Researchers at UWE Bristol and the University of Bristol are appealing for local authority planners, local plan officers and public health officials to take part in research that will help integrate health into local plans.
Participants will be aiding new guidance design aimed to raise awareness about the links between planning and public health, and support those working in local authorities maximise opportunities for promoting health through local plans. Researchers are looking for specific support in reviewing and sense checking draft guidance.
The research is part of the TRUUD (‘Tackling the Root causes Upstream of Unhealthy Urban Development’) research project, which is looking at how urban centres can be planned to reduce health inequalities.
The guidance is being created in collaboration with the Town and Country Planning Association.
Emma Bird, Senior Lecturer in Public Health at UWE Bristol said:
“We want to provide local authority planning and public health teams with much needed support to better integrate health in local plans. It’s really important that we include these professionals in shaping the guidance to ensure that it meets the needs of those working in a local authority context.”
The deadline to express an interest is Friday 10 May.
Notes for Editors
- Tackling Root causes upstream of Unhealthy Urban Development (TRUUD) is a research project, based at the University of Bristol, looking at how urban centres can be planned to reduce health inequalities. It brings together experts from academia, industry and government to recommend and create new tools and processes for healthier cities. The project counts the cost of poor health, works with communities to communicate the issues they face and maps out the decision-making process in creating urban centres and includes two active case-studies in Bristol and Manchester.
- The TRUUD consortium includes the Universities of Bath, Bristol, Reading, Manchester, Stirling and the University of the West of England across disciplines of public health, law, psychology, management, engineering and economics.
- TRUUD has created an economic valuation model – Health Appraisal of Urban Systems, or HAUS for short – that allows developers or planners to consider and adjust a range of health factors. HAUS provides unit costs for more than 70 health outcomes, disaggregated so that they can be attributed across multiple agencies from a societal perspective.
- TRUUD is supported by the UK Prevention Research Partnership (UKPRP), an initiative funded by UK Research and Innovation Councils, the Department of Health and Social Care and the UK devolved administrations, and leading health research charities.
