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Tim Gill

Independent scholar
Academia
UK

About Tim

Tim Gill is a global advocate for children’s outdoor play and mobility, and an independent scholar, writer, and consultant based in London. He is the author of Urban Playground: How child-friendly planning and design can save cities and No Fear: Growing up in a risk-averse society. A UK Design Council Ambassador and Churchill Fellow, Tim is a former director of the Children’s Play Council (now Play England). In 2002/3 he led a UK-wide government review into children’s play. Tim holds degrees in philosophy and psychology from Oxford and London Universities, and an honorary doctorate from Edge Hill University.

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Stories by Tim

  • Environment & Cities

Spaces that make children want to play

If you build it, will they come – and will they stay?

Featured work

Book

Urban Playground: How Child-Friendly Planning and Design Can Save Cities

Urban Playground: How child-friendly planning and design can save cities aims to elevate the status of children in city building. Urban Playground reveals how seeing cities through the eyes of children strengthens the case for design, planning and transportation policies that work for people of all ages and for the planet.

Book

No Fear: Growing up in a risk averse society

No Fear: Growing up in a risk averse society argues that childhood is being undermined by the growth of risk aversion. This restricts children’s play, limits their freedom of movement, corrodes their relationships with adults and constrains their exploration of physical, social and virtual worlds.

Focusing on the crucial years of childhood between the ages of 5 and 11, No Fear examines some of the key issues with regard to children’s safety: playground design and legislation, antisocial behaviour, bullying, child protection, the fear of strangers and online risks.

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