If you ask individuals what ‘sense of place’ means to them, they offer up thoughts like ‘it’s the people’, ‘a place with history’, ‘a place I feel connected to’, as well as ‘sights, sounds and smells.’ The academic literature supports this. For example, we know that ‘place attachment’, which is the psychological term, is good for mental wellbeing and emerges from a variety of experiences and situations, often related to parks, green spaces, and natural areas.

You can read my guest blog about this and our work to help engender a sense of place at Barking Riverside Healthy New Town on the Housing LIN website (published 22 May)..