Health Impact Assessment
and its Role in Planning Decision-Making
RTPI SW, Exeter, 15
thOctober 2015
Ben Cave
Email: [email protected]
Tel: 00 44 113 887 0770 Twitter: @ben_cave
Reflections
• Impact Assessment
• Health
• Health as a component part of
• Environmental Impact Assessment
• Strategic Environmental Assessment
• Technical issues (ie how are potential health effects identified) and
strategic or political issues (ie how is health as a topic integrated into
planning)
Impact Assessment has a dual nature, each
with its own methodological approaches …
• As a technical tool for analysis of the consequences of a planned
intervention (policy, plan, programme, project), providing information
to stake-holders and decision makers; or unplanned events, such as
natural disasters, war and conflicts.
• As a legal and institutional procedure linked to the decision-making
process of a planned intervention.
What is impact assessment?
International Association for Impact Assessment
(2010)
… Health Impact Assessment
… is a combination of procedures, methods and tools
… that systematically judges the potential, and sometimes unintended,
effects of a policy, plan, programme or project
… on both the health of a population and the distribution of those effects
within the population.
… HIA identifies appropriate actions to manage those effects.
International Association for Impact Assessment, 2006
From Hugh Barton and Marcus Grant, University of the West of England
What is health? (I)
Health is a state of
complete physical,
mental and social
well-being and not merely
the absence of disease
or infirmity.
Preamble to the Constitution of the World Health Organization; signed on 22 July 1946 by the representatives of 61 States and entered into force on 7 April 1948.
What is health? (II)
...
the extent to which an individual or group is able, on the one hand,
…
to identify and to realize aspirations and satisfy needs, and on the other,
…
to change or cope with the environment.
…
Health is therefore seen as a resource for everyday life, not the objective of living;
…
it is a positive concept, encompassing social and personal resources as well as physical
capacities.
Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion, 1986
Health and planning
Three components of
Public Health
Activities relating to
Spatial Planning … for example …
Health services
Calculate developer contributions for health
services
Health protection
Close, and existing, links with Environmental
Protection services
Health improvement
Forward planning
See Royal Town Planning Institute. Delivering Healthy Communities. RTPI Good Practice Note 5, 2009. www.rtpi.org.uk
… health in EA or HIA
• Early concern that integrating
health into EA would lose
essential characteristics of HIA
• Health now regularly as
component part of ES of
Nationally Significant
Infrastructure Projects and as
part of some planning
Directive 2014/52/EU of the European Parliament and of the
Council of 16 April 2014
Building in Health in a Strategic Urban
Extension
Gareth Bradford, Planning, Devon County Council &
Sara Gibbs, Public Health, Devon PCT/DCC
Ben Cave, Ben Cave Associates
WithSteve Brown, Associate Director Public Health, South Hams and West Devon, Devon PCT
… The Sherford
Valley
Plymouth
A38
A379
Stages of (H)IA
Screening
Scoping
Assessment
Reporting/Feedback
Monitoring/Management
Establish relevance to health
Identify key issues*
Identify potential effects*
Present results
Ongoing action *opportunities for wider involvement
Framework for presenting the recommendations
Strategic principles
Developer
contributions
Design
Management
… as developed by the Steering Group for
the Sherford & Cranbrook HIAs
Transport
Strategic principle Developer contribution
Strong political leadership is required to systematically reduce the demand for car ownership and use and to find answers to problems that are politically sensitive and to make Sherford sustainable
Identify/agree sanctions for not achieving the modal rate (eg fines) and incentives for exceeding the modal rate.
Travel information and other resources for new residents.
Transport
Design requirement Management requirement Monitoring and review
Use a design hierarchy headed by pedestrians and cyclists and public transport.
Ensure parking does not reduce visibility and movement for pedestrians.
Design for bicycles as an integral part of the road system
Promote cycling and cycle routes for everyday commuting & market them as such, & work in partnership to join these routes up with the main centres, from the outset
Car share network, Car Club and Travel Forum.
Personalised Travel Planning
Provide welcome packs for new residents with travel information.
Cycle routes for everyday commuting.
Travel surveys
Proportion of streets that are shared surface
Parking strategy implemented and enforced
