IN 2007, give or take, came a watershed moment in the 300,000-odd-year history of Homo sapiens. For the first time, more of us were living in urban settings than in small communities embedded in largely natural environments.
Urbanisation has been a driver of human cultural and material development since the first cities arose some 6000 years ago. Yet it is becoming clear that city life brings with it burdens on our evolved psyches. Indeed, green spaces have been shown to be vital not just to our physical health, but also to our mental health, including in alleviating conditions such as depression, anxiety and mood disorders. They also help with creativity, positive social interactions, healthy sleep patterns and much more.
Advertisement
The covid-19 pandemic has driven home the reality of those connections for many city dwellers. It has also highlighted the inequalities between socioeconomic groups, both in terms of access to green space and in the degree to which they are exposed to pollution, for example.
鈥淭he pandemic has driven home the connections between access to green space and our health鈥�
Yet all too often urban planning pays only lip service to matters of human health 鈥� and still less to creating environments in which the biodiversity we depend on can thrive.
The rapidly expanding cities of Asia and Africa are repeating the mistakes made in the West, subjugating liveability for all beneath sprawl and the demands of a motorised few. Attempts to reimagine cities for a greener, more sustainable, post-covid future have been piecemeal and disjointed, and often shouted down by vocal minorities with an interest in the status quo.
We are storing up trouble for ourselves. If there is one general lesson the pandemic has taught us, it is that investment up front prevents far greater costs down the line. How we plan our cities affects not just the health of those living in them now, but the health of billions who will live in them in the future.
A liveable environment must be seen as a fundamental human right. That requires consequential decisions to be taken across the world to reinvent cities as spaces in which all inhabitants can thrive.
