‘The integration of planning, community planning, regeneration, local economic development and local tourism, combined with councils’ existing functions, should provide a productive joined up approach that will enhance the role of local government as a natural partner in helping to deliver health improvements and addressing health inequalities at the community level.’
Dr Michael McBride, Chief Medical Officer, Northern Ireland (Your Health Matters, 2013)
This set of resources explains how better integration between health and spatial planning can help to create healthier places to live. It explains the opportunities for achieving this in Northern Ireland, and includes suggestions from elsewhere to illustrate potential ways forward.
These resources have been developed primarily for elected members, senior officers in local government, planners and public health practitioners. They will also be useful for community development practitioners and others who want to understand how the planning system can play a part in improving health and wellbeing locally.
Not everyone will want to know the same thing, and users will come with their own existing knowledge. To make the resources as useful as possible they have been written as standalone resources. This means that users can choose the ones they are most interested in, without having to start from the beginning of Resource 1 and work their way through to the end (you are of course welcome to do this too!).