2023 Canadian City Parks Report: A Spotlight on Solutions

Park People launches the fifth annual Canadian City Parks Report: Surfacing Solutions: How Addressing Conflict and Reframing Challenges as Opportunities Can Create More Equitable and Sustainable Parks.

Over the past five years of the Canadian City Parks Report, our goal has always been to tell a story—the story of where city parks are going and where they need to go. 

This year, we took an even deeper approach to gathering these stories. We sat down for interviews with 44 senior parks staff across 30 municipalities, who generously shared with us the challenges they are facing, the projects and people inspiring them, and their vision for the future of city parks.

In the report, we weave together the themes we heard from those conversations with the data we gathered from our surveys of 35 municipalities and over 2000 residents of Canadian cities. 

Key Insights

Dive into the pdf to read about our key insights on trends and challenges in city parks:

1. Plan for higher park use  –  Preparing for the new normal of a higher baseline of park use
2. Refocus on quality  –  Ensuring the parks we have are performing at their best
3. Explore new park typologies and funding arrangements  –  Identifying new types of parks for growing, urbanizing cities
4. Prioritize public education along with naturalization  –  Growing support for naturalization efforts through public education
5. Systematize climate resilience park improvements  –  Embedding climate resilience within park designs to safeguard the future
6. Deepen the focus on park equity  – Moving beyond amenity distribution to look at the social side of park equity
7. Adopt rights-based encampment strategies  –  Working with unhoused communities to find solutions with dignity
8. Experiment with flexible designs and policies to manage conflicting use  –  Addressing use conflicts so parks can work better for more people
9. Increase funding and support for community involvement  –  Supporting community involvement beyond one-time capital projects
10. Find the internal collaboration sweet spots  –  Leveraging departmental collaborations to achieve multiple overlapping goals

Case studies

Launch Webinar: Watch the Recording

Happy reading!