In-depth

Previous In-depths Landmark land settlement Carbon Conundrum Caribou in Canada The Mackenzie Delta Torngat Mountains Queen Charlotte Islands (Haida Gwaii) Travels with Louis British Columbia's Gulf Islands Moose on the loose Sustainable cities Icebergs Canada's musical landscape Quebec's James Bay Ottawa Valley Green with jade Hunting for cures Wild horses Canada's Bison Canada's place in the world Lessons learned in schools Power of powwows Cougars in Canada Greenland sharks Boreal birds Arctic grizzlies Lake Erie's Fire in the boreal forest Energy matters Parks for all Bighorn sheep Finding our way in the wilderness Shipwrecks of Nova Scotia Canada's grizzly bears

A wall of houses welcomes you into suburbia, communities James Howard Kunstler considered to be “the greatest misallocation of resources in the history of the world.” Photo: ©iStockphoto.com/Michelle Junior

FEATURES The natural city • Toronto's green rooftops Beat the street • City Repair Ottawa • It’s off telework we go… Back-to-the-future urbanism • Urban planning timeline • Ode to Jane Jacobs Building up sustainability • Green technologies DEPARTMENTS • Knowledge Toolbox • Cartographer’s table • Just the facts • CG vault

Back-to-the-future urbanism
By Melanie Sharp

1893 - The City Beautiful campaign begins in Canada. Originating in the U.S., the campaign is a citizen movement promoting the creation of urban parks, street tree planting and public art, and is a rejection of increasingly overcrowded, poor and unsanitary city living conditions.

1909 - The Canadian Commission of Conservation is established. Its original mandate is monitoring natural resources, but urban issues soon become a priority.

1919 - Adams is elected president of The Town Planning Institute of Canada. Members include architects, engineers, surveyors and landscape specialists. The professional organization still exists today as the Canadian Institute of Planners.

1924 - Kitchener passes Canada’s first zoning bylaw. Zoning, traffic regulations and road widening are top priorities for Canadian town-planners during the 1920s.

1930s - Urban planning projects slow down during the Depression. The government provides unemployment relief projects for infrastructure construction and the social housing movement gains momentum.

1947 - Canada’s first urban planning university program begins at McGill University in Montréal.

1953 - Construction begins on Toronto’s Don Mills suburb. Completed in 1962 with four housing quadrants, a local high school and a shopping centre, Don Mills sets a new precedent for neighbourhood urban expansion.

1959 - Construction of Canada’s first large-scale urban-renewal project is completed in Toronto’s Regent Park. “Urban-renewal,” or large-scale social housing projects, were popular during the post-war era but are now considered social disasters for creating poor inner-city ghettos.

1970s - The environmental movement gains momentum in Canada. Principles of environmental protection and conservation are beginning to be applied to urban planning initiatives.

1987 - United Nation’s World Commission on Environment and Development coins the term “sustainable development.”

1992 - Rio de Janeiro hosts the United Nations Earth Summit. Leaders from more than 100 countries attend, making history as the largest intergovernmental gathering. The conference led to the adoption of Agenda 21, a plan of action for sustainable urban development and planning.

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