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Open Space: People Space

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Highly visual and containing contributions from leading names in landscape, architecture and design, this volume provides a rare insight into people’s engagement with the outdoor environment; looking at the ways in which the design of spaces and places meets people’s needs and desires in the twenty-first century.

Embracing issues of social inclusion, recreation, and environmental quality, the editors explore innovative ways to develop an understanding of how the landscape, urban or rural, can contribute to health and quality of life.

Open Space: People Space examines the nature and value of people’s access to outdoor environments. Led by Edinburgh’s OPENspace research centre, the debate focuses on current research to support good design for open space and brings expertise from a range of disciplines to look at:

  • an analysis of policy and planning issues and challenges
  • understanding the nature and experience of exclusion
  • the development of evidence-based inclusive design
  • innovative research approaches which focus on people’s access to open space and the implications of that experience.

Invaluable to policy makers, researchers, urban designers, landscape architects, planners, managers and students, it is also essential reading for those working in child development, health care and community development.

Table of Contents

Foreword Laurie Olin Preface Penny Travlou and Catharine Ward-Thompson Part 1 Policy Issues: What are the current challenges in planning for inclusive access? 1. Public spaces for a changing public life Jan Gehl 2. "The health of the people is the highest law": Public health, public policy and green space Ken Worpole 3. Playful nature: what makes the difference between some people going outside and others not? Catharine Ward Thompson Part 2 The Nature of Exclusion: What is the experience of exclusion in different contexts? 4. Culture, heritage and access to open spaces Judy Ling Wong 5. Landscape perception as a reflection of quality of life and social exclusion in rural areas: what does it mean in an expanded Europe? Simon Bell and Alicia Montarzino 6. Mapping youth spaces in the public realm: identity, space and social exclusion Penny Travlou Part 3 Design Issues: Where are the Design challenges and what does inclusive design mean in practice? 7. What makes a park inclusive and universally designed? A multi-method approach Robin C. Moore and Nilda G. Cosco 8. ‘You Just Follow the Signs’: Understanding Visitor Wayfinding Problems in the Countryside Katherine Southwell and Catherine Findlay 9. Developing evidence-based design: environmental interventions for healthy development of young children in the outdoors Nilda Cosco 10. Healing Gardens for People Living with Alzheimer’s: Challenges to creating an evidence base for treatment outcomes John Zeisel Part 4 Research Issues: Where are the research challenges and which theories and methods offer most promise? 11. Measuring the quality of the outdoor environment relevant to older people’s lives Takemi Sugiyama and Catharine Ward Thompson 12. Three Steps to Understanding Restorative Environments as Health Resources Terry Hartig 13. On quality of life, analysis, and evidence based belief Peter A Aspinall

Author/Editor Biography

Catharine Ward Thompson is Research Professor of Landscape Architecture at Edinburgh College of Art. She is Director of OPENspace based at Edinburgh College of Art and Heriot-Watt University. Her award-winning research on historic urban parks and contemporary needs has led to projects exploring children’s and young people’s landscapes, the importance of outdoor access for older people and salutogenic environments for all.

Penny Travlou is Research Fellow at OPENspace and Lecturer in Cultural Geography and Visual Culture at the Centre for Visual and Cultural Studies at Edinburgh College of Art. Her work includes, among other themes, research on young people’s perceptions and use of public open space in Edinburgh, supported by the Carnegie Trust and the British Academy, as well as broader explorations of young people’s engagement with outdoor places.

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