Public health and wellbeing in public open spaces through climate responsive urban planning and design

Urban life allows for people to move between climate-controlled environments, including homes cars, offices and so forth. The planning and design of urban spaces, on the other hand, largely define the way we live affecting our health as it can, for instance, promote or hinder active lifestyles, social cohesion and access to healthy food choices. Climate responsive planning and design are, therefore, key to secure a healthy urban lifestyle. The Journal of Public Space is developing a Special Issue (SI) broadly focused on these relationships between urban planning and design and public health. This SI is premised on the belief that making the United Nation's New Urban Agenda (adopted in Quito, at the Habitat III conference) work locally needs more than overall regulations, or importing solutions from elsewhere. Climate can vary within short distances and the way public open spaces are designed must also vary according to the climatic characteristics of each place. This SI is then focused on local unique climates and their relationships with city dwellers’ age, culture, preferences and perceptions to promote and achieve healthy lifestyles. We are particularly interested in the role of urban planning and design for public open spaces in promoting healthy lifestyles and in exploring how these relationships are manifested in and influenced by different climates as well as environmental conditions. Papers in this issue are expected to be based upon theoretical and empirical studies, or evidence-based analysis based upon strong qualitative and quantitative data. Through a diversity of approaches, we aim to add a climate-based perspective for public open spaces to the discussions around planning and design for health and well-being and then inform the empirical discourse. If this is your area of work and/or interest, please send an abstract not longer than 300 words by 20th of November to our Guest Editor Dr Silvia Tavares from James Cook University (Australia) at: silvia.tavares1@jcu.edu.au. We will select promising contributions and discuss them with the Chief editor of The Journal of Public Space. The selected authors will then be asked to deliver a full manuscript by 10th of May 2019, which will be double-blind peer-reviewed. We expect the first round of reviews to be completed in August. We look forward to receiving your abstract, and if you know other colleagues who might be interested in contributing, please share this call with them