A survey released Wednesday by Corporate Knights magazine ranked Halifax as the second most sustainable city in Canada
By Terry Long <trl_36@hotmail.com>
Posted: Feb. 20, 2008
For the second year in a row, Halifax Regional Municipality has beat out other competing cities, such as Quebec City, Vancouver and Hamilton.
The survey’s organizers, the Toronto-based Corporate Knights Magazine, which has the goal of highlighting environmentally responsible business in Canada, scrutinized 16 cities across Canada.
According to Corporate Knights’ assistant editor Melissa Shin, the cities were grouped based on population and regional prominence.
The cities surveyed were judged on five categories of sustainability that included ecological integrity, economic security and empowerment.
A sustainable city is a city with a small ecological footprint, said Shin.
The final rankings also included data taken from government sources such as Statistics Canada, the non-profit Centre for the Study of Living Standards and the municipalities’ own records. Shin added that the cities were each scored out of 10 and that the highest score was 7.7
This year’s overall winner was Ottawa. Last year, the winner was Quebec City. The winner for the medium city category was Mississauga, Ont.
In the process of compiling the data necessary to assess each city, Shin said sustainability trends became apparent.
LED lights were commonly used in signs and traffic lights. Many cities were working to encourage the consumption of local foods.
Shin said the most surprising results came from the Maritimes where cities such as Halifax proved that smaller cities can be leaders in encouraging ecologically sound development.
“The smaller cities can serve as inspiration for the bigger ones”, she said.
Halifax has introduced many new initiatives with the goal of improving its sustainability.
The Halifax Regional Municipality has been working closely with local environmental groups such as Clean Nova Scotia, the Ecology Action Centre and the Sierra Club order to improve its environmental record.
In 2000 Halifax became the first major North American city to introduce pesticide control by-laws. Since that time 140 addition municipalities across Canada have enacted similar legislation.
Halifax was also one of the first Canadian cities to join the Federation of Canadian Municipalities’ climate change initiative, Partners for Climate Protection, a program which encourages more responsible urban development in Canadian cities.
Halifax has also seen reductions in the amount of carbon it emits each year.
Among the city’s many initiatives are its transportation plan and methane gas capture project, which siphons off methane from city landfill sites.
The Halifax Regional Municipality is also working to encourage the use of bio-fuels in vehicles and buildings, as well as alternate means of transportation such as bicycles through its implementation of the Active Transportation Plan.
“This achievement highlights the municipalities’ strong commitment to the environment and to ensuring we have a healthy, vibrant and sustainable community,” said Mayor Peter Kelly in a press release.
Chris Benjamin, a spokesperson for the Ecology Action Centre, was surprised that Halifax has risen from 17th to second place in such a short space of time.
“It was a surprisingly big jump,” he said.
Benjamin cautioned, however, that despite progress that has been made improving Halifax’s environmental record, there is still a long way to go.
Benjamin pointed out that Halifax has one of the poorest cycling infrastructures in Canada. Of the city’s 191 kilometres of bike trails, only 26 kilometres are on city streets. He added that very little has been done to promote the use of bicycles and other alternate means of transportation.
“It’s nice to get the recognition,” said Benjamin but added, “there is so much
more to be done.”
Feedback
Email
Print