City and Regional Strategies

Working at the scale of cities.

Cities matter more than they ever have to our collective well-being and quality of life. To remain competitive, in both local and global markets, cities must continue to nurture and accommodate new jobs, people, institutions and cultural offerings as we look forward to a very dynamic future. To meet these challenges, cities large and small must continue to be renewed in an inclusive, sustainable and economically viable manner. Assets must be protected, enhanced and leveraged; infrastructure and transportation investment coordinated with development; institutions and communities strengthened; environmental networks reinforced, and new and beautiful places created.

Good planning is a positive and proactive process, operating through a system of plan preparation and control over the development and use of land. We are experts in creating the necessary policy plans to ensure that good planning decisions are made by municipalities. Our plans, whether they be city-wide or neighbourhood specific, act as a blueprint in guiding Council decisions for managing social, economic, and physical future. We work in a diversity of communities from coast to coast to coast in Canada, and internationally.

To help our clients become the most appealing, livable and well-managed communities, our policy documents integrate and direct all future land use planning, design, transportation, environmental and development decisions. We work with our municipal clients and community stakeholders to identify shared goals, prioritize aspirations, craft supporting policies, create clear maps and plans and prepare development directions that are best able to shape the community according to its goals, including tools such as Zoning By Laws, Urban Design Guidelines and Form-Based Code.

Urban Strategies provides expert planning advice and testimony in defense of municipal secondary plans and other policy, liaising with City council, advising and consulting with City staff on policy interpretation and providing strategic advice on an ongoing basis.

Regional Strategies

Regional planning is one of our core areas of service. In Canada, Urban Strategies’ involvement in various growth management studies and public engagement activities for Provincial, Regional and Municipal level governments within Ontario, Alberta, BC and New Brunswick, positions us to effectively understand the local dynamic and applied context of growth planning, implementation and performance. We have also developed national-level physical development policy in Barbados, resulting in a completely new growth management and policy framework that addressed contemporary development pressures and issues of sustainability and environmental resource management.

• City-Wide Strategic Planning
• Community Engagement & Stakeholder Engagement
• Complete Communities
• Comprehensive Planning
• Downtown and Main Street Strategies
• Expert Testimony
• Geospatial Analysis
• Heritage Conservation District Planning
• Parks and Open Space Planning
• Regional Growth Management
• Sustainable Community Design
• Transit Oriented Communities Planning and Design
• Urban Design Guidelines
• Visioning
• Visualization, 3D Renderings and Animation
• Zoning By-laws
• Form Based Code
• Official Community Plans

“We work with our municipal clients and community stakeholders to identify shared goals, prioritize aspirations, craft supporting policies, create clear maps and plans and prepare development directions that are best able to shape the community according to its goals.”