Research in Action: Public - University of Calgary

Fit by design:
Applied urban planning research
gets us walking and talking.
Dr. Bev Sandalack believes you would be healthier and happier if you lived in a well-designed, dense, vibrant
inner city community. The urban designer and planner in the University of Calgary’s Faculty of Environmental
Design is an advocate of urban design that encourages walking and community interaction. She urges Calgary
to grow ‘up’ through dense urban development, rather than ‘out’ into low density, single-family suburbs.
“We’re looking at the practices of how cities develop, and socially and ecologically it makes more sense to
have a more compact form. The public health implications alone are significant. The evidence suggests that
just the day-to-day increase in activity in a denser urban environment positively impacts public health issues
such as heart disease, diabetes and obesity,” says Sandalack.
Working with colleagues from the U of C’s faculties of Medicine and Kinesiology, Sandalack is continuing to
research the relationship between urban form and public health.
Advancing living and working environments
Sandalack and her team apply their research findings to innovative projects at the Faculty of Environmental
Design’s downtown Urban Lab. Working closely with town and city councils, community associations,
neighbourhood committees and other civic groups, the environmental design students and graduates tackle
real-world urban development issues, community planning and design projects — for paying clients.
The Urban Lab team, together with members of the Faculty of Social Work, is working with the Mustard Seed
Ministry, the Victoria Crossing BRZ and the City of Calgary on a proposed improvement of the Mustard Seed site.
The Mustard Seed offers meals, programming and a place to sleep for the homeless and others in need. The
objective of this complex project is to use enhanced urban design to better integrate this social service into
the rapidly-developing Beltline neighbourhood.
Five years of research by Sandalack and her team is newly captured in The Calgary Project: urban form/urban life.
The book, funded by Enmax, the U of C and others, details several research projects. The evolution of Calgary’s
urban form and its qualities was critically evaluated, while another study analyzed Calgary neighbourhoods with a
focus on the characteristics of residential streets, with the intent of proposing directions for a sustainable future.
www.ucalgary.ca/evds
University of Calgary Research in Action 24
Urban Lab Directed by Dr. Bev Sandalack, the Urban Lab research centre
provides graduate students with internships and experience on real-world
design projects. Research conducted there adds to the knowledge base
of the new urban design program at the U of C, which Sandalack coordinates.
The work of the Urban Lab is published in articles and books such as
Landscapes/Paysages — the professional journal of landscape architecture
in Canada — and in Places, an internationally-circulated journal of The
Environmental Design Research Association (EDRA). The Urban Lab has received
numerous awards including the EDRA Place Planning Award, the National Honour
Award, the Canadian Society of Landscape Architects Professional Awards
Program and the Lion Award, Calgary Heritage Authority.