A Successful Community Starts With Planning
The CITYTREND planning process goes beyond the typical urban plan and involves extensive research and analysis to tailor urban planning tools to each unique municipal environment. We work with you to ensure sustainable, appropriate policies that appeals to private and public sectors alike.
Our extensive experience covers the following disciplines:
Approvals
CITYTREND can act as a development officer on behalf of small municipalities who lack the funding to fill this role internally. We provide municipalities with professional support and review planning approvals. This collaboration allows us to improve our knowledge of your community and provide cost-effective recommendations in the future.
Policy Plans
Our approach to planning documents, whether statutory or non-statutory, is based on engaging our clients and their communities. We have created tools and techniques that incorporate this information with our expertise, creating plans that are blueprints for beautiful places.
Area Structure Plan (ASP)/ Area Redevelopment Plan (ARP)/ Downtown Plan
CITYTREND can work with municipal departments, external agencies and stakeholders to create policy plans. By working with these groups, we can gain an understanding of the local context, build on existing assets, and create a shared ownership that improves success rates.
Municipal Development Plan (MDP)
Working directly with municipalities, CITYTREND creates community specific municipal development plans. We work with various municipal departments, external agencies and key stakeholders to create a united community vision for land use, growth, development and conservation, then prepare and distribute the completed plans.
Sustainable Plans
Our award winning approach to sustainable plans lays the groundwork by communicating to the community, establishing stakeholder/steering groups, hosting public open houses and educating the citizens on sustainable subjects. Extensive public engagement sets the foundation for the community’s future.
Housing Studies
CITYTREND works with municipalities to conduct a thorough analysis of the current housing stock and future housing needs. Our approach is to collect data, establish a stakeholder committee and identify institutional and regulatory hurdles to overcome. Once the assessment is complete we analyze the data, identify solutions to barriers, develop measures of success, create standard practices, conduct stakeholder meetings, provide education and from there we suggest the next steps.
Land Use Bylaws
If you need land use bylaws but do not have the expertise, CITYTREND can help. We take the time to fully understand your municipality and what the community wants to accomplish. This understanding is then applied to bylaws.
Public Consultation
The citizen participation process is critical to all of the planning services provided by CITYTREND. We customize all of our public participation programs to the clients and communities we are working with. We collect input through:
- Steering committee meetings
- Key stakeholder interviews
- Focus sessions
- Master planning charrettes
- Public opinion surveys and
- Strategic planning workshops
Training
Through our time in the business, we’ve developed extensive knowledge of the municipal process and regulatory framework. A large part of our involvement with the industry and our clients is sharing this knowledge by educating the private and public sector. We have developed a series of expert seminars and training workshops for the industry and are constantly adding to our repertoire.
Some of the topics are:
- Land use bylaws
- Subdivision and development appeal boards
- Planning decisions matrix and framework
- Urban design
- Strategic planning and council priorities
- Scenario planning
"There are not enough words I can put on paper to express the depth of the services and expertise that CITYTREND provide to our municipality, and I would not hesitate to recommend their professional planning services to anyone or any municipality."
Cheryl Skelly
Chief Administrative Officer,
Town of Crossfield
FEATURED PROJECT
Crossfield Sustainability Plan
On December 15, 2009, the Town of Crossfield Council approved the Award Winning Crossfield Sustainability Plan. To those dedicated community members, that December council meeting represented more than the approval of a plan; it marked the beginning of Crossfield’s transition to a sustainable community.
2010 AUMA Award Winner
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