Connect

Background and motivation

It is widely understood that public green spaces can make an enormous contribution to people’s quality of life and wellbeing. The benefits go far beyond providing something attractive to look at. Research studies have shown that spending time in outdoor spaces can lower blood pressure, reduce stress, help motivate people to take exercise, to look forward to things and offer the chance to take responsibility for the care of something living. It can also bring a whole range of social benefits, for example an attractive park or public garden is often a topic of conversation or somewhere to meet others and can help overcome problems of social exclusion and isolation.

Public open space is one of the main places where the day-to-day life of a community takes place. The experience of informally sharing space with people who are of different cultures, races, ages and genders is of benefit to everyone and something that most people take for granted. By dealing with some of the barriers that prevent older disabled people and people with learning disabilities from enjoying public open space we will enable more people to spend time in public open space and therefore engage more fully with the whole of their community.

Access to these spaces can be particularly important for people with limited mobility who feel isolated from their local community or whose lives involve considerable amounts of time spent at home. This is the case for many older disabled people and people with learning disabilities.

Unfortunately, such people often find themselves excluded from enjoying local parks, gardens or woodlands because of a range of physical, social and intellectual barriers. From previous work, such as the Making Connections study, we have found that some of these barriers result from poor design and management but many are linked to more complex issues. These include people’s low expectations of what will be available to them, lack of confidence in getting involved and insufficient access to information. It is these less tangible aspects that can make all the difference to whether people feel motivated and able to connect with the opportunities their local community has to offer. These less tangible aspects, such as lack of motivation or fear, are particular barriers for older disabled people and people with learning difficulties. This project is designed to address these issues and to work with older disabled people and people with learning disabilities to identify realistic and effective changes and opportunities.

Some of the project activities are giving people with learning disabilities and older disabled people the motivation to play a more active role in their communities. For example, through volunteering, helping with evaluation work and creating information for others to use.

Sensory Trust consider the people we work with as design and development partners, not simply as users to be brought in to try something we have developed. This partnership approach leads to a deeper understanding of needs by the Sensory Trust and to a richer and more rewarding experience for the people involved as they see their input make a real difference over the course of the project.