living in apartments with little or no outdoor space, it is important we provide opportunities for children and adults to access gardens. 

The photo shows a young boy pouring water from one container to another, sitting in a larger container. Beside him is a swing, hung from a tree, shaped like a horse. By bringing containers to a park, and having a water supply available, it is possible to recreate the experiences he would have had at home, if he lived in a property with its own garden. It comes down to how we design and develop our public spaces.

Given our need and right to access nature for health and well-being it is vital that we, as landscape and urban designers, provide those spaces in and around housing developments, wherever they may be. City parks can recreate the feeling of home gardens. It just takes a new way of looking at landscape.

What is the role of a local landscape architect or landscape designer if not to design gardens or landscapes?

In the UK we design green roofs (that is bio diverse, wildlife attracting, rainfall absorbing, planted (hence 'green') roofs for everything from school sand pit shelters to eco friendly garden sheds to corporate offices and apartment blocks. In NZ green roofs as a concept are slower to catch on...We are too focussed on the short term, profit based economies we can make to develop a site a cheaply as possible. Examples abound of such poor quality design and development.

Today I searched for examples of green roofs in New Zealand and found one at Massey University's Wellington campus - by Athfield architects. While I'm delighted that the built environment people are developing their skills in this area, where are the landscape professionals on this?

Green roofs offer insulation benefits to buildings, improving their BREAM ratings, and lower whole of life energy costs. While developers often complain that they cost (them) more to install, clients and Council love the environmental enhancements from bio-diverse planting attracting wildlife (birds and beneficial insects) the benefits of reduced storm water runoff, reduced energy consumption costs. 

We need to move away from short term thinking around profit margins towards mid - long term profits through enhanced values and benefits of various 'green' eco-friendly sustainable development options. We have a choice. 

"It's important that play environments are as safe as necessary, not as safe as possible," Dr. Sandseter says.

There is increasing press coverage of the benefits of risk in play. Last week there was an article in the Wall Street Journal. When we give our children opportunities to play outdoors, freely interacting with nature and the environment around them they develop an awareness of and a very healthy connection to that environment. Where and how we play as children shapes who we are as adults.

As our cities aim to intensify their urban form it is ever more important to remember to provide for the children who live in our communities. Many children in New Zealand and Australia are growing up in apartments designed for 'singles' or 'couples', not families. Children are mandated for in some countries as requiring 15sqm of outdoor play space, per child. There is no such requirement in Australasia, yet.

When we look at the numbers of children and their needs for risky, natural play we need to look closely at the availablity of urban open space. We need to look at how many urban forests or groves of trees and grassy or limed patches are there within our cities, within a 5 minute walk from home?

Providing abundant  'safe as necessary' play opportunities requires developers, city planners and designers to acknowledge the mental health impacts, the public health impacts of children's sensory development and their need for natural play.

While a collection of trees do not an urban forest make, they do make a wonderful home for birds and beneficial bugs and a setting for sitting out, playing in the shade, playing in, eating from. These trees were retained, and some new mature specimens added, when the social housing blocks were redeveloped by Wellington City Council.

These trees transform what would otherwise be a  fairly bleak, open space

Contrast the courtyard area above with this purpose-designed care home space and you can immediately see the difference trees make to a living environment. 

Trees take an institutional setting and make it 'home'. We have been brought in to transform this space and bring it to life, both to enhance the lives of residents, and the local environment. A real win:win. 

...after the important business of the election Hurricane Sandy is now being seen not as a political event but for what it is, a symptom of climate change.  

Perhaps if more people paid more attention to sustainable design principles, and understood the importance of sustainable urban design, green space would be seen for the buffer it provides, the carbon sink, the natural urban drainage system, the free mental health prescription that comes from time spent in healing gardens and urban forests.

Life on the planet is all linked. We can not afford to act in ignorance and arrogance. "To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it." - G.K. Chesterton.

Tomorrow I'm meeting with Christchurch's city arborist. We're going to discuss the role the urban forest can play in the health & well being of a redeveloped Christchurch. In the UK GPs are already prescribing a 'green' treatment for early stage depression, whereby people are given a prescription not for expensive medication but for a walk in a forest for 20 minutes, 3 times a week.

Landscape architecture has an important role to play in the sustainable design of the city. Sensory gardens are those gardens that are designed to stimulate the senses, to do more than just look good, but to function on a human scale, providing food, shelter, habitat and employment. Urban forests can be the ultimate sensory garden, when planted with mixed natives, fruit and nut trees, and designed for year round interest, to attract native birds and invertebrates.

Urban trees represent an irreplaceable asset for cities, and unlike most municipal infrastructure a trees’ value will increase over its life span. In technical terms, an urban forest refers to the trees located within a city’s limits, whether planted or naturally occurring.

Check out the link to the Danish Architecture Centre's article on Edmonton's trees.

As much as being stuck in depressing places and losing your way can diminish healthcare objectives, so can the wrong type of green spaces.

Over the last 50 years or so, shopping centres and office lobbies have demeaned the value of natural features with their plastic plants and feeble fountains. Such token greenery has rendered nature invisible - a virtual green wallpaper we no longer see, or benefit from.

A study by Massey University found that to be effective in reducing stress and countering depression / improving mood in hospital, retail and office based settings, greenery needs to be real and it needs to be placed sympathetically. " "Street" style navigation is logical, allowing services to be grouped together, with access and waiting areas pleasantly defined by greenery.

We've known it sub consciously but now we're being told it. In this age of science and technology we seemingly don't believe anything unless it can be proven.

So now we have proof.

Recent studies employing land-use data and satellite technology have reported that access to green space within a kilometre of one's residence is associated with improved mental health. Indeed, large population studies show that those with the least green space within one kilometre of home have a 25 per cent greater risk of depression and a 30 per cent higher risk of an anxiety disorder. 

Multiple studies from Japan show spending time in forests can lower stress, improve mental outlook, and lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol. Separate studies have shown similar cognitive-enhancing effects of short periods spent in natural settings. 

Spending just 20 minutes in vegetation-rich nature has been shown to improve vitality. Given that vitality is defined in psychological lexicon as emotional strength in the face of internal and external oppositions, and living life with enthusiasm and zest, the implications for personal and planetary health are enormous.