Planning Pool

A few of this week’s stories from the NewsPool are highlighted below, featuring some different takes on accommodating growth from around the world, as well as a reflection at the closing of the annual American Planning Association (APA) conference. Click on the links for some end-of-week reading!

Earth Day is coming up next week (April 22). This unofficial Earth Day flag is in the public domain.

Perhaps the most surprising piece of planning-related news this week was the US military acknowledgement (finally!) that oil shortages may be on the near horizon. This is sure to lend a greater sense of urgency to planning for a post-peak world.

US military warns oil output may dip causing massive shortages by 2015
Surplus oil production capacity could disappear within a … Continue Reading

Thanks to Martin Heigan on Flickr for this beautiful Creative Commons photo.

For the past three months, I have had the pleasure of participating in a series of discussions led by Dr. Bill Rees on the subject of the Post-Carbon City. It has been invigorating and exciting to imagine how we will transition out of our fossil fuel dependence. A key theme to these discussions has been: “What will the new economy look like when constrained by the social and ecological limits of our world?”

In a few weeks, this question (and many more) will be explored in greater detail when Vancouver hosts North America’s first ever De-Growth Conference from April 29 to May 2, 2010.

Speakers include: Vanessa Timmer, Peter Victor, Rex … Continue Reading

Typical Greater Toronto sprawl that Ontario is trying to prevent. Thanks to Carnotzet on Flickr for the great Creative Commons photo!

In Ontario, as in many other parts of North America, the gulf between what we know about city building and how we actually build our cities is pretty wide. Despite the province’s numerous attempts to eliminate sprawl, the same old car-oriented subdivisions keep springing up around the edges of the Greater Toronto Area. Last month, however, a glimmer of hope burst through the doors of the provincial legislature. After spending over half a year reviewing Durham Region’s Growth Plan, The Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing sent it back to the drawing board, claiming that there are “fundamental issues” with the document.

Why is … Continue Reading

Perhaps the last installment in live blogging from the 2009 CIP conference, this session (held October 3) dealt with growth management, a critical issue for many North American cities. This summary focuses on the presentations of two of the session’s speakers.

Russ Mathew, a planner from Toronto, ON with Hemson Consulting, spoke about the new Growth Plan for Canada’s most populous urban area. The Greater Golden Horseshoe includes the Greater Toronto Area as well as smaller subcentres. Looking ahead to 2031, the Plan sets numeric targets for residential and employment density (an average of 50 residents + jobs per hectare) as well as intensification of currently built-up areas (40% of new housing is to be accommodated within the current built-up area, especially transit-oriented growth centres.) Russ is concerned about the plan’s focus on predictive numeric targets instead of livable design, and … Continue Reading