Courses

Contemporary city development trends, policies, and practices across the globe as explored against the backdrop of culture and technology. Includes hands-on learning.

As a course, PLAN 221 provides a exploratory journey through the vast world of visualizing the city. Students will gain an understanding of the types and hierarchies of visualizations of the city and how to interpret them and use them to read the city. As such, it provides a basic introduction to drawing type fundamentals (plan, section, elevation, paraline, etc.) as well as techniques of representation (use of hue, value, etc.). The latter is supplemented with design analyses exercises (deconstructing different representations) and culminates in a ‘city visual’ design exercise. The course is currently scheduled to meet twice a week for 1.5 hours each session.

Examination of various approaches to hands-on engagement with urban communities while examining the meaning of public, community, and participation. Prerequisite: Restricted to BA Urban Studies students with second-year standing.

Place-based exploration of the multiple, complex and contested ways urban Indigeneity is constituted in Canada today, with opportunities for field trips and hands-on learning. 

Second-year students may be admitted with instructor permission.

Considers the city as a terrain for the manifestation and mediation of social justice. Explores how the allocation of land, goods, and services in cities (re)produces social stratification, and how institutions and civil society negotiate just and unjust outcomes.

The objective of this course is to understand the technological, social, ethical and policy challenges and opportunities for Smart Cities. This begins with a high-level overview of assessing key challenges that cities face including urbanization, social well-being, inequality, economic development and climate change; and through global case-studies and tutorials the course details key concepts, tools and frameworks to assess smart cities including: urban metrics and indicators, big-data analytics, data ethics and risk, and applications in urban modelling and simulation. Specifically, there is a focus on how data-driven analytics, and technological and social innovation can help address urban policy challenges and inform decision-making.

Second-year students may be admitted with instructor permission.

This course will examine green cities as a planning problematic: simultaneously essential for addressing global environmental degradation and part of urbanization processes that have fueled that degradation. We will examine the key historical, conceptual, and applied aspects of urban greening in cities throughout the world, with an emphasis on North America. As we develop our understanding of how, why, and under what conditions green cities take shape, we will examine both process and outcome – questioning overly-simple descriptions of the urban greening agenda. We will uncover through case-based analysis and community-engaged partnership what we mean by green cities; why we need green cities; and how we make green cities, given the challenges and opportunities.

Second-year students may be admitted with instructor permission.

Examination of how the diverse, multicultural, and cosmopolitan aspects of cities create challenges and opportunities for community planning. 

This course provides an overview of the theoretical perspectives and development of urban planning, highlighting contemporary planning issues and the translation of knowledge in policy and practice, towards the aim of fostering thriving communities and more just cities. For third- and fourth-year undergraduate students interested in urban planning.

Application of key elements of urban studies theory, concepts, and methods to a community-engaged urban challenge. Other prerequisites: GEOG 451. Equivalency: URST 452

As a course, PLAN 221 provides a exploratory journey through the vast world of visualizing the city. Students will gain an understanding of the types and hierarchies of visualizations of the city and how to interpret them and use them to read the city. As such, it provides a basic introduction to drawing type fundamentals (plan, section, elevation, paraline, etc.) as well as techniques of representation (use of hue, value, etc.). The latter is supplemented with design analyses exercises (deconstructing different representations) and culminates in a ‘city visual’ design exercise. The course is currently scheduled to meet twice a week for 1.5 hours each session.

This course undertakes a detailed, comparative examination of the history, and possible futures of, planning in a global context. It examines planning in diverse settings and highlights the ways in which planning has been and might be conceived and practiced across the Global North and South. It seeks to introduce students to the wide variety of planning paradigms, approaches and techniques that have been deployed by planners and other actors who create and are affected by plans. The course highlights the differences and similarities in the way planning has been conceived and undertaken across geographies. It pays particular attention to the debates, trade-offs, compromises and tensions that have dominated the way planners have approached their work and how they conceptualize and plan for the future. Rather than focusing on descriptions of key events or people (although those are covered too), the course is structured around a number of important analytic themes that can help students understand the work of planners across a wide range of temporal, geographic, political, economic and cultural settings.

PLAN 501 is a core course of the Masters of Community and Regional Planning (MCRP) program at SCARP. This course explores the relationships between planning (as a discipline and profession) and reconciliation efforts happening in cities and communities across Canada. We will reflect on questions like: What is the role of planning in perpetuating settler colonialism? How might planning contribute to reconciliation efforts moving forward? How can planners decolonize their planning practice? During this course we will: contextualize ourselves within Indigenous and settler-colonial histories; critically examine what reconciliation means (and to who) and how it plays out in the ‘era of reconciliation’ in what is now known as Canada, learn from Indigenous planners and worldviews, and; examine what it might look for planners to decolonize their practice and genuinely contribute to reconciliation efforts through city and community planning.

How sustainability and resilience concepts shape planning practice, including planning’s successes and failures in addressing environmental problems. Policies and tools that communities can adopt and employ in response to climate change, loss of biodiversity, and related challenges.

As a course, PLAN 504 provides a exploratory journey through the vast world of visualizing the city. Students will gain an understanding of the types and hierarchies of visualizations of the city and how to interpret them and use them to read the city. As such, it provides a basic introduction to drawing type fundamentals (plan, section, elevation, paraline, etc.) as well as techniques of representation (use of hue, value, etc.). The latter is supplemented with design analyses exercises (deconstructing different representations) and culminates in a ‘city visual’ design exercise. The course is currently scheduled to meet twice a week for 1.5 hours each session.