planning processes » Ren Thomas

Treading a new path: Indigenous planning at SCARP

The multitude of planning concerns faced by Aboriginal communities across Canada hit national headlines a few weeks ago when Attawapiskat, a First Nations community of about 2,000 in northern Ontario, declared a state of emergency. Horrific health conditions exacerbated by poor water supply, sewage problems, inadequate housing and schools resulting from decades of wrangling over governance and funding have devastated the community. The conditions prompted the Red Cross to provide emergency relief, provoked international criticism and launched intense debates in the House of Commons (“NDP challenges Harper to visit Attawapiskat himself”, The Globe and Mail November 30, 2011, “Aboriginal Affairs Minister dispatches team to Attawapiskat“, The Globe and Mail November 25, 2011). This is, in fact, the fourth time Attawapiskat has declared a state of emergency due to chronic infrastructure failures. Many serious health and housing issues persist in Aboriginal communities. The need for First Nations, Inuit and Métis (who comprise Canada’s Aboriginal peoples) to use their own knowledge and self-determination in planning their communities, for planners to help with the development of local plans and help negotiate collaboration, has never been greater. On a hopeful note, the UBC School of Community and Regional Planning (SCARP) is embarking on a new initiative in 2012: the launch of the Indigenous Planning concentration within our current Masters program with the First Nations House of Learning.

SCARP professor Leonie Sandercock has been working with First Nations communities for several years. Her most recent work, the documentary film Finding Our Way, highlighted the decades of turmoil faced within the Ts’il Kaz Koh First Nation (Burns Lake Band), the Cheslatta Carrier Band, and the Village of Burns Lake, BC. Dr. Sandercock has been instrumental in working with the First Nations House of Learning and members of the Musqueam, Carrier, Nisga’a and Cree Métis Nations to develop the Indigenous Planning concentration at SCARP. Professor Ted Jojola of the University of New Mexico Community and Regional Planning program also advised UBC on the creation of the program; the planning program at the UNM School of Architecture and Planning has an Indigenous Planning component and hosts an Indigenous Architecture lecture series. Dr. Jojola visited UBC recently for an “Indigenous Planning Teach-In” hosted by SCARP and the First Nations House of Learning. At this event the Tsawwassen First Nation, Musqueam First Nation and Westbank First Nation presented their community plans, highlighting public participation processes and the role of external planners as consultants in plan development. Several non-Aboriginal professionals specializing in law, governance, community economic development, and cross-cultural planning spoke about their work with Aboriginal communities across Canada. (Watch a video about the development of the degree, featuring scenes from the Teach-In, here.)

There have been some fantastic examples of Aboriginal community planning in recent years: the Seabird Island First Nation in BC built its own housing in partnership with Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC), Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (INAC), National Resources Canada (NRCan), and 25 building industry and community groups in 2003-2004. They later launched the Seabird Sustainable Community Project to provide “information to First Nations and other communities across Canada solve housing challenges in an environmentally sensitive, healthy, energy-efficient and affordable way.” The Ty-Histanis Neighbourhood Development, about 10km from Tofino, BC, is a new community being developed by the Tla-o-qui-aht First Nations (TFN) in partnership with CMHC and NRCan (ecoAction and EQuilibrium Communities Initiative). It is applies the TFN concept of Hishuk nish tsawaak (all is one), through practical, sustainable community development principles. The new community will include 171 single-detached units, 32 duplex units and a 12-unit elders’ complex; a school, health clinic, pharmacy, recreation centre, youth centre and elder centre are all located in the core area. The project target is a 50 percent reduction in greenhouse gases, mostly through building and energy efficiency. Forty per cent of the development site will remain undisturbed protected habitat, bogs will be used for natural water retention, and walking will be encouraged through footpaths and the mixed-use design of the site.

Clearly, there are many opportunities for planners in Aboriginal communities, whether they are local, community-based planners or external consultants in the planning process. SCARP’s new Indigenous Planning concentration will consist of five core courses covering law and governance, community economic development, regional sustainability planning, cross-cultural skills, and indigenous planning as an emerging paradigm. It will also feature a one-year practicum working in a First Nations community in BC and an optional internship with a First Nations community in the Lower Mainland. It is hoped that graduates (both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal) will go on to ensure immediate infrastructure concerns are addressed, help communities across the country plan for their futures and, over time, prevent crises like Attawapiskat.

Want immigrants to integrate? Give them better transit and affordable housing

Talk about timing. A few weeks ago, in time for provincial elections in Ontario, Manitoba, PEI, and Newfoundland and Labrador, the Federation of Canadian Municipalities released a report urging the federal government to support public transit and affordable housing in cities. This in itself is nothing new: FCM has long advocated stable funding for public transit and affordable housing in municipalities, who have been struggling to pay for new infrastructure and operating costs. The twist: FCM maintains that better transit and affordable housing can actually help immigrants integrate, and that municipalities should offer them along with services such as English language training (download their report: Starting on Solid Ground: The Municipal Role in Immigrant Integration). This echoes the findings of my Ph.D. dissertation, which found that flexible approaches to housing and transportation increased community resiliency.

This week, FCM and the Canadian Urban Transit Association met with members of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities to discuss the idea of a National Public Transit Strategy. They argued that fast and efficient transportation connections through public transit are crucial to strengthening the economy. MP Olivia Chow, NDP critic for transport and infrastructure, introduced a private member’s bill on September 30th (Bill C-615, An Act to Create a National Public Transit Strategy) calling for the federal government to work with municipalities in the creation of a national transit strategy and create a stable source of funding for municipalities. She noted the economic benefits and the disadvantages of long commute times: Canada’s big city mayors have been pushing for a national strategy since 2007. In the CBC’s unofficial poll on this topic, 88% of readers agreed that Canada needs a national transit strategy. I needn’t go into this issue here in Vancouver: this week, an Angus Reid poll of 504 Vancouver residents showed that 85% want improvements to transit service and 75% felt those improvements should be funded by the provincial government. As I wrote in my last post, the Mayors’ Council on Regional Transportation votes today on the adoption of the Moving Forward strategic plan, which includes a 2% hike in property taxes and the beginnings of a new provincial-municipal funding agreement to help pay for transit improvements.

It looks like public transit is becoming a hot issue among cities of all sizes. The Regional Municipal of Waterloo is in the process of constructing an LRT line (currently in the planning process) funded by the provincial and federal governments. A strong motivation for the Region, which includes the municipalities of Kitchener, Cambridge and Waterloo, was increased immigration to the area, a point they raised at this year’s Metropolis Conference on Immigration and Migration in Vancouver. It’s very humbling to see the recommendations I made in my Ph.D. dissertation being echoed at the municipal, regional and federal levels. Considering the numbers of immigrants settling in Canadian cities every year (approximately 250,000 Permanent Residents and 200,000 Temporary Workers), governments need to do a better job of helping them integrate, and that includes more housing and transportation options. Maybe after decades of research and policy innovation in municipalities, we’re finally reaching the tipping point: let’s keep a close watch on Bill C-615 and Bill C-304, the bill creating a national affordable housing strategy, which passed third reading in the House of Commons last year and is now under Senate consideration.

The future is now: Metro Vancouver’s Moving Forward plan

In an article in today’s Vancouver Sun (“Seven mayors weigh in–The case for funding public transit”, October 4, 2011), seven regional mayors weighed in on the importance of public transit infrastructure to the Metro Vancouver region: Dianne Watts (Surrey), Peter Fassbender (Langley), Richard Walton (District of North Vancouver), Gregor Robertson (Vancouver), Pamela Goldsmith-Jones (West Vancouver), Greg Moore (Port Coquitlam), and Richard Stewart (Coquitlam). This Friday, the Mayors’ Council on Regional Transportation, made up of 22 elected officials from around the region, votes on TransLink’s Moving Forward Supplemental Plan. The proposal includes a 2 cent-per-litre gas tax that will require provincial approval, a new joint long-term funding proposal approved by the Mayor’s Council and the province, and a temporary property tax increase that will cost about $23 per household for 2013-2014. Transit improvements include the Evergreen Line construction, improvements to existing SkyTrain stations, and service improvements in Langley and Surrey. If the plan passes, Minister of Transportation Blair Lekstrom has said that he will introduce legislation this fall enabling the gas tax by April 2012.

The mayors cite increased traffic levels and the 19.6 percent jump in transit ridership from June 2010 to July 2011 (due to transportation mode shifts during the Olympics) as proof that the region is overdue for transit improvements. 2011-2012 is shaping up to be another record year. They also reflect on the vision of previous leaders, who in 1980 struggled with the concept of rapid transit lines but eventually decided in favour of them. Clearly, they see themselves in sync with the region’s early strides towards sustainability.

“We have had the debate. Now we must move from words to deeds. The decision we make on Friday will forge the path Greater Vancouver so badly needs. Passing the 2012 Supplemental Plan is the right decision for Metro Vancouver’s transportation system, economy, and future livability.” –Dianne Watts, Peter Fassbender, Richard Walton, Gregor Robertson, Pamela Goldsmith-Jones, Greg Moore, and Richard Stewart

However, the municipalities of Burnaby, Richmond, the City of North Vancouver, Delta, and Langley Township have said they will probably vote against the plan. This is surprising considering TransLink’s extensive public consultation during the creation of Moving Forward showed that 80% of those consulted agreed with the proposed improvements and 75% said the Evergreen Line was important in reaching the goals outlined in Transport 2040, the regional transportation strategy. It’s also surprising considering Burnaby and Richmond have both been big winners in terms of transit infrastructure: the three existing LRT lines have paid off for them. With municipal elections a mere five weeks away (November 16th), the stakes are high; yet the stakes for the region have never been higher.

Update: The Mayors’ Council voted to support the Moving Forward Plan with 70% support from its 22 members.

Skeptics reluctant to board the Ford train

As promised, new Toronto mayor Rob Ford has taken significant steps to kill Transit City, Toronto’s plan to build several new LRT lines in the coming years. Ford’s most recent move has been to encourage an extension of the Sheppard subway, which has only slightly more ridership (about 46,000/weekday) as the Finch bus line or the Spadina streetcar. Among the many problems with Ford’s proposal: a subway extension would cost much more, serve fewer people, cost the city and province a lot of money in plan redevelopment, and it would not be built until Ford loses what is left of his hair…not to mention the next municipal election.

The Sheppard subway extension would cost more than ten times as much as the LRT line proposed under Transit City. The mayor’s office is proposing a $13 billion extension to the existing subway line, instead of the $1.1 billion LRT line adopted in the Transit City plan. At least $5 billion would be raised through development cost levies and tax increment financing (TIF). TIF has been used extensively in the US, normally in areas that have suffered disinvestment for years, have a majority of low-income residents, low land values and often, an under-used rail line. When the state DOT takes on a transit-oriented development in the area, TIF is used to leverage funds: the city floats a bond and the money from the increased property values upon completion is used to fund the development. However, TIF hasn’t been used in Canada; to use it in Toronto, the proposed subway development would have to be approved by the province of Ontario. The laws governing TIF and development-cost levies would need to be updated. None of this is likely to happen before this year’s provincial election, and in Canada, governmental regime changes are death knells to public transit proposals.

There is a whole literature around public-private partnerships (or P3s), which have been very common in the past two decades. State infrastructure is expensive, whether it is hospitals, highways or LRT lines. In order to finance these projects, all three levels of government have become accustomed to contributing a part of the capital costs, while the private sector carries the majority of the burden. This in itself is not unusual in Canada: Vancouver’s Canada Line was built this way. While they seem to be good for the municipal budget, P3s often speed through crucial stages such as public participation. Private companies are not elected officials or state authorities; they aren’t as concerned about involving local residents in the planning process. This is part of their appeal for state authorities: a more streamlined process (as former BC Minister of Transport Kevin Falcon put it, when he eliminated TransLink’s elected board in favour of one made up of his private-sector appointees). Councillor Doug Ford, Rob Ford’s brother, recently said that he believed in the strong mayor system, where the mayor “should have veto power…he should have enough power to stop council.” Any P3 has the potential for less public control and less accountability.

There’s also the issue of ownership and maintenance of the line after its construction, and this is where things get a little sticky. Vancouver transit passengers complain to TransLink, for example, when they can’t find maps of the station, they want more security at stations, etc. But in fact, the British Columbia Rapid Transit Company (a subsidiary of TransLink) runs the Expo and Millennium lines, and ProTrans BC runs the Canada Line. This complexity is invisible to the frustrated passenger, and as a result TransLink, as a provincial body, bears the brunt of the criticism; it takes longer for TransLink to implement changes in customer service, orientation and other operational issues since it must go through an intermediary.

Ford argues that P3s using private funding are commonly used in Hong Kong (skeptics have pointed out that there might be a slight discrepancy in the densities between Toronto and Hong Kong). The Sheppard-Yonge corridor has attracted condo development, as John Lorinc and Kelly Grant point out (“What it will take to make subway plan a reality”, Globe and Mail), and there may well be developers interested in backing a new subway line. But the fact is that development has been much slower than either Mel Lastman or Rob Ford would like, and the ridership of the Sheppard line is no higher than the city’s busiest bus and streetcar lines. If the Sheppard extension is built and new development doesn’t happen as quickly as planned, the public will have to provide the funding shortfall.

A Sheppard subway extension would probably serve fewer people than the proposed LRT: the subway line would be 8km long and have 7 stops, while the LRT would be 12 km and have 26 stops. Anyone who’s driven or taken the bus along the busy section between Kennedy and Morningside will tell you that better transit is definitely needed here; a subway line would bypass this section altogether. Despite the Province’s (and Premier McGuinty’s) lackluster support of Transit City, the plan did propose much better service for Toronto’s suburbs, where the immigrant population is high; immigrants in Toronto have a much higher transit commuting rate than non-immigrants. Ford’s argument that “everyone wants subways” doesn’t fly either…despite the miniscule amount of subway infrastructure in the inner suburbs, there is barely any difference in ridership between the suburbs and the downtown. David Hulchanski’s “Three Cities” report, tracing thirty years of income polarization in Toronto, showed that 31% of those living in the inner city travelled to work by transit compared to 33% of those who lived in the outer suburbs.

Outside of the thorny acronymous issues of TIF and PPP, there is the incredible amount of taxpayers’ time and money Ford is wasting on forcing the TTC and Metrolinx to drop the plans they’ve been working on for years and instantly come up with a new subway plan. Everyone has been frustrated at the slow pace of building and financing expensive subway lines, and that was the appeal of the Transit City plan. Ford’s proposal, even if it made any financial sense, would take years and years to get off the ground, and by then Ford and McGuinty won’t be in power any more (remember the proposed Queen subway line?) Transit City, for all its criticisms, was adopted and funded by the Province. Ground has been broken. Contracts have been signed. We have only to recall the tumultuous history of the original Sheppard subway to know how rare this is, and how hard Toronto residents, councillors, and transit advocates fought to get a plan that worked for the growing inner suburbs. Bringing all of this momentum to a screeching halt has left Toronto with one hell of a concussion; Transit City languishes in a tangled heap. When your skeptics are people like Dr. Eric Miller and former city budget chief Shelley Carroll, you might want to call in the paramedics and do some damage control.

SCARP + SALA: the design process

Many of you (hundreds, in fact) have been following my posts about the new SCARP/SALA building. As you know, Shape Architecture/FeildenCleggBradley Studios (architects) and PWL Partnership (landscape architects) will be producing a feasibility study and the anticipated full design for the UBC Integrated Planning and Design Facility. Andrew Harrison (DEGW), a leading expert in learning environments, and Atelier 10 are also involved. In addition to the public events planned this semester, an IPD Working Group has been created with the design team and representatives from all the stakeholders: SCARP Masters students, PhD students and faculty; SALA Masters students and faculty; UBC Properties Trust, Buildings Operations, Campus and Community Planning and Infrastructure Development; the Belkin Art Gallery, Applied Science, and the Faculty of Arts. I am a PhD rep, with fellow SCARP students Rohit Mujumdar (PhD), Erica Lay (Masters) and Jessie Singer (Masters), so I have an inside view into this stage of the design process. I’ll be providing regular updates on this after the three “event weeks” that are planned: Learning Landscapes (Jan 14th), Spaces for Learning (Feb 11), and Low Energy Landscapes (March 25).

Each Event Week begins with a kickoff event in a social environment, then there is a public lecture on campus, and an all-day IPD Working Group workshop. This week was focused on Learning Landscapes.

The kick-off event was held downtown and got a great turnout. The public lecture featured presentations by Andrew Harrison and Peter Clegg, and short segués by Nick Sully and Alec Smith from Shape, and Derek Lee from PWL. Andrew’s presentation did a great job of showing different types of learning environments at universities and colleges: from specialized spaces (science labs, workshops, computer labs) to general use spaces (student lounge, reading room, café). Even hallways can be designed to facilitate conversation and collaboration (he called them “learning corridors”). I’m hoping Andrew will make his presentation available online so you can all see it.

The Working Group meets every two weeks, including the workshops each month during the Event Weeks. For this first workshop, we were asked to consider questions such as “How does a changing studio culture within architecture resonate with SCARP and the Arts?” and “How much time do students/faculty spend teaching/researching/writing/drawing/discussing ideas?” We were asked to submit images that represented the culture of learning in our programs. Then at the workshop, we discussed these ideas in more depth, both in large-group and small-group conversations. The five images shown on the right were provided by the SCARP Masters reps. (Outside of the IPD Working Group, SCARP is running a Directed Studies class, which will be meeting regularly with the design team to discuss their ideas. The students organized a survey, held a visioning workshop and presented the responses to the survey in the format of images to the Working Group.) The text images (general, specialized, and informal learning spaces) were produced with Wordle, which allows you to represent the number of times each word/concept was raised by font size (similar to my website’s “tag cloud” on the right).

It was really interesting to hear from the UBC folks as well as those in the adjacent arts buildings (Music in particular). Some ideas that were discussed were the switch from hand-drawing to digital work in architecture, the need for more social space to discuss ideas, the need for a shift in educational approaches, and the possibilities for shared infrastructure (like photocopying/printing space). Another interesting idea was having faculty offices closely aligned to the student workspaces: Larry Frank from SCARP said he’d like his office to be closer to the transportation modelling lab and also students who use the space. Peter Clegg told us about his virtually paperless office in Bath, where there are no drawing tables at all because everything is done digitally. Scott Watson, curator of the Belkin Art Gallery, raised the idea of having informal exhibition space available in the studios so that students could look at each other’s work as it progressed, and we discussed the idea of “open studio week” where students would host visitors from the broader campus and community.

However, as a research-based program, I still feel that SCARP’s needs are not being addressed: Peter actually admitted that we needed to tell him what we meant by research. SCARP Director Penny Gurstein and Larry Frank both raised the issue of research space, but all of us still felt the issue needed to be further discussed. Larry’s definition of a studio was a good fit for SCARP (a space where people learn in a collaborative way), and the studio culture is changing so much anyway: no need for glassed-in spaces when everyone works on computers. When I said that most SCARP students would graduate without ever drawing anything, Peter asked if that was okay. I think it is, but then I may be biased because I already have those skills from my undergrad in landscape architecture. I should have asked if it’s okay that SALA students graduate without knowing participatory planning or municipal planning processes? We have a lot to learn from each other: many SCARP students would like to learn how to draw, read plans and understand design terminology, and likewise I think SALA students would like to learn about how to build the structures and landscapes they want within the current planning framework and processes. I also think SCARP students could learn how to represent written work in a visual format through diagramming, short film/animations, and the like; and as a former landscape architecture student myself, I imagine that the SALA students could benefit from more attention to their research and writing skills.

Another alarming comment: when Leslie Van Duzer, Director of SALA, discussed the three areas used in assessing faculty for tenure (teaching, research and service), one of the SHAPE architects asked what service was. Now this could just be a terminology issue, but it’s also possible that SALA does a lot less community service than SCARP. Both Larry and Leslie raised the need for specific spaces that could be used for community meetings and to welcome visitors to the new building. Of course service means more than that (participation in groups such as the IPD Working Group or on committees/councils for your professional association are also service activities), but I get the sense that because architecture isn’t a field where all the faculty are PhD-holders with tenure-track positions, there’s a weak understanding of both research and service.

At the end of Event Week 1, I’m cautiously optimistic about the IPD design process. There seems to be a great deal of interest from all the stakeholders and the public, people are raising many innovative ideas and willing to collaborate with each other, and there’s a general feeling of trust among the various players. But there are definitely some issues that need to be worked out: a better understanding of SCARP’s teaching and learning processes, a governance model for the new building (considering that SCARP and SALA are under two different administrative units), and the issues of research and service. It’s also unclear how much these workshops will influence the design: how will the design team use our ideas and responses to their thought-provoking questions? Planning students and faculty will continue to watch the process closely, since “that’s what planners do.”

If you’re interested in keeping up with the IPD process, or giving the design team feedback on any element of the process so far, go to ubcipd.wordpress.com. The site has photos from the events, news from the design team, and details on upcoming public lectures. Here’s the current list, but any changes would be listed on the website.

Event Week 2: Space for Learning

Public Kick-off Event February 11, 2011 5:30-6:00 pm Lasserre Lobby

Public Lecture February 21, 2011 6:30-7:45 pm Math 100

Working Committee Workshop February 22, 2011 8:30-4:30 pm Liu Centre Multipurpose Room

Event Week 3: Low Energy Landscapes

Public Kick-off Event March 25, 2011 5:30-6:00 pm Lasserre Lobby

Public Lecture March 28, 2011 6:30-7:45 pm Math 100

Working Committee Workshop March 29, 2011 8:30-4:30 pm Liu Centre Multipurpose Room

Transit? Who needs it?

New Toronto mayor Rob Ford has been making headlines: and not in a good way. Ford has long been a controversial figure, and this summer’s mayoralty race was no exception. Echoing Mel Lastman, a similarly polarizing figure, Ford seems an odd fit for such a multicultural, cosmopolitan, and diverse city. He’s at best a pompous blowhard with insights into the political process; at worst, depending on your information source, he’s a racist homophobe who doesn’t support affordable housing, public transit, or any of the other pressing needs of the burgeoning city. But like Lastman, who was in office for six years, Ford will likely have a lasting effect on the City of Toronto.

In Canada’s biggest city, where 22% of the population takes transit, Ford has decided that transit is the enemy. On December 1st, his first day in office, he managed to kill the city’s proposed vehicle registration tax, freeze property taxes, and get council’s approval to have the Toronto Transit Commission deemed an essential service. With this designation, the TTC will be unable to strike, and union leaders say they’ll fight the decision, which will be made by Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty.

McGuinty and regional transit planning authority Metrolinx also have to deal with Ford’s tyrannical attack on Transit City, an initiative that was seven years in the making and is already being built. The province, after approving the construction of four LRT lines, announced this spring that they may not be able to fund the entire plan at this time. Ford wants to scrap Transit City entirely, arguing that streetcars cause traffic congestion, and everyone prefers subways anyway. He wants to extend the Sheppard subway line to meet up with the Scarborough RT instead, even if the high cost of this option means that no other transit infrastucture can be built in Toronto. Perhaps he isn’t aware that one of Transit City’s approved lines was a retrofit of the Scarborough RT, which is rapidly deteriorating, and another was a Sheppard LRT that would extend much farther than the subway will? In vain, Metrolinx tried to convince Ford that many other options were more suitable and affordable than subway extension, but surprisingly, the man who claims to be so concerned about taxpayers’ wallets wants the most expensive option. The main beneficiaries of Transit City were to be the inner suburbs: Etobicoke, Scarborough, North York. Neighbouring municipalities like Mississauga also strongly support Transit City. David Hulchanski, who just released an update to his popular “Three Cities within Toronto” study, says that building LRT is the answer to slowing or reversing the segregation of the city by income. Doesn’t Ford feel a responsibility to represent the suburban “working man” that elected him?

Electing Ford represents frustration: residents are frustrated with the way their city is run. Suburban residents see traffic congestion, unreliable public transit, job losses, and rising taxes, and they want things to change. What they don’t see is that municipalities are chronically underfunded by the provincial government in ways that matter: it is the provincial government that funds transit and road infrastructure, and a good proportion of job creation also comes from provincial initiatives. This underfunding leads the TTC to strike, since they rarely have the money for either their capital or operating costs, and also requires the city to raise money in other ways, usually new or increased taxes. Canadian cities have precious few mechanisms to generate money, and unfortunately taxes are among the few. The vehicle registration tax would have raised $64 million for the City of Toronto; Ford has not announced another way of raising the money. Opponents claim that it is “mathematically impossible” that these two tax losses won’t cause any service cuts for City residents. Cancelling Transit City could cost the province fees for broken contracts: $137 million has already been spent on Transit City and $1.3 billion is committed. In fact, for a pro-business, right-wing mayor, Ford doesn’t seem to be very good at managing money. Perhaps his 2011 budget review will inform him that transit actually makes money for the City of Toronto: former budget chief Shelley Carroll says that high transit ridership contributed to a year-end operating surplus.

Both Lastman and Ford came into office at a time of economic recession. Both came to power after a period of progress for the City of Toronto: Barbara Hall (1994-1997) preceded Lastman and David Miller (2003-2010) preceded Ford. Both Lastman and Ford claimed to appeal to suburban “ordinary people”: indeed, the voting maps of Toronto illustrate the pervasive divide the media loves to play up (the Globe and Mail included). We know from US elections that the maps don’t tell all: as Joshua Kertzer and Jonathan Naymark wrote in the National Post,

“This attempt to create a downtown versus suburb cleavage is at best a distraction, and at worst, sets a dangerous precedent.”

Toronto's 2010 Election Results

Toronto's 1997 Election Results

Perhaps most tellingly, both Ford and Lastman faced a slew of opponents for mayor: Lastman was one of over thirty candidates, while Ford was one of 40. According to the City of Toronto’s website, 383,501 voters elected Ford: 813,984 actually voted in the election. So, 47% of voters, who represented 35.3% of the City of Toronto’s population, elected him: that’s 16.7% of the city’s population. Lastman, the first mayor elected after Toronto announced its amalgamation with five suburban municipalities, won by a slim margin of about 41,000 votes. In times of discord and recession, the appeal of the right-wing, cost-saving, businessman is strongest.

The next three years will be momentous ones in Canada’s biggest city. Ford will have to make allies in the provincial government if he wants to keep taxes low. Let’s hope that Ford has a fight on his hands, at least as far as transit is concerned: it takes very little to kill programs and policies that have taken years to approve. As Councillor Janet Davis said, “For the first time [we're] expanding transit across the city that we waited generations for — the mayor can’t walk in on Day 1 and say, ‘it’s gone.’ It doesn’t work like that.” If anything, Ford’s rising star only proves how little power cities have over the issues that really matter to them, and how limited their sources of funding really are. The problem is that Ford’s blustery, and logic-free, decision-making will have long-term consequences on the City of Toronto: Lastman managed to have the Sheppard subway built, against the TTC’s advice. The result was a white elephant, no funding for additional services that the system badly needed, and at one point the streetcars running at very low speeds to cope with deteriorating tracks. While Vancouver is no stranger to provincial wrangling over transit infrastructure, at least we have a mayor who cycles to work and strongly supports sustainable transportation.

…and the winner is…

UBC just issued a press release announcing the winning architectural team for the new SCARP/SALA building. I’m happy to announce that the joint venture of Shape Architecture/FeildenCleggBradley Studios (architects) and PWL Partnership (landscape architects) will be producing a feasibility study and the anticipated full design for the UBC Integrated Planning and Design Facility. Joining the core design team is Andrew Harrison (DEGW), a leading expert in learning environments as well as Atelier 10, consultants in sustainable design. SCARP students will be watching the new team, anticipating their plans to involve faculty, staff, and students in the design process. This was one of the strengths of the winning team’s presentation.

Thanks to our Director Penny Gurstein and Assistant Professor Maged Senbel, SCARP faculty members who have been very involved in this process, and also to the many SCARP and SALA students that got involved in the process, met as committees, and voiced their opinions on what kinds of spaces we wanted to create in the new building. Several landscape architecture students were particularly active in the process and I think inspired a few of us SCARP students to participate more. It’s so rare that my predictions are accurate, and even more rare that the best team actually wins. All you SCARPies out there, come and help us celebrate tomorrow night at the Museum of Vancouver.

On a side note, my two earlier blog posts about our new building generated an unexpected level of interest: over a hundred and fifty of you read them! The second post broke my all-time record for the most views in a single day, with 72 views. Thanks for visiting, and come back again for more planning, urban design, and urban development miscellany.

SCARP + SALA: design presentations

As I wrote in my last post, SCARP and SALA are currently choosing an integrated design team for our new building, an addition to the existing Lasserre building at UBC. Two teams presented last week, and two this week. The winning team will be announced October 20th. Since we were encouraged to send along our comments on the presentations to the committee who will be choosing the best of the four teams, I thought it might be worthwhile to discuss them here.

The four short-listed teams were follows:

Patkau Architects
Teeple Architects and Proscenium Interiors
Shape Architects and FieldenCleggBradley
OMA and CEI Architecture

Here are the videos for these presentations online: Week 1 (Patkau and Teeple) and Week 2 (Shape and OMA).

I’m sure that Patkau did think about how classroom space, lecture spaces, and offices would be designed compared to studio spaces, because they had diagrams showing the breakdown of program space in the new building. However, it was not clear from their presentation how they planned to differentiate these types of spaces and functions. I was alarmed by their use of the Harvard Graduate School of Design as an example of “good” studio design. Having visited the GSD, I felt that the student spaces were cold and mechanistic, and sound control in this space is not great. The other examples Patkau showed (like the Winnipeg Public Library) were all basically glass boxes. Obviously, in Vancouver it would be great to use as much natural light as possible, but sound controls are going to be an issue. Likewise, they did use students’ quotes and work in their presentation, but it was not clear how they might involve students in the design process. Moreover, the landscape design was still too embryonic to figure out at this point, and do we really want to bring the focus of the building inward, like every other modernist building on campus? Why not address the street (either one) and create a space that can actually be used during the (rainy) school year?

Teeple went a little further in their approach. They did show some specific examples of small-scale student spaces (at Langara, SFU, MacMillan, the Stephen Hawking Institute), perhaps because Proscenium focuses on interiors. While Patkau talked about the need for social spaces, Teeple actually showed examples of comfortable smaller student lounges and work spaces. As a landscape architect I will add that since the proposed SCARP/SALA building aspires to be a green building, it is a huge coup having Cornelia Oberlander as the landscape architect on their team. She was designing sustainable landscapes way before they were trendy, and has decades of experience understanding site, microclimate, and people’s use of space, which will be crucial in the design of the open spaces and axes that will anchor the new building. Although the team didn’t let her speak much, Cornelia is very careful about working with architects who will allow her to play a major role in the overall building design.

I definitely felt that Shape and FieldenCleggBradley have the necessary experience, collaboration with each other, and the most interesting proposal. In particular, I felt that their presentation style was indicative of the close working partnership the team has: each spoke for an equal amount of time, each spoke highly of the other team members, and each fielded questions in their areas of expertise. I felt that the landscape architects, with their local UBC experience in participatory process, was also a major strength. They seemed to “get” the idea of collaboration, combining these three different areas of study in both the building itself and the building process. I also liked the projects highlighting their use of artificial light made to look natural, as this will likely be needed in the rainy, dark Vancouver climate. FCB’s experiences in the UK, a very similar climate to ours, will be very useful in terms of the building’s design, lighting, and materials. Teeple was the only other team that convinced me that they would design interesting, functional, and well-designed smaller spaces within the SCARP/SALA building. These two teams were the strongest in terms of their commitment to the overall design: landscape, relationship to existing buildings on the site, the building itself, and its interior spaces.

As expected, OMA’s approach to “iconic” architecture was troublesome and problematic for our site and building, since it is a small addition, rather than a brand-new structure. Ultimately, we don’t want form over function. In terms of function, although they were the only ones to offer a glimpse of how the interior space might be broken down, the hierarchies emerge: the majority of the space was designated as studios, and the highest floors and best views as private offices. Even though the firm supposedly does landscape architecture as well as architecture, their proposal was particularly weak in the interaction of the building with the site: the weakest of all the groups. I don’t even remember OMA mentioning the name of the landscape architecture firm they would be working with, which I think says a lot about their attitude towards their collaborators. I feel that they are still working in the modernist-brutalist tradition, and frankly UBC has enough giant, bland glass and concrete buildings and vast empty open plazas already.

In general, I felt that Patkau, Teeple and OMA were overwhelmed by the concept of designing a design school, and spent way too much time claiming they were going to build something that would put Vancouver on the map. We need well-designed, functional spaces for students and faculty. It would be nice if the building was also innovative, but I would leave that to the sustainability features rather than the mere design characteristics. Star-chitecture is not always great design, and in most cases the interaction of these buildings with their surroundings is jarring, not to mention their impact on the pedestrian realm. I still think that all three of these teams think they’re designing an architecture building, and while several have designed research-based buildings before, they don’t consider this to be a research facility, since SALA students don’t do the type of social science research we do at SCARP. I think this is problematic since about 80% of SCARP students are in streams other than urban design, and will not be working in studio-type settings. This is partly why the Shape team is the strongest: they had a more developed design process and seemed to anticipate the difficulties of designing a building that would house three different programs with different needs. OMA emerges as the weakest not only because their previous work highlights their modernist attitude towards design and collaboration, but also a lack of interest in participatory processes; all three of the other teams mentioned specific steps they would take to involve students and faculty at all three programs (particularly Shape, who had very specific events planned to involve the public in the design process).

Of course, we see only the public presentations. The committee responsible for choosing the winning team (made up of faculty and students in all three programs) started by interviewing 23 teams and shortlisting these four, who were also interviewed in depth after their presentations. It will be interesting to see which emerges as the winner come October 20th.

TransportCamp

No, TransportCamp isn’t a bunch of transit geeks getting together at a fantasy camp in the woods. In fact, it’s a transportation “unconference” that brings together people from variety of fields with an interest in sustainable transportation. The participants are actively involved, from brainstorming ideas to generating sessions for the day. There are no formal presentations, no PowerPoint, no real organizational structure other than brief opening and closing remarks. Toronto held a TransportCamp last year, and Vancouver decided to follow suit today, with the event held at the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT) building downtown.

I was skeptical about this event, even more so when I received an update about a week ago from organizer Bernadette Amiscaray. She works for the Car Co-op, a major sponsor of this event, and from her email it seemed to me like we’d be doing more Facebooking and Tweeting than face-to-face networking, which I wasn’t that excited about. But having forced myself out of bed on a typically dark grey Vancouver morning, I was pleasantly surprised by TransportCamp.

First of all, while I did see some familiar faces from the School of Community and Regional Planning (past and present) I also met people from architecture firms, engineering companies, municipalities, and the provincial government. There were transit advocates and bike share/car share representatives, and students from SFU, BCIT, and UBC. Some had a wealth of experience implementing programs or policies, while others had only ideas of where they wanted to see transportation innovations happen. In this way, the experience was a lot like SCARP’s recent Housing Symposium for Affordable Housing. Old connections were deepened and new ones made. This was enhanced by ample time for chatting between sessions and at the lunch break. But the organizers also placed brown bags out, encouraging participants to write an issue on the front: anyone else interested in the issue could drop in their business cards and the organizers would make sure the group got in touch with each other through a listserv. They asked if we wanted our emails to be included on a general listserv around sustainable transportation issues.

Second of all, like Gordon Price, who offered the closing remarks, I had never been to a conference where the participants created the agenda and sessions themselves. It was done in quite a simple way: the organizers asked people to volunteer ideas for sessions. As people raised ideas, another organizer typed them directly into a chart on his computer, which was hooked up to a digital projector so everyone could see it. They quickly filled in the chart, which had available rooms on one side and available time slots along the top. Then they kept going, writing down other ideas as they came. Once all the ideas for sessions were up, they asked if they could merge some sessions together so they all fit in the alloted spaces/times. We then wrote down the times/locations of the sessions we wanted to attend. It seems so simple, but somehow it worked.

The sessions were very simple and low-tech. The group (from 10-20 people usually) would select a note-taker and a facilitator, then begin discussing the idea. Session ideas ranged from civic engagement to transit-oriented development to social media; one participant suggested “congestion: friend or foe”. Each session was an hour in length, generated a ton of both old and new ideas, and bridged the divide between activists and policymakers, students and professionals, pessimists and optimists. It was inspiring to be surrounded by people who genuinely believe in sustainable transportation and are committed to it in their own way. I’m used to that at school (students are at most times fairly optimistic) but it was great to be among a whole range of people of various ages who, although they might disagree on timing and methods of persuasion and priorities, at least agree that we need better transportation options for everyone in this region.

Some interesting ideas shared in the three sessions I attended included examples of car-free housing developments in Sweden and Toronto, the TTC using Twitter to interact with transit users and send out service updates, using social media sites to allow participants to create an organization’s vision/mission, and giving municipalities in the region “credits” for their adherence to the regional plan (such as preserving their Agricultural Land Reserve properties or issuing development permits within transit-accessible areas). Best of all, the whole day was short and sweet: an opening brainstorming session at 8:30am followed by a half hour generating the sessions, then three one-hour sessions, ending at 3:30pm.

I’m particularly impressed with the low-tech, low-organizational needs for this type of event, which has lots of interesting implications for working with communities, disengaged populations, etc. All you need is a few organizers, a few rooms, a small registration fee ($25 in this case) to cover snacks and lunch, and people willing to share their ideas. There was supposed to be wireless service set up, and we were encouraged to bring our computers, but unfortunately BCIT’s wireless service was down today. I actually think this might have been a strength of today’s TransportCamp because this forced people to chat and share ideas more than Tweet them. I am doing my part by blogging about it though, despite having the reputation of a Luddite. Long live simple solutions!

SCARP Affordable Housing Symposium

No matter what your profession, you’ve probably been to your share of conferences. From professional to academic, trade shows to think tanks, conferences are still the most popular way to share your research and ideas with a larger audience. In academia, paper presentations and face-to-face networking with other academics are still the norm even in our increasingly wired society. Similarly, practicing planners share their policies, plans and tools with each other at the Canadian Institute of Planners/American Planning Association conferences, and their provincial and state equivalents.

I confess that while I gain a lot from these events, and often meet other interesting researchers in the field, I find the whole thing a bit draining. Several days of listening to presentations and networking is tiring. The other thing is that there seems to be a divide in the types of people these conferences attract: practicing planners go to one conference and academics to another. It’s rare that you have that blend of practicing planners, academic researchers, and those working in municipal, regional and federal policy development.

Last March, students at SCARP organized such an event on sustainability, and I wrote in an earlier post about the success of this one-day symposium and our PhD panel on research dissemination. SCARP repeated the success of this event with another one-day symposium on affordable housing funded by the BC provincial government and several key sponsors like VanCity and the Planning Institute of BC. Papers were presented by both Masters and PhD planning students, municipal planners, housing developers, architects, and more. It was a rare confluence of research, policy development and practical planning tools that have impacted the construction of affordable housing in Canada. Some of the sessions I attended included Haley Mousseau (BC Non-Profit Housing Association) on the long-term survival of non-profit housing units in the province; Andy Yan (Bing Thom Architects) on the impact of empty condos on Vancouver, and Vanessa Kay (internship for the City of Vancouver) research on the long-term costs associated with amenity spaces in Vancouver condos.

The breadth of experience in the room was palpable, and it was easy to strike up conversations over breakfast, lunch, and the cocktail hour with (in my case) the director of a shelter, a housing provider in a suburban municipality, a planning consultant working extensively on housing development, an academic researcher looking at sustainable neighbourhoods, a PhD candidate in geography at UBC, and a Masters student who had travelled from northeastern US to attend the symposium. Best of all, the one-day format kept things moving and packed a lot of information into a short amount of time. The only problem I overheard participants discussing was that there were concurrent sessions, so it was impossible to hear all the presentations.

It’s easy for us to become entrenched and isolated in our little silos, whether it’s a municipal department of planning or an academic faculty. Events like this provide a rare opportunity to share our work with a wider audience and to learn from a variety of different viewpoints. The short length of the symposium effectively limited participation to those within a short distance of the host city, forcing people to develop better ties in their own locality. While there is a place for big conferences, and connecting with people over continents who share our interests, it’s a sad fact that few of us have the time to create or maintain local research/practice networks outside the context of our immediate projects.

Next week I’ll be attending another rather unconventional conference, or rather “un-conference” called TransportCamp, which uses multimedia techniques to foster dialogue between participants. A similar event was held in Toronto in April 2008. I’m skeptical, but I’ll let you know how it turns out.

Ren Thomas

M.A., Ph.D. (Planning)