Health Impact Assessment for Urban and Land-use Planning and Policy Development: Lessons from Practice

Abstract

There is increased interest in, and awareness of, the health impacts of urban and land-use planning. At the same time, health impact assessment (HIA) has emerged internationally as an approach to strengthening the possible positive impacts of a proposed development or plan and mitigating the possible negative health impacts. This article first provides an overview of HIA, focusing on the history of HIA and its core conceptual underpinnings. The article then critically reflects on the value of undertaking HIA based on experiences from 13 HIAs on planning proposals in Australia. In doing so, the article makes the case for the use of HIA in urban and land-use planning based on practical examples of how HIA has been applied to different types of urban policies and plans to improve healthy urban places.