Project

Thrive Zones in Lambeth

Project information
Year
2020
Location
London, United Kingdom
Client
Guy's and St Thomas’ Charity, Lambeth Borough Council

There’s a fundamental air quality problem in London. This project uses urban strategy and design to take on cities’ biggest urban health challenges.

Sophia Schuff
Team Director European Foundations
The Challenge

A need for urban intervention

Air pollution is an invisible force that causes health problems for over 9,000 Londoners a year. Lambeth Borough has committed to becoming carbon neutral by 2030 and to protect residents from poor health outcomes by improving air quality. Gehl responded to this call to action with support from Guy’s and St Thomas’ Charity and the Bernard van Leer Foundation.

The team worked with a local Community Research team from The Social Innovation Partnership to gather data insights into people’s lived experiences in highly polluted neighborhoods. The insights generated informed a “cleaner air” network plan and temporary intervention designs aimed at reducing people’s exposure to air pollution in Vauxhall and Oval and testing new clean air planting solutions for Lambeth Borough.

Cycle and pedestrian commuters in Vauxhall

Using an online survey, Gehl learned where exactly people receive cleaner air. The yellow indicates where people identify cleaner air, while the blue indicates people’s favorite places.

Insights into Vauxhall’s public life.

The Impact

Fresh approaches to tackling polluted air

Gehl designed the ‘Cleaner Air Network Plan,’ complete with tactical pilots and neighborhood-wide strategies that prioritize people’s health. The short-term programming designed by the team works to create conditions for people to spend time in places with better air quality, while the long-term strategy works in tandem with the Local Authority’s aim to reduce the actual emission sources of air pollution.

Each ‘Cleaner Air Thrive Zone’ pilot site was selected by Gehl based on public life data, insights from a parent focus group facilitated by community researchers in The Social Innovation Partnership, resident air quality data, and spatial GIS analysis. Once selected, the pilots used unique typologies of urban environments to reduce people’s (especially children’s) exposure to pollution. These pilot sites function to test and respond to people’s needs through physical change and activation, offering a way of engaging the community in long-term neighborhood-wide transformations through experience and exposure.

These ‘Thrive Zones’ give people access to cleaner air through integrated transportation networks, opportunities to walk or cycle, connections to family amenities and public services, friendly-air greenery, and the ability to move quickly through areas of bad pollution and spend time in places with cleaner air.

Durham Street sits between two schools and several key destinations for children. This Thrive Zone is designed to be a well-connected street that gives pedestrians priority and supports people who want to spend time there. Systematic data collection of traffic and air pollution levels provided the evidence to make this intersection a safe, efficient, and healthy crossing for children.

Data from Durham St.

Gehl envisions a future where people can move quickly where they need to, and pause where they want to. Along with a reprioritized traffic management program and an extra large pedestrian crossing, Gehl recommended the installation of air quality sensors and responsive traffic sensors.

The goal at Durham Street is to invite people to move quickly where air pollution is bad, prioritize pedestrians, and improve safety for children near their schools.

Bus stops are positioned along busy roads forcing people to interact with traffic-related pollution daily. Gehl re-imagined the Oval Bus Stop with a scalable solution to improve the waiting experience and identified locations across Lambeth with this same setback typology.

This bus stop is a key transit hub for children and their caregivers. The goal is to invite people to wait further back from the road, introduce a new cleaner air bus stop typology for Transport for London, and fill in untapped street space with green infrastructure.

Data from the Oval Bus Stop

Dorset Road was an underperforming local neighborhood street with small businesses and residential council estates that didn't have a supporting public realm. After analyzing lived experience and public life data, Gehl’s curated pilot for Dorset Road introduced a "friendly air” street that encourages locals to feel a sense of belonging and ownership of the surrounding public space.

This residential community with green public space welcomes locals to stay: businesses generously unfold into the public realm, the mixing of different communities, and newly established play and pause areas are used by all. The vision for Dorset Road was to become a place known by individuals where they could walk to avoid traffic while also letting their kids roam independently.

Data from Dorset Road

More information

Next phase

Together with Guy’s and St Thomas’ Charity, Lambeth Borough, and Transport for London, Gehl tested the feasibility of the green wave intervention for Durham Street and continued the effort to build the capacity of local partners to ensure air pollution is monitored and communicated broadly in the future. 

Read more about Guy’s and St Thomas’ 10 year programme to address the health effects of air pollution and the Thrive Zone report here.

Get in touch

Want to know more about this project?

Director, Health & Community Expert
Louise Vogel Kielgast
louise@gehlpeople.com
Team Director European Foundations & Philanthropic Organizations
Sophia Schuff
sophia@gehlpeople.com
Our services

Delivering impact through a multidisciplinary approach

Service
Urban Strategy

Urban Strategy is the foundation upon which form, function and behaviour are created. Our holistic approach always starts with asking what life should exist in place, what spaces invite for that life, and what buildings and facilities support this. People and life first, always.

Service
Public Life Data

Public Life Data, the collection and analysis of qualitative and quantitative information about how people use and engage with public spaces, uncovers the true picture of how design impacts behavior. Our teams use this collected analysis to develop strategies and plans that foster more equitable, healthy and climate-positive lifestyles.

Service
Engagement

Inclusive engagement that meets people where they are. Listening to the community through research to build trust and better shape the environment to its users and visitors.