The TCPA has long championed that the way places are planned, designed, built and managed has a significant influence over whether communities are able to live healthy lives. The built and natural environments are important determinants of health and shape health inequalities.
We support councils and communities with advice about planning healthier, more active environments and how to ensure that plans and policies help deliver public health objectives. Evidence shows that creating ‘complete, compact and connected’ neighbourhoods – otherwise known as 20-minute neighbourhoods – results in places that are healthier to live in and contribute to climate targets.
The TCPA have published a range of influential reports and practical guidance documents which can be found in our Resource library.
Contact
Please contact Gemma Hyde for further information.
Workshops
Healthy Local Plans and policies
The TCPA has extensive experience of helping councils use public health data to strengthen their Local Plans and policies to ensure new development supports good health for all. We can provide bespoke practical advice for your area.
Healthy Homes Campaign
This campaign calls on government to adopt our Healthy Homes Bill, which would require all new homes and neighbourhoods to be of decent quality, and effectively outlaw those which undermine residents’ health and wellbeing.
The 20-minute neighbourhood
The TCPA is working in coalition with a range of partners to learn from places that already are implementing 20-minute neighbourhoods and supporting local authorities to create them in the context of the English planning system.
TCPA healthy place-making publications
A collection of the TCPA’s healthy place-making publications
Useful healthy place-making resources
A collection of helpful healthy place-making resources from external organisations
Resources
The importance of democratic planning
Evidence from the Town and Country Planning Association for the Planning and Infrastructure Bill committee (April 2025)
Practical Hope: Woodgate Community Shop
Woodgate Community Shop is more than just a business. It has played a pivotal role in facilitating community cohesion between new and existing community members in Woodgate, West Sussex.
News & Blog
The economics of failure
It is a crucial moment for our collective survival. In this blog, first published in the March – April edition…
Thermal comfort for all homes
To ensure better and more inclusive health outcomes, the TCPA has identified 12 Healthy Homes Principles that all new housing developments must…
New guidance for embedding health and wellbeing into the design coding
Quality of Life Foundation has released new guidance, Design Codes for Health and Wellbeing, which has been developed in partnership with…
