Healthy Environment Promotion aNd Ecosystem Services Support for ACTIVE CITIES development

HEALTHY ENVIRONMENT PROMOTION AND ECOSYSTEM SERVICES SUPPORT FOR ACTIVE CITIES DEVELOPMENT – HEPNESS established a transnational cooperation where cities (Vicenza, Bonn, Craigavon, Ljubljana, Sofia, Padova), research and sport organizations (ZRC SAZU, FOOTURA, UNIVE; USMA asd) advanced new synergies to develop health and sport cities, enhancing cultural and natural ecosystem services for the promotion of an active lifestyle. The project started recognizing that, notwithstanding researches demonstrate the importance of Physical Activity for health, people in cities are less active than ever before. Considering that the built environment influences how people move and get around, and urban design is essential to encourage physical activity, CITIES should reconsider strategies integrating sport in diverse urban policies, being aware that, for example, encouraging walking and cycling contributes also to cleaner air and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.Acknowledge that Cities play a key role in enabling the population to become more active and once developed an in depth literature review and shared good practices of what cities can do to promote physical activities in the urban environment, the partnership worked towards the following dimensions:1) sharing a perspective to support city leaders to adopt a human centred approach to public spaces design, 2) developing and testing new shared governance patterns to promote PA in the urban environment,3) defining an monitoring framework to both assess impacts of policies and to call other cities to implement the hepness cities challenge. The perspective enhances the role of cultural and natural ecosystem services to increase physical activity exploiting a range of diverse resources (parks, squares, green commons, streets, rivers, lakes, sea and providing several responses to current health, socioeconomic and environmental challenges.Integrating physical activity into daily lives is a creative process. Hepness calls for cities to improve the use people make of public space. It is a process that requires the contribution of numerous city departments and public private partnership amid citiies, sport associations, tourism organizations, health and educational settings. By providing methodology and practical tools, and by reinforcing the capacity of decision makers to define people centred policies and develop interventions for physical activity promotion that draw on the contribution of numerous sectors, HEPNESS generated new leadership for the promotion of health sport’s cities.The main project deliverables are published on both the project website and the E+ platform; the outcomes are described in the project publication and in 2 videos: one general describing the project scope and one depicting the project theoretical model. Partners Cities (Vicenza, Cragavon, Bonn) and associated ones (Padova, Ljubliana, Sofia) developed diverse pilot actions and related results are described and shared in both a joint project brochure and on the project website. Finally, a memorandum of understanding signed by partners during the last public event and a sort of Roadmap to the mainstream has been defined. The roadmap provides step by step approach to design, develop and manage an hepness city.