Lena Sanz Tovar

Lena is an Urban Planner and researcher whose work has focused on cultural heritage preservation, land use planning and community development in various communities in Toronto. She is passionate about bringing people and communities together through planning, ensuring that they are representative and accepting of all. Through Lena’s professional experience at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy and Innis College, she has worked to examine indicators of neighbourhood change and understand the lived experiences of underrepresented youth as a result of ongoing redevelopment in Regent Park. She has also explored commercial displacement prevention methods through a graduate workshop project in Little Jamaica; and worked to assess the relationship between built form, lived experience and social outcomes in the Annex neighbourhood through her work at the Bloor-Annex Business Improvement Area.

At Urban Strategies, Lena is exploring opportunities to convert various underutilized employment sites into vibrant and active mixed-use areas in the City of Mississauga. In the Weston Park redevelopment, Lena contributed to a community services & facilities study, assessing the community services and facilities that currently available to future residents generated by the proposed development. She is also contributing to the Canada Square redevelopment project.