Pavements to picnics: Green spaces making you happier and healthier in the heart of London
Last summer Alfred Place Gardens was teaming with local office workers stretched out on the grass enjoying lunch, passers-by paused to enjoy the rustling grasses and swaying flowers nested around trees. Younger cries of delight came from children clambering on play equipment testing their courage or teasing their siblings (often both). While this picture isn’t unexpected for a London park, what might surprise you is that if you’d passed the same spot in the summer of 2020 all you’d have found was an unremarkable grey road.
The unrecognisable transformation of Alfred Place from road space to green space is part of the West End Project, Camden Council’s largest ever transport and public space scheme. This £35 million project focused around Tottenham Court Road and stretching across such a large area involved working with a large and diverse set of stakeholders, a special thanks goes to the West End Streets Group for their support during this project. The West End Project addressed traffic congestion, road safety concerns, poor air quality and the limited local access to nature. There was a core investment in new and improved green spaces plus over 59 new trees (and counting) planted across the area.
Alongside Alfred Place Gardens sit a series of pocket parks on Tottenham Court Road when side road junctions are closed and replaced by people and nature friendly seating and planting. Pocket parks at Windmill Square and outside the new UCLH Cancer centre provide much-needed places of calm. The rejuvenated Whitfield Gardens includes the full restoration of the stunning mural while Princes Circus once completed, will be a beautiful new green connection between Covent Garden and the heart of Bloomsbury to the British Museum and beyond.
By investing in this new “green infrastructure” the local community, businesses, visitors and nature are all reaping benefits. Such developments also provide the Council a return on investment of £11.58 for every £1 spent on green spaces1. New carefully chosen planting works hard to increase the local biodiversity and alongside the traffic improvement measures, tackles climate change on a local level through improved air quality.
Beyond much-needed spaces for local nature are the sanctuaries they also provide for our own health, happiness and enjoyment. Greenspace reported that 83% of respondents in the UK believed that parks and green spaces provide a focal point for their communities2. The pandemic provided a shocking glimpse into just how important such spaces can be both as an escape from the indoors and as a place to meet and connect with people away from a screen.
A shocking survey by Natural England reported that children from low-income families spent less time outside in green spaces during the pandemic than children from higher-income families3. Within Camden 39% of households do not have access to private outdoor space4 so in the heart of a global urban city, being able to enjoy nature by just stepping outside of your door, for free, with all the associated benefits, shouldn’t be a luxury nor related to your socio-economic status. By introducing new and improved green spaces from parks to simple seating with flowers Camden is working to readdress this balance.
Parks also make our communities healthier. They provide somewhere to exercise be it jogging, walking or even Pilates on a lawn. Just two hours a week contact with natural environments can reduce the risk of poor health by 45%5. And its not just your physical health that can improve, more important than ever they provide a way for us to nurture our own mental health. Each time you make an extra trip to any natural environment each week, that lowers your risk of poor mental health by 6%.
Finally like the gleeful kids on the climbing frame these spaces can actually make you happier! Fields in Trust reported regular users of parks see an increase in life satisfaction equivalent to a £974 increase in their income6. And while that might not be real money in your pocket there is nothing more valuable to us than health and happiness.
1. Based on the GreenKeeper assessment of the value of Camden Parks for Health Strategy
2. Greenspace (2007). The Park Life Report: the first ever public satisfaction survey of Britain’s parks and greenspaces
4. ONS, Access to garden space, 2020 Access to gardens and public green space in Great Britain — Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk)
5. White, M.P., Alcock, I., Grellier, J. et al. Spending at least 120 minutes a week in nature is associated with good health and wellbeing. Sci Rep 9, 7730 (2019) Spending at least 120 minutes a week in nature is associated with good health and wellbeing | Scientific Reports
6. Fields in Trust, Revaluing Parks and Green Spaces (2018) https://www.fieldsintrust.org/revaluing