Planning Pool

Over the course of a few decades, a neighbourhood’s demand for school infrastructure can change dramatically. Changes in population size or composition fuel the need for new schools or erode the viability of existing ones. The effects of these demographic changes are highly localized, since the residential catchment area of an urban elementary school is generally less than a one kilometer radius around the school site.

Cranberry School in Powell River, BC, shown above, was closed in 1983. Its playing fields are still maintained and used by local sports teams, but children from the Cranberry neighbourhood now attend school in other parts of Powell River. To the dismay of local heritage preservationists, the Cranberry School building, built in 1930, sits empty … Continue Reading

The first morning of the Gaining Ground, Resilient Cities conference concluded with a presentation by Paul Hawken, renowned author of Natural Capitalism, the Ecology of Commerce, and Blessed Unrest. His remarks followed up on Mayor Gregor Robertson’s introduction of Vancouver’s Greenest City Initiative, so he opened by teasing Vancouver about our good-looking and charismatic mayor, whose work he takes seriously.

Creative Commons photo of Paul Hawken from 2007 by the Rainforest Action Network.

Hawken’s hopeful message is that resiliency is innate to cities, which are the most effective and natural epicenters of change. Humans’ most complex creations, cities are resilient for the same reason that ecosystems are resilient – with complexity comes efficiency. Culturally, … Continue Reading

This afternoon’s session, entitled “Old Age Ain’t for Sissies and What that Means for Planners” was a full house. The enthusiasm shown for this topic indicates that planners are very aware of impending demographic changes that will require accommodating aging communities to become a planning priority. The moderator, Don May, opened the presentation with a mind-boggling time-lapse series of Canadian population pyramids from the late 19th century. (You can see a similar series of pyramids online here.) Canada expects an 86% increase in its senior population over the next 20 years; by 2041, one in four Canadians will be over 65.