Winter Cities Shake-Up 2019
Thriving in the World’s Coolest Season
Choose which day to view
Wednesday, January 23, 2019
Remai Modern Art Gallery - 102 Spadina Crescent E
6:00PM – 9:30PM
Arrivals and Check-In
7:00PM – 9:00PM
Opening reception
Thursday, January 24, 2019 at tcu place - 35 22nd St E
6:45AM - 8:00AM
Morning Skate Come and experience the magic of the Meewasin Skating Rink. This rink has been featured as the best place to skate in Saskatchewan and one of the best outdoor rinks in Canada by Flare Magazine, Reader’s Digest and was recently the highlighted location for the Central Time Zone on CBC’s New Year’s Special. Skating and skates to borrow at the rink will be free of charge
8:30AM - 8:55AM
Opening Remarks
Morning Deep Dive Sessions
9:00AM – 12:20PM
Sabine De Schutter Co-creation workshop lighting design for winter cities In this workshop, we want to explore the potential of lighting design for public space. How can lighting enhance the nighttime identity of a winter city? How can creative lighting shape vibrant, social cities and desirable places after dark? Topics like placemaking through lighting, but also aspects like light pollution will be discussed on the basis of examples and case studies. Together with the attendees, we will map out the opportunities and create lighting approaches for a given site. When possible, we would like to turn this into a real-size prototype that can be experienced and evaluated by the conference attendees and the people of Saskatoon. In this way, participants will be able to experience first hand, what the impact of lighting is on perception and atmosphere in a public space.
Michael Wexler Cycling Cities and Design for 4-Season Mobility In order to gain a deeper understanding how the bicycle can be a powerful tool for mobility in cities across the globe, the first part of this session will have participants survey some of the best practices and designs from the world's leading cycling cities. Copenhagen serves as a strong model for how a winter city can develop its infrastructure and policy to offer citizens another reliable, healthy, cost effective and fun mode of transportation in all 4 seasons! A first workshop will have participants discuss and share some of their own thoughts on how bicycle-friendly design in their own Canadian cities can help make the streets more accessible all year long. This will be followed by a presentation and workshop on the marketing and communications side of urban cycling in an urban and winter context, with a collective brainstorm on best-practice bicycle messaging for Canadian cities.
Morning Breakout Sessions
9:00AM – 10:30PM
Isla Tanaka & Susan Holdsworth Embracing Winter: How Edmonton Shifted Its Culture It’s not latitude, it’s attitude! Find out how Edmonton has shifted its culture and begun embracing the snowy season. Learn how we have been changing the mental models that underpin all our systems, how we have changed the stories that people tell themselves and each other about what winter is like in Edmonton, and how we know we’ve made a difference. How has our 10-year WinterCity Strategy encouraged residents to get out and get active in the snow? Delve into key elements of Edmonton’s wintry success: park design, maintenance, programming for all ages, promotion of winter activities, and creating social licence. We’ll share our secrets and explore ideas and strategies for identifying outdoor winter activities already happening in your community and how to promote them. It might still be cold and dark during our #yegwinter, but it’s never boring!
Amardeep Dugar & Melody Culanag Dark Night…Active Light – lighting design interventions to activate life during dark hours of winter This lecture aims to activate life and lifestyles after dark in winter cities. Physical activity is essential for a healthy lifestyle especially during winter months. Quality of urban public spaces plays an important role in promoting physical activity among people. Well-designed lighting can influence activities in urban public spaces: the way people use, enjoy and feel these spaces. So what makes activated night-time lighting of winter cities? This involves understanding how people want to use urban spaces, the affects and effects of light on their bodies and behaviours, and why they need darkness too. Creating effective night-time lighting requires expertise in lighting design, urban planning and sociology. The role urban lighting plays in winter cities will be influenced by a multitude of social, technological, economic, environmental and political factors. Winter cities will need to be more resilient to challenges of future, while also being safe and fun places to live.
Hailey Rilkoff Adapting winter city planning strategies from large urban centres for mid-sized communities – A comparative case study in the Thompson-Okanagan region Urban planning and design often ignore the cold climate conditions that exist in cities that are located within the frostbelt. Urban planning and design theories and practices are often borrowed, replicated and altered from one community or region to another. Preliminary research identified examples of large urban centres which are having tremendous success at adapting their cities to enhance livability for residents and visitors in the winter months. My research objective was to explore how small to mid-sized communities can scale the winter city planning strategies that are being undertaken in large urban centres. Using examples of successful winter city planning strategies found in large urban centres, my research is exploring how a small or mid-sized community would be able to implement their own winter city planning strategies. In this session you will hear the results of a comparative case study between three large urban centres in Canada and three mid-sized communities in the Thompson-Okanagan region of BC.
10:30AM – 10:45AM
Health Break
10:45AM – 12:30PM
Isla Tanaka, Susan Holdsworth & Tyler Golly Exploring Winter Through a GBA+ Lens Have you ever considered that winter might affect women and men differently? Did you know that women use public transit and active transportation modes more often than men? In this session, find out how snow creates more challenges for women as they move around a winter city. Find out how applying a gender lens can change snow clearing and public transportation policies. Explore how urban design principles increase or decrease women’s perceptions of safety, especially during dark winter nights. Also, consider that women tend to be the primary caregivers to children and elderly parents. What does this mean in winter? Examine how accessibility and warming spaces for all ages affect outdoor activities in winter. Consider how the differences between women’s and men’s winter fashions might affect how willing women are to spend time outside in winter. Finally, discuss ways to support women better in winter and how to encourage them to embrace the snowy season.
Tyler Rittinger Channeling A Year-Round Youth Cycling Culture Youth are enthusiastic and resilient when given the proper chance to move! An active winter city requires active habits that are formed during the other three seasons to allow for success. The Ecoquest program and the Move2Grow Initiative within Saskatoon Public Schools are means to channel students' enthusiasm and create a safe and successful year-round culture of active transportation. By expanding the idea of a classroom to include the entire city, and how they move within it, students will strengthen their sense of place and grow their desire to contribute positively to their communities through all seasons.
Avi Akkerman
The downtown back alley as a winter-city pedestrian channel and a place of encounter One of the earmarks of winter-city downtown has been the abundance of back alleys as places of contempt. In historic cities of Europe, however, dense pedestrian traffic has been facilitated by Romanesque streets of about the same width as the North-American back-alley. Narrowness of the Romanesque city street is due not only to reasons related to constrictions on land, but – in central and southern Europe – also due to deliberate design aimed at protecting the pedestrian from scorching summer heat. The narrowness of the winter-city back alley has correspondingly mitigating effect in the winter: warmer temperature in the alley than in the open streetscape. It is this urban - climatic feature of the narrow alley that has yielded a charming street environment in European cities, facilitating dense pedestrian movement and residential population. The North American winter-city back-alley can achieve similar success through careful design and community participation.
12:30PM – 1:30PM
Luncheon
Afternoon Breakout Sessions
1:30PM – 3:15PM
Ana Karinna Hidalgo Mental health in urban winter streets This research establishes the causal effect of winter streets on people’s psychological health, specifically the restoration from stress and mental fatigue. This study analyses theories and concepts of urban streets, psychological restoration, biophilic design and experimental methods. A lab experiment was conducted to identify the effect of vegetation and brightness in winter scenarios on people’s mental restoration. Sixty-three participants were randomly assigned into three different treatments (vegetation, brightness and control). Participants on the vegetation treatment showed a quicker recovery from mental fatigue than those in brightness or control group. The findings resulting from the theoretical framework and the lab experiment inform comprehensive urban design principles for restorative urban design. This research constitutes a pioneering work in the field of urban design by providing evidence on how urban streets can improve people’s mental health in winter cities.
3:15PM – 3:30PM
Health Break
3:30PM – 5:00PM
Ana Karinna Hidalgo Urban design principles for restorative winter cities. This presentation proposes four urban design principles for the design of restorative winter streets. These principles are built upon theories of urban design and the creation of a street categorization framework that includes new functions for urban streets. In addition to urban design theories, the principles are based on interdisciplinary research: environmental psychology restorations theories and environmental concepts and biophilic design. Empirical research findings and qualitative studies completes the structure that frames the principles for restorative winter streets. This presentation highlights the need to design cities with mental health as a public priority.
Tracey Klettl Painted Warrior Indigenous tourism is a unique sector of the tourism industry, it directly engages indigenous people as operators and managers, and provides an authentic experience. The demand for indigenous tourism is one of the fastest growing sections of the industry. Indigenous people have lived of the land for many years and developed skills to live in all seasons. Some of the means we used to survive have today evolved into sensational tourism activities. The session will describe the benefits of indigenous tourism-specifically winter activities, in terms of economic development and means of building a bridge between cultures. A description of specific winter activities will be explored as well as the opportunities for potential indigenous operators who may be interested in developing a business in tourism. There will also be a discussion on the benefits of having people of all ages and cultures participate in these winter programs.
Afternoon Deep Dive Sessions
1:30PM – 5:00PM
Ryan O’Connor Wintermission: How to Bring Public Life to Winter Cities This session will explain how simple changes to the built environment can reduce social isolation and civic lethargy in winter. By sharing best practices for public realm design, programming, and management, participants will learn how the public realm can be used to enliven the coldest, darkest months of the year. Through group activities, participants will create strategies for facilitating inclusive conversations about winter, brainstorm winter pilot projects, and develop a vision for their ideal winter city. Participants will return home with innovative ways to animate public spaces in winter and practical strategies for moving ideas forward.
Chad Carlstrom & Dan Penner Building Winter Communities and Citizenship: The Story of Fort St. John’s Winter Strategy Join Urban Systems in this interactive session that explores a unique approach for fostering winter communities through the cumulative impact of small interventions that provide practical and functional contributions to the Winter experience. In 2017, the City of Fort St. John reinvigorated a longstanding ambition to become a winter-city leader in Canada. With the technical guidance of Urban Systems, a cost-effective, practical and readily implementable Winter Strategy was created. The Strategy focuses on enhancing quality of life for all residents through targeted “micro-projects” and building a “Winter Citizenship” culture in the community. The project team utilized academic research and their practice and personal experiences to develop a customized work plan to move Fort St. John forward as a winter-city. This session will tell the story of the Winter Strategy from conception to implementation and demonstrate how it can be applied from a neighbourhood to city-wide scale. Attendees will take part in two interactive activities that put the session themes into practice. This includes a thirty (30) minute long walking tour mid-way through the session, so we ask attendees to bundle up and come share your winter experiences!
Jenna D. Gabrysh & Bruce Gilmour Accessible Winter City Universal Design Experience Participating in this session will go beyond just a conversation about accessibility issues in winter cities; participants will be joining an immersive experience. Facilitators with lived-experience will apply design concepts of accessibility and universal design to a winter city setting in a brief orientation presentation. Participants will then navigate outside on city streets with vision-loss simulation goggles or in wheelchairs. The facilitators will then challenge the group to complete a scorecard with their observations on various design features, after which there will be a roundtable debriefing session in which learnings will be applied to our own cities.
Adrian Stimson Istuitsiniksin - Winter Stories Workshop In the distant winters of the past, the Blackfoot would build many fires during the winter time, stories would be told around these fires "Istuitsiniksin", winter was a time of introspection and imagination. In the not so distant past, Blackfoot people loved to go sliding, as many were poor, cardboard would be used as the slide, it brought community together, fun was had and stories were shared. Winter Stories will be a workshop that explores indigenous perspectives of winter, from the past to present contemporary indigenous art. Together we will explore stories, imagine them, then build them with cardboard. The process of bringing the imagination into reality will speak to the continuum of indigenous history and knowledge. That stories are universal and can create a space for all of us to be in the presence of our imagination.
Friday, January 25, 2019 at Prairieland Park - 503 Ruth St W
6:45AM – 8:00AM
Morning Walk/Run
8:30AM – 8:55AM
Opening Remarks
9:00AM - 5:15PM
Winter City Cafe
WinterCity Café
9:00AM - 5:00PM
The WinterCity Café is a multi-faceted space that will draw participation from both conference delegates and the wider community (free public entry). The Café will have a number of different engagement activities you can explore, including self-guided reflection, conversation starters, and other creative activities that provide valuable insight to guide the City of Saskatoon in developing a Winter City Strategy. Open to all delegates and members of the public.
Exhibitor Demos
9:00AM – 5:15PM
The exhibitor demos will feature technologies, practices, activities, equipment, music, art, fashion and food that contribute to thriving winter cities, winter living and economy. It is a celebration of the people, organizations and businesses that make winter life enjoyable, safe and unique. Interactive displays and hands-on experiences will be part of the action as we dig in to what makes life great in a Winter City!
Morning Breakout Sessions
9:00AM – 10:30AM
Susan Holdsworth & Isla Tanaka What Does Winter Design Really Mean? Imagine designing the wind chill out of your city. Imagine making your streets more accessible and inviting, making your city easier to get around on bike and by foot winter. These are just some of the things that winter design can do. In December 2016, the City of Edmonton took the bold and visionary step of embedding winter-specific design principles into official City policy. The Winter Design Policy is tied to the comprehensive Winter Design Guidelines which provide a robust winter lens - can be applied across the city in all contexts and at all scales - and focus on placemaking. The Winter Design Guidelines are helping to transform Edmonton’s colder months to be more comfortable, beautiful and inviting. Susan and Isla will walk you through the key principles of winter design and provide examples of how they apply in various contexts. They will challenge you to think about the many ways you can apply a winter lens in your work, and transform winter in your city from a time of hibernation to one of celebration.
10:30AM - 10:45AM
Health Break
10:50AM – 12:20PM
Liz Wreford & Peter Sampson Creating Active Outdoor Spaces At Public City, we believe playfulness is the critical relationship between ordinary conditions and their extraordinary power to transform conventional thinking about how we inhabit the land. We are committed to playfulness as a design methodology that explores resilient approaches to seasonal adaptation, our connection to place, and a celebration of stories about how we have lived and how we will live, up here, down north. In warming northern cities, winters are becoming increasingly uncommitted, challenging our regional identity. A series of winter infrastructure projects designed by PUBLIC CITY will frame a presentation on the design of the urban public realm in our shifting landscape, including: Crokicurl (a regionally inspired mash-up featured on the Rick Mercer Report and As It Happens), Root Cabin (a temporary public art installation), Hygge House (an iconic warming hut), Manitoboggan (an accessible toboggan slide structure), and Down North (a regenerative winter park).
Patrick Coleman & Norman Pressman Livable Winter Cities; History, Principles and Successes Planning and working towards the ideal of the Livable Winter City is not a new concept. From its beginnings, nearly 40 years ago, to the recent resurgence in interest and implementation of winter city strategies and projects, many ideas remain unchanged since the inception of the winter cities concept. This session will provide a brief overview of the history of the winter cities movement, discussion of key winter city design principles, and case studies/examples of successful winter city design and strategies.
12:30PM - 1:45PM
Luncheon
Afternoon Breakout Sessions
1:50PM - 3:20PM
Kari Leibowitz The Norwegian Mindset for Loving Winter In this talk, Kari Leibowitz combines her psychological expertise about the power of mindset with her first-hand experience as a Fulbright Research Scholar living in Tromsø, Norway, located 350km north of the Arctic Circle. Tromsø experiences a two month winter period during which time the sun does not rise, known as the Polar Night. While many might despair at the thought of two cold, wintery months without the sun, Leibowitz’s research investigated how mindsets about winter are associated with well-being in Norway. She found that most people in Tromsø have positive wintertime mindsets: they find much to love about the winter. In this talk, Leibowitz shares research about the power of mindsets and how they shape our everyday lives in meaningful ways. She then provides insights about the Norwegian approach to winter and details how you can use the Norwegian mindset to thrive during winter wherever you are.
3:20PM - 3:40PM
Health Break
3:45PM – 5:15PM
Liz Wreford & Peter Sampson Creating Active Outdoor Spaces At Public City, we believe playfulness is the critical relationship between ordinary conditions and their extraordinary power to transform conventional thinking about how we inhabit the land. We are committed to playfulness as a design methodology that explores resilient approaches to seasonal adaptation, our connection to place, and a celebration of stories about how we have lived and how we will live, up here, down north. In warming northern cities, winters are becoming increasingly uncommitted, challenging our regional identity. A series of winter infrastructure projects designed by PUBLIC CITY will frame a presentation on the design of the urban public realm in our shifting landscape, including: Crokicurl (a regionally inspired mash-up featured on the Rick Mercer Report and As It Happens), Root Cabin (a temporary public art installation), Hygge House (an iconic warming hut), Manitoboggan (an accessible toboggan slide structure), and Down North (a regenerative winter park).
Afternoon Deep Dive Session
1:50PM – 5:15PM
Melody Culanag & Amardeep Dugar Life at Night: Practical Observations on Human Behaviour with Light at The Forks, Winnipeg This lecture is based on a master thesis research experimental study documenting day-night behaviour and dynamics of people at The Forks in the city of Winnipeg/Canada. Although light is one of the most important elements in creating holistic urban spaces at night, oftentimes, is introduced as an after-thought. The lecture advocates importance of integrating light into urban planning process by presenting an evidence-based study. The study conducted systematic observations and activity mappings to understand the: impact of light on social night life in urban spaces and how it contributes to quality of life of users and society as a whole; modes for creating awareness amongst users about what and how they want to create more liveable urban spaces at night; design measures to be undertaken while tackling urban spaces at night. Results show lighting affects behaviour, direction and use of urban spaces at night while impacting overall wellbeing of users.
Saturday, January 26, 2019 at prairieland park - 503 Ruth St W
6:45AM – 8:00AM
Morning Walk/Run
8:30AM – 8:55PM
Opening Remarks
9:00AM – 12:20PM
WinterCity Café The WinterCity Café is a multi-faceted space that will draw participation from both conference delegates and the wider community (free public entry). The Café will have a number of different engagement activities you can explore, including self-guided reflection, conversation starters, and other creative activities that provide valuable insight to guide the City of Saskatoon in developing a Winter City Strategy. Open to all delegates and members of the public.
Exhibitor Demos The exhibitor demos will feature technologies, practices, activities, equipment, music, art, fashion and food that contribute to thriving winter cities, winter living and economy. It is a celebration of the people, organizations and businesses that make winter life enjoyable, safe and unique. Interactive displays and hands-on experiences will be part of the action as we dig in to what makes life great in a Winter City!
Pecha Kucha
9:00AM - 9:30AM
Saskatchewan Elocution & Debate Association (SEDA)
9:30AM - 9:50AM
Paul Constable
9:50AM - 10:10AM
Steve Kushman
10:10AM - 10:30AM
Joe Van’t Hof & Brad Sylvester
10:50AM - 11:10AM
Aditi Garg
11:10AM - 11:30AM
Ashleigh Mattern
11:30AM - 11:50AM
Barb Stefanyshyn-Coté
Facilitated Conversations
On Saturday Morning attendees can choose from one of three facilitated Conversations to be a part of. These sessions will have a qualified facilitated to help steward the conversation. Each Conversation will have a Panel of four experts – these will be people who have spoken/presented in the conference already. The panelists will be a mixture of sessions to create a cross pollination of ideas. The concept here is to have this cross-pollinated conversation aimed at exploring so what does all this information really mean; what are the opportunities before us; What can and needs to be done globally and locally; and what can the conference do to sustain momentum forward. The conversations will be centered around our three primary conference themes: Designing for Winter; Operating in Winter; Active in Winter.
9:00AM – 10:30AM
Operating in Winter
9:00AM – 12:20PM
Active in Winter
10:50AM – 12:20PM
Designing for Winter
12:30PM – 1:30PM
Bagged Lunch & Travel to Guided Tours
Registrants will get to choose one of six guided tours that demonstrate the history and celebration of winter in Saskatoon! The guided tours include lunch and travel.
3:30PM – 4:00PM
Travel back to hotels.
5:30PM – 8:00PM
Conference Closing Ceremonies and WinterShines Winter Festival Opening Ceremonies. Includes the unveiling of the Ice Castle Lighting Project.
Pre and Post-Conference Activities
What better way to top off your Winter Cities Shake-Up experience than to take in activities before or following the conference. Immerse yourself in snow, sub-zero fun and experience what this winter city has to offer!
We would like to offer you the following activities to enjoy before or after the conference:
Winterruption
January 24 - January 26
A multi-day, multi-venue festival that seeks to celebrate the fact that Saskatoon is a winter city
Nutrien WinterShines
January 26 - February 3
Saskatchewan's Premiere Winter Festival
The French Film Festival of Saskatchewan
January 24 & January 26
The shows will be free and there will be discussions with actors, and/or producers after the movies. All movies will have English subtitles.
January 16 - February 26
Crokicurl is the brainchild of Public City Architecture, and combines two iconic Canadian pastimes: crokinole and curling, to become an exciting new outdoor sport for all ages.
Shakespeare on the Saskatchewan
January 22 - January 27
Shakespeare on the Saskatchewan is proud to bring to Saskatoon, pimohtewak, Cree for ‘the ones who walk,’ a collaborative multidisciplinary piece on and around our site this winter!