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FROM THE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF PEDIATRICS: Committee on Environmental Health The Built Environment: Designing Communities to Promote Physical Activity in Children Pediatrics 2009; 123: 1591-1598 [Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]

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Child-Friendly Communities Certification Program

Suzanne H. Crowhurst Lennard, Ph.D.(Arch.), Bruno Bottarelli, AIA, National Town Builders Association   (27 May 2009)

Child-Friendly Communities Certification Program 27 May 2009
Suzanne H. Crowhurst Lennard, Ph.D.(Arch.), Director International Making Cities Livable Council, Bruno Bottarelli, AIA, National Town Builders Association Send letter to journal: Re: Child-Friendly Communities Certification Program Suzanne.Lennard{at}LivableCities.org Suzanne H. Crowhurst Lennard, Ph.D.(Arch.), et al.	The International Making Cities Livable Council (IMCL) and the National Town Builders Association (NTBA) wholeheartedly support the AAP policy statement on "The Built Environment: Designing Communities to Promote Physical Activity in Children" and offer a tool for achieving this goal. IMCL and NTBA are partnering to guide the development of a "Child- Friendly Community" Certification Program that gathers together under one umbrella all of the guidelines necessary to design and restore neighborhoods that encourage children's physical and emotional health and well-being - neighborhoods that offer children the free range and daily contact with nature and community they require. Qualifying projects will be officially certified and celebrated as "Child-Friendly". IMCL and NTBA are forming an Alliance of national leaders and organizations to spearhead this effort. We welcome participation of the American Academy of Pediatrics in this Alliance. We hope pediatricians will also join Advisory Councils with experts from the fields of public health, child development, planning, urban design, transportation planning, landscape architecture, municipal government, building and land use development to help create the principles, guidelines and standards. (See: http://www.livablecities.org/publications/articles/67-child-friendly -communities.html) NTBA (http://www.ntba.net) is organized to serve builders and developers throughout the nation in an effort to build the very best traditional neighborhoods and town centers. The organization is committed to the successful development of smart growth neighborhoods that are economically, socially and environmentally sustainable. In the development and redevelopment of America's neighborhoods, NTBA is convinced that it is not only possible, but highly desirable, to do well by doing good. The mission of the IMCL Council (www.livablecities.org) is to bring together planners, urban designers, architects and landscape architects, elected officials,planning staff, developers, public health professionals and social scientists to collaborate to make the built environment more healthy and more livable. Since its founding in 1985, children have been IMCL's chief concern. If anything is wrong with the way a neighborhood, town or city is built, children are the first to suffer, and suffer most deeply. We believe if we work together as a multi-disciplinary team we can make profound changes in the way new neighborhoods and towns are built, and how existing neighborhoods, towns and cities are reshaped to become healthy and child-friendly. Conflict of Interest: None declared