CREATING A GLOBAL MODEL
Editor’s Note: This story originally appeared in Growing Bolder magazine. Bolder Media Group is headquartered within Lake Nona.
Lake Nona is, in a word, unique. A 17-square-mile master-planned community in Southeast Orlando, it was built from the ground up with a commitment to the health of its residents. It’s an intergenerational, family friendly ecosystem with 40 percent green space, parks on every corner, pools in every neighborhood and more than 44 miles of trails.
One of America’s fastest growing communities, Lake Nona is home to more than 2,000 residents and 5,000 workers in its 650-acre Medical City, a world-renowned life sciences cluster that includes Nemours Children’s Hospital, the Orlando VA Medical Center and National Simulation Training Center, the University of Central Florida College of Medicine and Health Sciences campus, the GuideWell Innovation Center, the Johnson & Johnson Human Performance Institute and the University of Florida Research & Academic Center and more.
One of the most technologically advanced communities in the U.S., Lake Nona has a groundbreaking gigabit fiber-optic pipeline that supports the needs of some of the world’s top tech companies and enables the nearly frictionless, personalized delivery of educational and motivational health and wellness content to its residents.
Lake Nona is developing a robust Sports & Performance District that’s anchored by the largest tennis facility in the world, the 100-court United States Tennis Association (USTA) National Campus.
It's also home to training facilities for Major League Soccer’s Orlando City Soccer Club. The team’s 23-acre campus encompasses six practice fields, training and fitness centers, film and meeting rooms, a players? clubhouse and an injury prevention and rehab center.
Daily life in Lake Nona increasingly revolves around a 3.8 million-square-foot lifestyle and entertainment Town Center that includes world-class retail outlets, office space, restaurants, hotels and more.
Lake Nona isn’t just a great place to live — it’s also a healthy place to live. It’s a “living lab,” and the focus of the Lake Nona Life Project, a multigenerational longitudinal study by Johnson & Johnson Health and Wellness Solutions and the Lake Nona Institute.
The Lake Nona Life Project is designed to discover, develop and share the factors that lead to better health in communities. It has been called “a modern day Framingham,” a reference to the landmark Framingham Study which began in Framingham, Massachusetts, in 1948. That study is now on its third generation of participants, identifying risk factors that contribute to cardiovascular disease.
Participation in the study is voluntary, but the potential benefits are nothing short of a longer, healthier and happier life. The study evaluates the overall health and wellness of participants, focusing on the links between sleep, nutrition, exercise, social engagement and more on health, longevity and quality of life.
It’s the ultimate win-win for companies interested in healthcare and wellbeing, and for residents who gain access to unique opportunities and resources — such as a recent meditation session led by bestselling author and wellness guru Deepak Chopra.
Is there another community like Lake Nona in the world? Gloria Caulfield, executive director of the Lake Nona Institute, doesn’t think so.
“We’re actively pursuing multidimensional health and wellbeing with best-in-class partners,” she says. “We have an advanced technology infrastructure and the benefits and innovation capabilities of Medical City. Plus, there’s the programming that we offer to residents. All of these factors combine to create a community that we believe is unlike any other.”