Boring architecture may take an emotional toll on the people forced to live in and around it.

A growing body of research in cognitive science illuminates the physical and mental toll bland cityscapes exact on residents. Generally, these researchers argue that humans are healthier when they live among variety — a cacophony of bars, bodegas, and independent shops — or work in well-designed, unique spaces, rather than unattractive, generic ones. — nymag.com

'Mexico City’s water system goes against its own functional essence. The city is dehydrating itself. We’re mixing our water with poisonous waste and then pumping it out through a complex network of pipes. Just like what happens when a human is dehydrated, Mexico City has diarrhea.' — Elias Cattan — Quartz

Amid the controversy that perpetually surrounds Planned Parenthood, it's easy to forget that the nonprofit organization is, first and foremost, a health care provider. It is the largest provider of sex education in the United States. Every year, 2.5 million people—men and women—visit its health centers for care and information. It administers life-saving cancer-screening tests and offers contraception. In some states, it's the only abortion provider... — FastCo Design

In 1980, for instance, fewer than 12 percent of American workers commuted for 45 minutes or more one way, according to the Census.

The Census didn't even bother separating out 60- and 90-minute commuters in 1980, since it was relatively rare. But they began tracking these mega-commuters in 1990. That year, 1.6 percent of workers commuted 90 minutes or more one way. In 2014, 2.62 percent of workers were commuting this long, an increase of 64 percent over the prevalence in 1990. — Washington Post

Given the threat of ongoing lead exposure and the community’s well-founded mistrust of government, should families be offered at least temporary resettlement while upgrades, repairs and enhancements are made to Flint’s badly contaminated water infrastructure?

I ask this fully aware of how unprecedented and complex such a policy would be. After all, some 9,000 young children may have been exposed to contaminated water. — Washington Post

[Healthabitat, the non-profit Paul Pholeros co-founded,] developed a model called Housing for Health...working with Aboriginal communities, conducting a survey of all housing and completing urgent repairs using mainly local Indigenous contractors, and adding whatever upgrades or repairs they can afford until the money runs out.

The organisation has improved more than 8,000 houses – a third of Australia’s Indigenous-controlled housing stock – and with them the lives of 55,000 people. — The Guardian

For [Oklahoma City] is one of the nation’s most spread-out urban environments, covering 620 square miles, which means its 600,000 residents rely on cars [...]

[Mayor Mick Cornett] began to look afresh at the culture and infrastructure of his city, realising how the extent of reliance on cars had alienated human beings from enjoying and using their own urban environments. [...]

[Cornett] wanted to remake his huge metropolis by remoulding it around people in place of cars. — mosaicscience.com

boring environments can generate stress, impulsivity, lowered levels of positive affect, and risky behaviour. [...]

based on well-understood principles of neuroplasticity and on what is known of the effects of deprivation and enrichment in other more extreme settings ... there is every reason to believe that these sterile, homogeneous environments are exerting a measurable effect on our behaviour [...]

Given this, the prudent design of city streets and buildings is a matter of public health. — aeon.co

Scientists in Korea have discovered that using antibacterial soap when hand-washing is no more effective than using plain soap, according to a paper published today in the Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy... The study examined the effect of triclosan...on bacteria in two ways. The first was to examine the bactericidal effects of triclosan in soaps against all 20 strains, and the second compared the ability of antibacterial and non-antibacterial soap to remove bacteria from human hands... — Science Daily

[Botany professor Paloma Cariñanos] found it surprising that the design of these green spaces thought about landscaping, climate, and fashion criteria, but didn't think about pollen problems.
[She] says that in the future, urban green spaces 'will become 'comfort islands' inside 'urban heat islands.''...Cariñanos and her team stress that their research is a tool for planning and prevention. They hope that other cities will be able to use their methods to prevent high allergen levels. — phys.org

With the huge impact of mental disorders on people’s health and wellbeing, and the increased mental health risk of that comes simply from living in a city, you might think that mental health would be an urban health priority. In fact, few policies or recommendations for healthy urban environments address mental health in any depth. — CityMetric

Fullilove increasingly came to see cities as ecosystems, with streams and channels, one flowing unseen into the next, disruptions wreaking havoc, threatening vitality everywhere. In a 1999 article in The International Journal of Mental Health, she showed federal urban renewal policies to be a fundamental cause of disease — NYT Magazine

Archive (“Architecture for Health in Vulnerable Environments”) proposes “bringing attention to the built environment and how it is a transmission vehicle for the spread and control of a respiratory illness like TB” [...]

Archive is starting small, with an as-yet-uninitiated project on respiratory health and indoor pollutants in Ethiopia and projects on TB awareness in London. — nextcity.org

'When these [2007 Pan Am] venues were built the government told Brazilians that these would be Olympic-ready, and there would be a rather smooth and efficient transition to eventually hosting the Olympics,' explained Rio-based reporter Taylor Barnes...'But, these venues have instead had some pretty checkered after-lives.' — pri.org