WALKABILITY, SOCIAL INCLUSION AND SOCIAL ISOLATION AND STREET REDESIGN 461 BUILT ENVIRONMENT VOL 36 NO 4 Walkability, Social Inclusion and Social Isolation and Street Redesign CARMEL BOYCE Within the body of literature on walkability there are many papers on improving a population’s health by increasing rates of physical activity, and on how walking improves health. There is, however, a dearth of evidence on public infrastructure investment in built environments, which aim to promote healthy activity, and the relationship between these and evidence of social inclusion, exclusion and public health improvements. In this paper two projects based in the City of Geelong – the Corio Norlane Active Transport Network and Cloverdale Walkability + – are described and used as grounding for discussion of theory and practice relating to these issues. Designing for, and the promotion of, walking have the potential to support beter health outcomes (WHO Europe, 2003). By promoting socially inclusive streets and social conviviality, walking can ameliorate one of the causes of social exclusion. Walking can thus improve health and wellbeing outcomes for whole communities. Designing socially inclusive spaces for walking is one thing. From a practical per- spective, it is possible to develop and design inclusive spaces in communities. But for which people? For any design to meet the require- ments of a specific community, designers must have a well-grounded understanding of the community for which they are designing, their needs and aspirations, as well as the social landscape within which the community functions. Different disciplines promote participatory and inclusionary approaches. Sections of the planning fraternity promote deliberative plan- ning, community participation and engage- ment processes. They argue for the mutually beneficial nature of participatory planning exercises, in that they encourage communities to take ownership over the public realm, and take control over the things that occur within them. However participation is fraught. For a decade or more social scientists have been documenting the impacts of social exclusion. They argue a person’s social circumstances act to inhibit or exclude a person from joining in as an active participant. The ‘social model of health’ (Ibid.) provides a framework to understand the beneficial nature of the relationship between community members’ participation in decision-making on matters that affect them and the health benefits they are likely to gain as a result. It is possible, therefore, that well-targeted social inclusionary strategies at the planning and design phase of any public realm project may well lead to more inclusive space, and spaces being used more inclusively. Separately sociologists have been exploring the nature of localized anomie. Urry (2003, p. 184) explored mobility as an important facilitator in building trust through eye- to-eye contact. Giles-Corti and Donovan (2003, p. 1586) noted the significantly higher likelihood of a person walking in circum- stances where he or she had someone to walk with. Flint (2006, p. 52) explored the nature of