Brampton Riverwalk Resilience, Sustainability, and Healthy Development Strategy

A comprehensive resiliency strategy provides a flood prone downtown with the tools to revitalize its urban core and highlight an historic creek as a centerpiece of a thriving and healthy urban green space.

Brampton, Ontario, sits within the Etobicoke Creek floodplain and has been vulnerable to flooding for decades. The city’s first recorded flood dates to 1854, and a portion of Etobicoke Creek that once flowed through the urban core was diverted into a bypass channel after a 1948 flood severely damaged its historic downtown. Although the existing channel provides crucial flood protection, the area is still at risk and subject to regulations that limit further development. To eliminate flood risk while creating a renewed public open space for residents to experience nature, the city sought help in developing the Downtown Brampton Flood Protection and Riverwalk Area Urban Design Master Plan.

For this follow-up effort focused on creating a resilience strategy for the Riverwalk, the city sought an expert consulting team to prepare a framework of strategies and metrics to track the Riverwalk’s efforts toward improved sustainability and health. As part of a team led by Sustainable Solutions Group, Biohabitats provided a rapid review of prior planning studies for the Riverwalk and relevant existing sustainability frameworks (SITES and EcoDistricts) to identify the most relevant approaches that would apply to the Riverwalk. With a focus on meadow restoration, stream channel function, and forested riparian corridor restoration within the urban fabric, Biohabitats then developed a series of sustainability targets, guidelines, performance measures, and monitoring strategies. These metrics were associated with ecological corridor connectivity, ecological restoration, integrated biodiversity and habitat enhancement, riparian corridor enhancement, floodplain function, and water quality.

The project team created a framework tailored to the specific needs of Brampton and its ecological and watershed context. The final framework will ensure that the effort to revitalize the underutilized downtown with the Riverwalk project is sustainable and resilient for years to come.

TAGS

• Analysis+Planning
• Conservation