Category: Bibliography Annotation

National Center for Environmental Health, CDC. “Impact of the Built Environment on Health.” June 2011. PDF file.

The article begins by identifying the health issue that can be caused by the built environment. The built environment effects one’s physical health as far as something like having sidewalks or lack there of. The CDC has done research on the health impact, and on how much people would take advantage of sidewalks and bike lanes.

The CDC has found that having safe sidewalks and bike lanes greatly increase the number of people who take advantage of them which improves their health at the same time. Not only has the CDC done research on this topic, but it has also funded many workshops, events, and organizations to improve the built environment for the sake of peoples’ health.

I chose this article because it shows more about the effect of simple things in the built environment such as bike lanes and sidewalks that will improve peoples’ health. It is related to several of my other sources because it is on the topic of the effects of the built environment on health. The only weakness in this article was it was too much about what the CDC has done working to improve health rather than the built environment and health.

Rick Fedrizzi. “The greening of Pittsburgh: Next up, schools.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. PG Publishing  Co., Inc., 24 March 2016. Web. 25 March 2016.

Pittsburgh is known for its Leadership in Energy an Environmental Design certifications. The majority of the buildings in Pittsburgh have been designed to be ecologically efficient, making the natural environment healthier for its people. The next goal is to make schools go green too so the kids in Pittsburgh will have a more healthy environment to learn in.

The article goes on to point out that there are many schools throughout the United States that are not built to be healthy for the kids and people who work there. It states in the article that it has been proven by research that bad quality construction of schools can lead to students having bad eyesight, concentration, and unhealthy breathing. Their goal is to create and update schools that will provide a healthy and safe built environment that the kids of Pittsburgh can successfully learn in.

I chose this article because it is the first article that I have seen that speaks on the topic of changing schools to improve the health of children and employees in the schools. This is related to a few of my other annotations because it is about the effect of the built environment on peoples’ health.

Video

Municipal Art Society.“Health in the Built Environment.” Online Video Clip. Youtube. Youtube, 30 October 2014. Web. 23 March 2016.

This video is about DELOS which is an organization that builds for health and well-being. It starts off by explaining that we spend ninety percent of our time inside, but we do not know the affects it has on our health. The entire video is focused in on the interior built environment.

The director of DELOS, Natasha Franck, came up with a well building standard. The concepts of the well building standard consists of: air, water, nourishment, light, fitness, comfort, and mind. She gives examples of how being inside makes boundaries between us and nature. For instance, not being in the natural lighting takes away the natural ques the natural light does for us. Also, she points out things like poor air quality in an interior built environment. The interior built environment has more of an impact than realized. With the well building standard, aspects of the built environment such as air quality would improve drastically.

This video seemed relevant because of the topic being how the interior environment affects one’s health and behavior. It falls in line with my latest annotations on the health aspect of built environments. The only improvement that could have been made would be more examples given when talking about what the well building standard would consist of.

Harvard T.H. Chan. “Nature, Health, & the Built Environment“. Center for Health and the Global Environment. n.d. Web. 22 March 2016.

This source is about the layouts of cities affecting human health. It points out that designing cities to promote health is becoming more important as populations expand and cities get overcrowded. By using evidence from research, the claim that coming into contact even just a little bit each day can help a person think more clearly and relieve some stress. Another point made in this article is that by interacting with nature on a regular basis, a person will become more connected by doing so. With this connection comes the attachment that would make a person want to protect the natural environment more.

The interior built environment is also mentioned in this source. It states how people spend majority of their time inside of buildings in the interior built environment, but the affects of it on health is not known.The more knowledge about the affects of the interior built environment on our health, the more designers and architects can make them better for us.

I chose this source because I would like to know more about the influence of the built environment on a person’s health. More information would have been helpful, but it relates to my other sources by talking about the effects of the built environment on people.

Chernoff, Michael. “Social Displacement in a Renovating Neighborhood’s Commercial District: Atlanta.” The Gentrification debates: A Reader. Japonica Brown-Saracino. New  York: Routledge, 2010. 295-303. Print.

This source is about social and physical displacement, specifically in Little Five Points, caused by built environments. Disagreements began between the residential area and the business owners when talk began about altering roads and such in order to let more traffic through. The residential area wanted no part of this, but the business owners were all for it because they saw opportunity to make more money. In this way, the built environment drove these two groups of people apart. Even later on, old merchants and new merchants began having disagreements due to the same change in the built environment that was only desired by some. The dispute on altering the built environment in Little Five points is creating social displacement between the old and the new. This shows how important the built environment is to the people who live in or around it.

I chose this source because it showed how changing the built environment can have such a large impact on people, and it is specific to Little Five Points which is my exterior built environment. The information is somewhat outdated, but even with it being outdated it shows the effect of the built environment on its people. My source one and two are directly related because they are both about the desired alteration to the built environment in Little Five Points.

Gutman, Robert. “The Social Function of the Built Environment.” The Mutual Interaction of People and their Built Environment. Ed. Amos Rapoport. Paris: Mouton Publishers, 1976. 37-50. Print.

This article is about the built environment’s impact on a person’s behavior and social organization. It shows how built environments are created in a way to produce the behavior of a person that is desired. Architects design buildings and such to create specific reactions to the environment. Gutman also explains how architects design buildings in a way to improve social communication.This article has shown me that every built environment in Atlanta, or any other place for that matter, is built the way it is to create a certain reaction from the people using the environment.

This source gave a lot of explanation behind the relationship between the built environment and a person’s behavior. It explained why things are built and set up the way that they are. Gutman gives perfect examples to show how the architectural designs of built environments can produce the behaviors that they are supposed to. For instance, he used the example of how a lecture hall is set up the way it is to have students focused on the speaker. I found no flaws within this source. This article reinforces what I have read in my other two sources about how the built environment can have a large impact on the people who use it.

“Little Five Points: Atlanta’s Alternative Neighborhood.” City-Data.com. Some parts © 2016 Advameg, Inc. N.d. Web. 4 February 2016.

Source2 URL

This source describes Little Five Points in Atlanta. Due to the location of Little Five Points, it has almost always been a place of interest in the East Atlanta area.  Up until the 1960’s, Little Five was a well-known area for shopping. Then a freeway was placed right through the middle of it, and the area became segregated. This freeway created such separation that the whole area changed. The 1970’s was when Little Five started to come back as something new. The division that was created by the freeway made Little Five evolve. Now Little Five Points is a very mellow, hip place where people with piercings, colored hair, and tattoos can be seen. It has become a very artsy and unique place.

I chose this source because it is about my exterior built environment and it specifically tells how something that was built changed the whole area. The only problem with this article was that it did not contain quite enough information on the separation caused by the freeway, but it included more information on what the area has to offer now. This source’s information was only a step in the right direction compared to my other sources, but all three of my sources are somewhat interlinked.