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Research article2007Peer reviewedOpen access

Landscape planning to promote well being: Studies and examples from Sweden

Skärbäck, E

Abstract

There has been a rapid increase in knowledge regarding the importance of the external environment to our health. Eight characteristics of outdoor environments (serene, wild, lush, spacious, the common, the pleasure garden, festive/centre and culture) have been identified as fulfilling recreational needs through a number of environmental psychology studies carried out at SLU, Alnarp, Sweden between 1995 and 2005. The external environment has become an increasingly decisive factor in the choices made by people regarding where to live and work. This has meant that the landscape has become a competitive factor in the attempts made by companies and local authorities to attract well-educated, mobile manpower and housing. Knowledge-based companies predominate in the Öresund Region, which at present has substantial recreational values that make it an attractive area in which to live and work. The annual population growth is in the region of 20-25,000 inhabitants. The prime ministers of Sweden and Denmark have expressed a common objective that the Öresund Region shall be one of Europe’s cleanest metropolitan regions. The objective of this paper is to present methods to implement the eight characteristics as indicators for impact assessment in planning projects. The paper presents case studies of the application of the environmental impact assessments in the municipalities of Malmö and Svedala, which are situated in the immediate vicinity of the Öresund Bridge. Development plans are being evaluated through impact assessment. Mitigation and compensation measures are being created to achieve the environmental quality goals defined by the eight characteristics. The case studies referred to in this paper are in a very early planning phase: the feasibility or pre-feasibility phase. This paper does not present complete investigations of balancing, but discusses some principal ways of defining values and suggests measures for mitigating and compensating for negative impacts on existing values

Published in

Environmental Practice
2007, Volume: 9, number: 3, pages: 206-217