We are very proud to announce that Horder Healthcare Musculoskeletal Physiotherapist, Claire Powell, has been collaborating with Huskisson Brown, a landscape architecture company, on the national Ebbsfleet Garden City competition for which they were recently shortlisted to the final five entries.

The vision for the new city at Ebbsfleet is innovation, good design, sustainability, community and, most importantly, health. On behalf of Ebbsfleet Development Corporation, Dartford Gravesham and Swanley Clinical Commissioning Group and the NHS England Healthy New Town Programme, the challenge was given to landscape professionals and students to collaborate with other built environment professions, artists, and place-makers and propose design ideas for what can be achieved in a truly modern healthy city.

Entitled ‘Everyday Adventure’, the unique design focuses on creating a framework of accessible, active and sociable green routes that connect communities, destinations and population groups, to promote walking and physical activity as the preferred choice for everyday journeys and experiences.

Image credit Huskisson Brown

Claire has played an important role in providing evidence on physical activity recommendations and positive benefits to health. She has also provided the designers with information about common barriers to physical activity and how to build activity into the daily routine, making this engaging and fun for all levels.

Claire completed an informal survey of patients at Horder Healthcare regarding their barriers to physical activity and their favourite outdoor spaces. The outcomes were then shared with the designers, highlighting issues around accessibility. Barriers to using outdoor spaces, for example walking along a seafront, were things like worrying about not enough stopping points for rests. Wheelchair users were worried about inclines and felt the current minimum requirements still felt dangerous and lead to fear and difficulty in using outdoor spaces. All of these findings were incorporated into the design.

The winning design will be announced in September 2018. For further information on the project please visit healthygardencity.co.uk.