Creating Sustainable Urban Communities

^{Image above – Montreal, Canada}

What concepts should inform plans to create sustainable cities, considering projected population increases? The urban population is expected to more than double by 2050, with 7 out of 10 people living in cities.¹

Eric Peissel:  There are multiple concepts that contribute to shaping sustainable cities—ranging from livability and quality of life to social equity and environmental health. Population growth  and increasing rates of urbanization will certainly add pressure to what is already a complex challenge with a myriad of actors. On top of that, there is a need to limit urban sprawl, which has been embedded in the way many urban landscapes have been planned and designed since suburbanization started in the middle of the last century. Sprawling development has led to fragmented communities and extensive reliance on cars, which facilitated the rise of urban sprawl in the first place.

To address sprawling communities, urban planners, policymakers, real estate developers and others in the public and private sectors responsible for developing the urban realm need to work collaboratively with a shared focus on ways to support public transport and active transport options and repurpose aging infrastructure to promote more connected communities.

In parallel, protecting and increasing green spaces within the built environment is essential to support quality of life, biodiversity, resilience and cleaner air, and enable greater social interaction to cultivate cohesive communities.

Designing our urban spaces for the people that inhabit them should guide future decision-making. By taking a human-centred design approach that prioritizes safe mobility, access to essential services and place-led needs, it’s possible to develop sustainable infrastructure that supports communities within the city core and the urban realm overall.

A practical means to do this is through transit-oriented development, or TOD, which focuses on urban development around public transport stations. TOD can reduce private-vehicle use and support walking, cycling and other forms of active transportation. In this way, TOD can advance low- and zero-carbon mobility options and lead to reduced private-vehicle congestion. TOD can also prevent further sprawl.

How can transit-oriented development support urban equity?

Eric Peissel: Generally speaking, transit-oriented development incorporates either medium- or high-density, mixed-use development into the immediate environs of public transport.  The concept can be tailored to support social equity goals and other identified community values.

Just a few months ago, I visited the Kalasatama–Pasila line 13 in Helsinki, a WSP project that not only transforms a multi-lane roadway into a public transport corridor but serves as a catalyst to regenerate a former industrial part of the city into a great TOD neighbourhood with diversity of housing, offices and commercial activities.

Often people think that density translates into skyscrapers, but this does not need to be the case. The concept of the missing middle, which has been explored in North America as well as in Australia, can respond to the need for diverse and affordable housing. These structures are not tall high-rise towers and are not spread out like detached homes. They are common in Europe and consist of three- to four-story multi-unit buildings mixed with commercial and other services. The Mile End neighborhood in Montreal, for example, includes three-story structures with backyards, roof-top patios and gardens, amenities, technology jobs and repurposed industrial buildings—all within walking distance to metro stations and high-frequency bus routes.

Sustainable transport is essential to sustainable development in the urban realm, and TOD can play an increasingly helpful role in this process. A forward-thinking approach to delivering TOD brings opportunity to use land more efficiently and support a diversity of urban lifestyles and equitable communities. Owning a car is much more expensive than many people think, because the real cost arises from a combination of expenses including insurance, parking, servicing, fuel, licensing and tolls. Robust and accessible public transport networks can free households from car ownership and increase options for housing and quality of life.

According to the United Nations, cities consume 78 per cent of the world’s energy and produce more than 60 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions.² How can cities reduce harmful impacts as populations increase?

Eric Peissel: Population growth will certainly put greater pressure on cities as they continue to address ongoing socio-economic issues and technological change, and the impacts of climate change will test their resilience and adaptive capability.

Accelerating the transition to renewable energy sources is key to reducing the energy sector’s contribution to climate change.  Cities are already putting measures in place to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and enact policies to encourage the use of clean energy sources.

The need to address today’s complex challenges more quickly requires stakeholders to approach decision-making with an ecosystem perspective, which will enable them to better understand how systems interact and influence each other within urban landscapes. The right data will help city planners gain the insights they need to drive meaningful change, whether related to energy or water systems, for example. Transitioning to electric mobility, requires more renewable energy, improved electrical grids and provision of charging infrastructure.

What role does public engagement have in driving meaningful change to develop sustainable communities?

Eric Peissel: It’s difficult to overestimate the value that early community engagement can bring to build social value into infrastructure projects and advance inclusive and equitable outcomes to support sustainability overall. For example, in the United States, WSP led the effort to develop a comprehensive Vision Zero Action Plan in Kansas City, Missouri that drew on more than a year of public engagement efforts directed toward traffic safety and mobility in the city where there is a long history of racial segregation and disinvestment in minority neighbourhoods. Improving equity in Kansas City was a major focus of this plan as well as creating safer streets for everyone.

Another example is the ongoing and evolving Safety Inclusion Assessment being carried out by one of our teams in the UK to support enhanced personal safety through design. The assessment is informed by the lived experience of people using community spaces. 

Community feedback also impacted our collaborative work to remove dangerous level crossings throughout Melbourne in the Caufield to Dandenong Level Crossing Removal project. Community members asked for more green space in the project area, and this was achievable with an elevated railway that opened use of the land beneath to include multi-use pathways. In addition to improved safety for pedestrians and drivers as well as reduced congestion, other benefits of the project include reuniting communities that had been separated by the physical barrier of the railway and creating lasting benefits such as new open space and cultural enrichment.

As a key part of human-centred design, community engagement can be especially powerful when combined with broad stakeholder collaboration and a systems-thinking approach that leverages the right data to understand and help solve today's pressing issues, notably adapting to a changing climate and addressing localized problems impacting a given community.

1 _{Urban Development, The World Bank, accessed December 4, 2023.}

2 _{Generating Power, Climate Action, United Nations, accessed December 4, 2023.}