The major goal of healthy cities is the well-being of all people who live, learn, work and recreate in it. Large cities with a high density of buildings and mixed land-uses bear health risks that are unequal in their social and spatial distribution. In such cities one can find districts and neighborhoods with massive transport, less green space and more industrial sites than in other areas of the same city. Often people with lower income, education or a background of migration live in such neighborhoods that imply a higher health risk.
This team came out on the top with its concept for a junior research group in the call entitled ‘Stadt der Zukunft’ by the Fritz und Hildegard Berg-Stiftung. The research programme ‘Stadt der Zukunft’ aims at integrating the concepts of sustainability and health for planning in urban areas. The junior research group Salus strives to initiate an interdisciplinary and international dialogue amongst public health and spatial planning. Five PhD students will research at the universities involved and build the core of this junior research group.
Results of the research will be transferred into strategies for healthy cities as well as tested in role playing games. The Municipalities of Dortmund and Munich are case study cities in this project. Dortmund and Munich are larger cities, both member of the healthy cities network and differ in major spatial as well as social factors.
Further partners are the World Health Organisation (WHO Bonn), the Federal Environment Agency, the AOK Westfalen-Lippe (health insurance), the Regional Association Ruhr (RVR), and the Ministry for Climate Protection, Environment, Agriculture, Nature Conservation and Consumer Protection of the German State of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Coordionation of the junior-research group:
Univ.-Prof. Dr.-Ing. Sabine Baumgart
Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Faculty of Spacial Planning
Project-Partners:
Prof. Dr. phil. Beate Blättner
Hochschule Fulda
Department of Health Promotion
Public Health Institute Fulda, Faculty of Caring and Health Hochschule Fulda
University of Bremen
Institute of Public Health
Asst. Prof. Dr. phil. Johannes Flacke
University of Twente, Enschede, Netherlands
Faculty of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation (ITC)
Department Urban and Regional Planning and Geo-Information Management (PGM)
Ph.D. Students
The junior-research group Salus, without Ph.D. Students
(l.t.r. Johannes Flacke, Sabine Baumgart, Gabriele Bolte,
Andrea Rüdiger, Heike Köckler und Beate Blättner)
