Neighbourhood environments that support families

Key Results

Community resource access varies widely between neighbourhoods. Access is generally highest in areas close to suburban town centres and along major access routes, and lowest on the urban fringes. Pockets of poor service and amenity access exist across both cities. The CRAI is a useful tool for identifying localities that have good or poor access to services and amenities. The level of community resource access was higher in the North Shore, the generally more affluent of the two cities. Thirty-six percent of meshblocks in the city had accessibility scores in the highest two septiles on the CRAI, whereas this was true for only 19 percent of meshblocks in the less affluent Waitakere City. However, it is notable that within both cities, community resource access increased with increasing levels of deprivation. Natural and built characteristics of neighbourhoods that were valued by parents and/or supported parenting included:

• local streets and shops that were primarily used by local people

• cul-de-sacs that provided spaces for children to play and a common site for neighbourly greetings and exchanges

• access to open outdoor spaces, particularly natural landscapes such as bush, beaches and wetlands

• a centrally positioned shopping/service hub or ‘village’ that catered to most household needs

• access to a core set of resources, the most important of which were: a general practitioner, pre-school, primary and intermediate school, supermarket, pharmacy, A&E clinic, hospital, library and parks public spaces that served as community meeting places (eg parks, primary schools, a shopping village, cafés).

• co-location of child-related facilities that offered convenience in scheduling and transport to daily destinations for parents of children of different ages. Co-location also increased the foot traffic around child-centred institutions, and the opportunities for parents to have serendipitous meetings with other local parents

• local places that were experienced as pleasant and safe environments for walking

• distinct and visible neighbourhood/suburb boundaries that enhanced a neighbourhood’s identity and parents’ understanding of and identification with an area a residential locality that was not bisected by main roads. Main roads were a common safety concern, particularly where they formed a barrier to walking between home and destinations such as school, shops and the homes of friends.

Social characteristics of neighbourhoods that were valued by parents and/or supported parenting included:

• neighbourliness – feeling that people kept an eye out for each other, and shared local information and informal greetings
• stability and familiarity – seeing familiar people in public places within the neighbourhoods (eg children, families, shopkeepers, older residents). A perception of high residential turnover and change reduced participants’ sense of neighbourhood familiarity
• knowledge of local action (current or historical) to preserve or enhance the local social or physical environment
• safe community meeting places in which parents and children recognised and met up with other
• local parents and children. Pre-school and primary school gates and ‘village’ shops were particularly significant local meeting places
• community events held in local venues (eg Santa parades, school events, market days, music in parks, sports days)
• a network of known parents who could be called upon for support, and with whom reciprocal
• childcare arrangements could be made. For Samoan parents such networks were often built through church contacts, whereas for M-aori and P-akeh-a parents local institutions, particularly schools and pre-schools, were the sites around which peer networks developed
• regularly seeing people of the same ethnicity in local places such as schools, pre-school, shops, parks and sports clubs
• local schools that were perceived by parents to be good schools, were crucial to parents’ satisfaction with their neighbourhood
• participation and strong local identification could offset and challenge a negative locality reputation held by outsiders
• the presence of a local café was a significant positive marker of social change and a neighbourhood’s transition.

A common trajectory for establishing neighbourhood-based parenting support networks was evident, but it was also apparent that not all parents successfully negotiated entry to neighbourhood networks. Many of the participants who took part in the in-depth interviews, and almost all Samoan participants, had chosen to live close to family members. For these individuals, parenting support primarily came from family living nearby. All parents, but particularly those without family in the area, valued knowing and being able to call on other local parents for support. However, gaining entry to parental peer networks was not always straightforward. Publicly funded child-focused organisations and institutions played a key role in providing opportunities for parents to meet and form networks, but common barriers to entry were identified for particular groups of parents. Parents who experienced themselves, or their children, as different in some way to other parents in the area (eg due to age, disability,ethnicity, marital status etc) often encountered barriers to access and participation in parent networks.

A window of opportunity to enter peer networks is offered to many parents by well child agencies soon after the birth of a child, but it is often a narrow and easily missed window. For those parents who miss this common entry point, it is often not until their children commence pre-school or school that a second opportunity to access this highly valued form of parental support is available to them. The policies and practices of organisations that facilitate or limit parents’ opportunities for accessing peer networks are discussed, as well as variations in the networks sought and accessed by Samoan, Māori, Pākehā and new settler participants.