Active by Design
Feb 11, 2010 2:34 pm
Last week, the New York City released its new Active Design Guidelines. The guidelines provide architects and planners with strategies to create designs that promote physical activity for better health. The guidelines are the first in the City to focus on the role of design in combating obesity, which is one of the most urgent health crises facing the city today. Many of the strategies are common sense, and many are supported by academic research, but all use design to help us find ways to incorporate healthy activity into our daily lives. West 8’s park and public space design for Governors Island will feature a number of these strategies, and we’ll show them to you in a future post. But first, here are some of the ways Governors Island is already making it easier and more fun to get your heart rate up:
[caption id=“attachment_2592” align=“aligncenter” width=“300” caption=“We chose play equipment everyone can enjoy, even grown-ups. ”]
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[/caption] [caption id=“attachment_2695” align=“aligncenter” width=“300” caption=“All of our more than five miles of car-free roads are scenic. You can’t help but choose to take the long way home. ”]
[/caption] [caption id=“attachment_2596” align=“aligncenter” width=“300” caption=“Having flexible spaces and great programming partners are another strategy. Here, RECESS hosts a badminton tournament on Colonels Row.”]
[/caption] [caption id=“attachment_2696” align=“aligncenter” width=“300” caption=“We believe everyone should have the chance to ride a bike on Governors Island. Bike and Roll’s Free Bike Fridays have put more than 18,000 people on bikes.”]
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