Magali Thomson RIBA, Project Lead for Placemaking at Great Ormond Street, advocates greening London's streets collaboratively to enhance community health.

Working in Bloomsbury at GOSH, I have observed beautiful streets in Conservation Areas, adjacent to low quality housing in poor condition, where deprived communities are living and where the public realm has been left to deteriorate. What ties these contrasting areas together, which are typical in London, are our streets and public realm. 

Improving these streets and the public realm, is key if we want to improve people’s lived experience in the city. They could become green networks, community spaces knitting the city together and a shared resource which improves people’s health. A thriving network containing a variety of elements that are designed for multiple purposes including ecological, educational, play, recreational, cultural, aesthetic, health, or other purposes which contribute to people’s health and wellbeing. This could be adapted depending on what area you are in.

A city-wide approach to greening our street networks and public spaces is required, to ensure interventions do not remain disjointed and are not focussed and therefore reliant on infrastructure and building projects. Because of this approach too often the areas which are most in need of investment and improvement are left behind. Regeneration schemes and new developments focus on improving what lies within their red line boundaries. World-class institutions focus their energies on developing their own masterplans, sometimes extending their approach to incorporate a few of the immediate streets surrounding them. Inevitably large areas are left out with this approach, and the results are disjointed. There is a large amount of research and knowledge, in many cases being carried out in silos and in parallel, which could all be pooled together if we approached the public realm collaboratively. Adopting a systems wide approach, recognising that we need to collectively look beyond our red line boundaries, is required.

The network could share similar principles as the BID model, but rather than being reliant on business rate payers, it could be financed by anchor institutions, housing associations, educational and health providers – a new public/private model working beyond administrative boundaries, and across specialisms. A Health Improvement Bid perhaps. Business is not necessarily a shared interest within a neighbourhood, whereas health is a concept which is universally understood and valued. The new BID model could include urbanists, health professionals, cultural and educational players, economists and policymakers, housing associations and developers. We can also learn from inclusive advisory panels such as the one at the Earls Court Development, which includes a diverse group of people from the local area, aged 15 and up who have a range of experiences, requirements and support needs. It could provide guidance on establishing effective partnerships, potential funding mechanisms, and efficient processes which enable change.

This model would be focussed on people, their diversity and lived experience, and would put a value on the many roles in cities which have been historically undervalued, brought to the fore during the pandemic. Creating a green caring infrastructure for a city that cares.