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Active by Design: a new movement to improve the health of the nation

Kathy MacEwen, head of programmes for the Cabe Team at the Design Council, discusses the new Active by
Design initiative, which promotes good design to encourage greater levels of daily physical activity in buildings and public spaces.

As our physical activity decreases, and sedentary lifestyles and poor diets increase, our levels of obesity, heart
disease, high blood pressure, stroke, type 2 diabetes, some cancers and, even, dementia are on the rise.

Physical inactivity now costs the UK economy approximately £20bn a year, affecting our health and economy significantly. 

The facts are clear. We have an epidemic on our hands. The joint problems of high levels of inactivity and unhealthy diets need to be addressed. We want to be a catalyst for change.

Catalyst for change

There is increasing awareness of the problem globally, and in the UK a recent report by
the All-Party Commission on Physical Activity recommended urgent action and identified
the need to design activity back into our everyday lives.

There is plenty of evidence to show that the built environment can play a significant role in supporting more active lives – which is why we have decided to launch our new programme, Active by Design.

Active by Design promotes the use of good design to encourage greater levels of daily physical activity in buildings and public spaces in cities and towns, and to increase access to healthy and nutritious food. We want to be a catalyst for change, finding new linkages between our planning system, health service and the built environment sector, both public and private, where few currently exist and in ways that have not been done before.

Case studies

To launch our programme, we have published our Active by Design short guide, which sets out 10 ‘killer facts’, 10 reasons to be positive and 10 changes we believe a range of professionals could make to contribute towards finding solutions. We show that, in different parts of the world, a wide range of programmes are being put in place.

For example, in New York City, the Centre for Active Design has been promoting the benefits of prominent stair cases that encourage people to walk rather than using lifts. The Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in New York is a great example of this. It’s been designed with impressive staircases that visitors enjoy using and that add to the ambience of the space.

Closer to home in Brighton, an award-winning scheme in New Road has transformed an unloved street in an important cultural quarter into an attractive space for pedestrians and cyclists, now extremely popular with residents.

Collaborative approach

Getting things to change will involve a wide range of people and as an independent charity we are ideally placed to bring these groups together.

We don’t just want to work with architects, landscape architects, engineers and planners – we think we should be working with healthcare professionals to consider the impact of buildings and places on people’s health and wellbeing too.

Together we could find new ways to encourage physical activity in the home, at work, at leisure and when people need to stay in a hospital or similar health facility. We would also like to encourage closer links with the architects of health facilities, planning departments or meal providers, to influence policy and improve the overall wellbeing of people.

We’d also welcome working with health estate managers to try out new ideas. In the past, we have provided independent support to health trusts; in Welwyn the redevelopment of the Queen Elizabeth II hospital was more than a major building project. Our support enabled the health trust to develop a vision for the new hospital and a master plan for the whole site. We ensured local people could air their views and ran a competition to choose an architect.

When the new hospital opens, people will have easy access to the services they use most often. Clinicians will be able to treat them in an environment designed for modern healthcare. And NHS Hertfordshire will have a hospital service fit for the future.

We would welcome working towards making health estates healthy and active places.

In September we are holding a conference to inspire and inform.