“It’s important to ask for more in terms of sus-
tainable initiatives, not just wishes, but when
you put that into the local regulation, then it
becomes something that any developer must
respect throughout their projects for years to
come,” said Gariepy. “The main challenge for
us is to take sustainable development initiatives
and translate that into existing or new regula-
tion, that is standards that developers will have
to follow. But it’s a more proactive process that
brings a positive contribution, instead of just
being reactionary to policies and regulations.”
Provencher Roy is increasingly involved as a
firm in architectural and urban planning proj-
ects for cities that incorporate sustainability
initiatives and actually creating a new set of
services for architects and helping to antici-
pate any issues in advance that may arise from
the implementation of the local legislation or
regulation. This process takes time, and under-
standably so, says Gariepy.
Just to get social acceptability for these ur-
ban planning initiatives by public authorities
can be a challenge in and of itself.
“Even though it may seem that people want
more sustainable planning and projects which
are not standard, integrate new systems and
will have an impact on existing public struc-
tures, you have to expect resistance from, for
example, the Public Works Department or the
Engineering Department, because they are
used to doing things a certain way,” said Gari-
epy. “It’s hard to align everything properly at
one point in time, but it’s all part of the nego-
tiation process.”
He notes that this is one of the biggest con-
cepts of young inspired new architects and
planners to understand who have perhaps trav-
elled extensively and are familiar with a variety
of new aesthetically-pleasing structures and
infrastructure that incorporate sustainable ini-
AUGUST 2014
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