The Future is Green. Integrating Green and Blue Space Data from European Urban Atlas into UK Biobank

Background Green and blue spaces can promote good physical and mental health and prevent the development of long-term conditions. Evidence suggests that not all green spaces affect health equally, and that certain types and properties of green spaces are stronger predictors of health than others. However, research into the causal mechanisms is limited in large cohorts due to lack of objective and comparable data on green space type, accessibility, and usage. Methods We used data from Urban Atlas to compute measures of urban park accessibility, street trees availability, and total green and blue space availability for 300,000 UK Biobank participants. Exposure metrics were computed using circular buffers with radii of 100 m to 3000 m. Pearson correlation coefficients and other descriptive statistical parameters were used to test agreement between variables and explore the utility of indictors in capturing different types of green spaces. Results Strong positive correlations were observed between variables of the same indicator with different buffer sizes. The presence of park and proportion of street tree canopy variables were negatively correlated with amount of total green space variables. This signifies distinct differences in type of green spaces captured by these variables. Conclusions Overall, five distinct indicators of park accessibility, street trees availability, and total green and blue space availability have been integrated into a large sample of the UK Biobank. Our method is replicable to settings across Europe and facilitates evidence-based research on the roles of different green and blue spaces in health promotion and ill-health prevention. Key Messages ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. ### Funding Statement The research was funded by the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration Yorkshire and Humber https://www.arc-yh.nihr.ac.uk/. The views expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care. PC and SG are part funded by the UK Research and Innovation Closing the Gap Network+ [ES/S004459/1]. UKRI does not necessarily endorse the view expressed by the authors. ### Author Declarations I confirm all relevant ethical guidelines have been followed, and any necessary IRB and/or ethics committee approvals have been obtained. Yes The details of the IRB/oversight body that provided approval or exemption for the research described are given below: Researchers do not require a separate ethics approval to use UK Biobank data and are covered under the UK Biobank ethics approval by the North West Multi-centre Research Ethics Committee (MRAC) as a Research Tissue Bank. This project was approved by the UK Biobank's Access Management System (AMS), application no. 7370, and grants access to restricted UK Biobank Fields 22701 and 22703 (home location - east coordinate and home location - north coordinate). I confirm that all necessary patient/participant consent has been obtained and the appropriate institutional forms have been archived, and that any patient/participant/sample identifiers included were not known to anyone (e.g., hospital staff, patients or participants themselves) outside the research group so cannot be used to identify individuals. Yes I understand that all clinical trials and any other prospective interventional studies must be registered with an ICMJE-approved registry, such as ClinicalTrials.gov. I confirm that any such study reported in the manuscript has been registered and the trial registration ID is provided (note: if posting a prospective study registered retrospectively, please provide a statement in the trial ID field explaining why the study was not registered in advance). Yes I have followed all appropriate research reporting guidelines and uploaded the relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material as supplementary files, if applicable. Yes Data fields derived from this study and all other data underlying this article is owned by UK Biobank and can be accessed with an approved project application from the UK Biobank's Access Management System (AMS). Raw environment data from Urban Atlas is open access and available from European Environment Agency.