2013/10/16 Council Agenda Packet

Strategy 20: Invest in Environmental and Public Health How we design our cities has an immense impact on community health. Healthy communities include safe and healthy housing, opportunities for recreation and non-motorized travel, and are free from environmental or other negative health hazards. Evidence increasingly shows that land use and ZOtransportation planning decisions impact whether people can easily choose to be physically active, eat nutritious food, and live in safe places. Bringing public health into planning decisions is also a strategy for ensuring that all people and communities have the opportunities to make healthy choices regardless of their income, education or ethnic background. In addition, accommodating more of the region's population growth in compact, complete and connected communities helps protect rural lands, farms, forests and wildlife habitat from urban development, thereby preserving access to open space and a higher quality of life for the entire region. Puget Sound Regional Council 20.1 Strengthen public health benefits as a criterion for promoting funding for projects in transit communities that enhance non-motorized options,such as walking and bicycling. 20.2 Collaborate with public health agencies in the region to develop and disseminate Healthy Transit Community Principles as an assessment and planning tool for local governments. The Northgate Healthy Community Principles may provide a model for a regional tool. Transit Agencies 20.3 Encourage bicycling and walking by strengthening policies to encourage and fund non-motorized access to transit. O Local Governments v 20.4 Use Healthy Transit Community Principles as foundational element in station area planning and implementation. D20.5 Invest in the infrastructure for non-motorized travel, to include sidewalks, trails, bicycle facilities, and safety features for both pedestrians and bicyclists. C20.6 Provide sufficient parks and open spaces that are accessible to and meet the needs of current and anticipated future transit community members. 20.7 Identify and address areas that lack access to affordable healthy foods, including through land use and economic development strategies. u20.8 Promote healthy housing by mitigating the potential noise and air quality impacts of proximity to busy roadways, Ce such as freeways,such as through proactive land use regulations and building codes. Public Health Agencies 20.9 Improve access to public health and human services to all residents of transit corridors, with facilities sited within transit communities or within easy transit distance. Regional Equity Network and Advocacy Organizations 20.10 Engage community members on the benefits of walking and bicyling in coordination with local planning efforts and funding decisions. 20.11 Identify and advocate for strategic investments in transit communities that can protect and improve community and regional public health and the environment. Priority Transit Communities for this Strategy • Transit communities with current high capacity transit service or expected within 10 years,and other regionally significant transit communities • Communities that score low on the Opportunity Mapping Health and Environment index 51 The Growing Transit Communities Strategy ( Public Review Draft I May 2013