Urban Blue Acupuncture: A Protocol for Evaluating a Complex Landscape Design Intervention to Improve Health and Wellbeing in a Coastal Community

Simon Bell, Himansu Sekhar Mishra, Lewis R. Elliott, Rebecca Shellock, Peeter Vassiljev, Miriam Porter, Zoe Sydenham and Mathew P. White
Additional contact information
Simon Bell: Chair of Landscape Architecture, Estonian University of life Sciences, Kreutzwaldi 56/3, 51014 Tartu, Estonia
Himansu Sekhar Mishra: Chair of Landscape Architecture, Estonian University of life Sciences, Kreutzwaldi 56/3, 51014 Tartu, Estonia
Lewis R. Elliott: European Centre for Environment and Human Health, University of Exeter Medical School, Knowledge Spa, Royal Cornwall Hospital, Truro, Cornwall TR1 3HD, UK
Rebecca Shellock: European Centre for Environment and Human Health, University of Exeter Medical School, Knowledge Spa, Royal Cornwall Hospital, Truro, Cornwall TR1 3HD, UK
Peeter Vassiljev: Chair of Landscape Architecture, Estonian University of life Sciences, Kreutzwaldi 56/3, 51014 Tartu, Estonia
Miriam Porter: Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, University of Edinburgh, 74 Lauriston Place, Edinburgh EH3 9DF, UK
Zoe Sydenham: Plymouth City Council, Plymouth, Plymouth PL1 3BJ, UK
Mathew P. White: European Centre for Environment and Human Health, University of Exeter Medical School, Knowledge Spa, Royal Cornwall Hospital, Truro, Cornwall TR1 3HD, UK

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 10, 1-21

Abstract: Within the BlueHealth project, funded under the Horizon 2020 European Union research framework, a number of targeted experimental design interventions were used to test the effect and impact of planning and design on encouraging people to use various blue spaces. Complex interventions were implemented and evaluations before and after each were made using a set of tools which triangulate with each other—a site assessment tool, a behaviour observation tool, a questionnaire survey (including an economic evaluation) and qualitative interviews. The theoretical basis for the research is that of affordances, and the projects each involved modest changes to the landscape using the approach of “urban acupuncture” where a small intervention can potentially have an effect out of all proportion to the investment. This paper is a protocol paper and describes the research strategy and methodology in detail for one of the intervention sites, located in Plymouth in the UK. The aim is to present the methodology as a whole so as to act as (a) a reference framework for the results of all the projects which will be reported separately in a series of research articles once all the results are in and analysed and (b) a useful reference for other researchers wishing to carry out such complex projects and where a comprehensive presentation of the strategy and methodology is unavailable. We offer this protocol for reference, for critique and for inspiration to those following us.

Keywords: urban acupuncture; evidence-based design; complex intervention; multi-methods; Plymouth (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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