Sydney Science Park

A great deal of work has been done on how urban design can improve physical health: reducing obesity, or lung diseases, for example. But in the proliferation of research and guidelines for the healthy city, mental health is still often an afterthought. This is disappointing because cities affect our mental health, and mental health problems exert huge impact on cities. This creates a vicious circle.

Urban design holds exciting potential in population mental health. While more research is needed, there is already clear evidence of the ways in which urban design can help promote good mental health, help prevent mental illness, and help support people with mental health problems. This research is ready to be grasped by architects, urban planners, developers, policymakers and others, and integrated into project requirements and project design. It is summarized in our Mind the GAPS framework, which can be applied to any plan or project.

A healthy city is defined by a process, not an outcome. A healthy city is not one that has achieved a particular health status.
It is conscious of health and striving to improve it. Thus any city can be a healthy city, regardless of its current health status.
The requirements are: a commitment to health and a process and structure to achieve it.
A healthy city is one that continually creates and improves its physical and social environments and expands the community resources that enable people to mutually support each other in performing all the functions of life and developing to their maximum potential.
WHO/Europe recommends a basic model for a healthy city.

As cities experience a demographic shift, the need for age-friendly design is becoming ever more critical. From almshouses to driverless cars, the future of urban housing and mobility may just be shaped for and by the elderly

Green hospital concepts will play an important part in the curative process in time to come. Instead of being referred to as a place that houses healthcare amenities, hospitals of tomorrow will now focus on wellness and be transformed into welcoming spaces to get well.

Patient outcomes are better, productivity is improved and ongoing energy costs are reduced in health-industry buildings that are Green Star-rated, according to new a research report.

Adapting to climate change by hospital and community health services will entail responding to changing health needs of the local population, and to the likely effects of climate change on health service resources, workforce and infrastructure.

A CSIRO report published today, Australia’s Biosecurity Future: Preparing for Future Biological Challenges, highlights the biosecurity risk of urbanisation as cities become hotspots for new and emerging infectious diseases.