Keeping active is a walk in the park
Buckinghamshire Council’s Active Communities programme is designed to inspire everyone to add a little more activity into their daily routine. Just by sitting less and standing often as part of our lifestyle everybody can gain major health benefits, today and in the future.
Moving more is even better. Going for a run or to the gym would be ideal but it is not something that appeals to everyone. Regular walks, on the other hand, are achievable for many and the impact on our wellbeing can be huge.
That is why Buckinghamshire Council have launched a series of park walks as part of its Active Communities programme in Aylesbury and Wycombe. These nine special park walks come in different shapes and sizes to encourage all residents to add a little more movement to their lives.
The aim is not to get everyone to walk miles, but to help all residents get used to walking regularly – even if it is only a short distance. For example, one of the walks is only 240 steps. That does not seem much, but if you took that short walk every day and each step was a yard, you would walk nearly 50 miles a year!
This is all part of the Active Communities approach to adding small, regular movement to your day-to-day life.
Making small changes to your routine, such as a short walk each day, can mean an enormous gain in your activity levels. It helps your weight, too. You use 1 calorie on average for every 20 steps you take. The 240-step walk would burn 4,380 calories in a year!
Each walk has markers along the way with details of how far you have walked, as well as a QR code that you can access with your mobile phone for more information about the walk, your health and the Active Communities programme.
Carl Jackson, Buckinghamshire Council's Deputy Cabinet Member for Health and Wellbeing (Public Health), said:
“Walking is an excellent way to maintain and improve your health and wellbeing. Active Communities Park Walks are an innovative way of engaging residents to be a little more active on a regular basis. Whether you take one of the longer or shorter walks set in local communities, exercising little and often can add up to huge and lasting benefits for our health."
You can find out about the location of these unique walks on Buckinghamshire Council's website. And for those who like to go on organised walks, visit the council’s Simply Walks programme.