How and where we build housing, streets, and stores can have major effects the health of our communities. That’s the focus of the next Reshaping Rochester event, which explores how to create equitable and healthy neighborhoods.
We discuss the rising popularity of Health Impact Assessments (HIAs), which analyze how public health can be impacted by proposed plans and policies. In San Francisco, for instance, developers building an affordable housing complex near an area with high traffic pollution changed their plans to construct windows on the traffic side of the building after seeing data from an HIA. The new plans led to windows facing a courtyard, with less noise and pollution, and more views of green space.
The solutions proposed by HIAs are pushing developers to think about construction and health in new ways. There are even a few HIAs in Rochester, including one exploring the city’s waterfront. We discuss all of this and more with our guests:
- Maria Furgiuele, interim executive director of the Community Design Center of Rochester
- Dr. Katrina Korfmacher, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Environmental Medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center
- Rebecca Morley, director of the Health Impact Project at The Pew Charitable Trusts in Washington, D.C.
