Have you ever ever skilled that jolt of shock whereas working, out of the blue catching the sounds of visitors or the footsteps of one other particular person within the darkness? For Canadian runners, it is a frequent consequence of city landscapes that fail to accommodate their presence. However in keeping with a brand new examine printed in Science Direct, one worldwide metropolis has set a shining instance: Helsinki, the capital of Finland. With its in depth array of outside sports activities services, the town has boosted the life satisfaction of runners and may very well be a blueprint for different cities to observe.
The examine
Northern European cities have lengthy been identified for his or her devotion to bodily exercise and high quality of residing, which is mirrored of their city planning. At this time, Helsinki boasts a complete community of two,100 outside public sports activities services. These embody heated swimming swimming pools, fields, leisure parks, jogging tracks, and snowboarding tracks. These services span practically each neighbourhood, guaranteeing quick access for all residents.
In line with a current examine of Helsinki’s city design, these providers enhance life satisfaction amongst Finns. To evaluate the affect of those services on bodily exercise ranges and life satisfaction, researchers checked out GPS routes used amongst runners between 2018 and 2021, in keeping with Strava, a well-liked GPS monitoring app for athletes. The information revealed that by contemplating city density, greenery, and the abundance of water, Helsinki has grow to be a runner’s paradise.
What’s “runnability”?
This examine emphasizes the idea of “runnability” as an important measure of how city environments can promote working and lively existence. Previous analysis has highlighted the connection between the constructed surroundings and runners’ satisfaction.
Helsinki’s city planning, guided by the ideas of runnability, focuses on three important elements: “eye-level greenness” (greenery at eye degree), “top-down greenness” (general greenery seen from above), and “blue area density” (quantity of water current). These elements had been discovered to extend the chance of individuals going for runs and intensify their expertise. Helsinki’s metropolis design displays this, with densely populated areas that includes extra parks and paths tailor-made for runners.
Greenery as a recreation changer
The examine checked out how many individuals reside in an space through the use of one thing referred to as the Flooring Space Ratio (FAR), a software additionally utilized by Canadian city planners to measure the density and variety of issues like housing, workplace, business, and industrial areas. Inside these areas, Helsinki’s city design strategically consists of slopes in terrain, as a strategy to enhance the problem of city working routes and mimic extra pure environments.
Inexperienced areas had been additionally discovered to have a chilled impact and motivated runners to maintain going. Of the 13,322 road segments in Helsinki that the examine assesses, these with essentially the most inexperienced area had been discovered for use essentially the most typically by runners. The examine suggests future city planners ought to pay extra consideration to the variety of road bushes and vertical greening (the place vegetation may be grown on, up, or towards a constructing), as Helsinki reveals, which have been demonstrated to advertise well-being.
Water is nice for the soul
One other factor that makes Helsinki a unbelievable place for runners is its geography, notably its abundance of lakes (about one-tenth of its space is roofed by water). The examine explores how such lakes may have an effect on the town’s runners. It was found that close to Helsinki’s lakes, the place there’s normally much less visitors, runners have a tendency to maneuver sooner and extra freely.
Setting has lengthy been linked to helpful impacts on each runners’ psychological and bodily well being. It ought to come as no shock then that simply final month, for the seventh yr in a row, Finland was ranked the happiest nation on the planet, in keeping with the 2024 World Happiness Report.
This examine proves simply how essential it’s for city planners to embed bodily exercise within the design of our communities. When city planners prioritize the wants of runners, they improve not solely residents’ high quality of life and bodily well-being but in addition contribute positively to the economic system, sustainability and surroundings of a metropolis.
Try this yr’s Helsinki Metropolis Working Day, Finland’s hottest street race, which takes place on Could 11.
