Canada needs to invest in significant new housing starts. And this investment needs to include the social, cultural, transit and economic infrastructure that will allow healthy communities to grow and thrive, says OCAD University President Emerita Dr. Sara Diamond who is co-leading a research project to study this issue.
The research project, iCity2.0: Urban Data Science for Future Mobility, will help to plan communities that are more resilient, equitable, affordable, and healthy.
“Adaptable complete community guidelines and evaluation are important factors in urban planning, and through iCity2.0, we have the research to support these efforts,” explains Dr. Diamond.
She says urban planning needs a new set of tools to ensure there is deep engagement of all those who are impacted by a development and who might make use of a development.
“Carefully curated artificial intelligence tools can support demographic analysis, and a set of visualization tools allow us to share the current context of a community and present scenarios (for example types of employment that might be available in a community, or different housing mixtures and the kinds of amenities needed to support these),” says Dr. Diamond.
The research project has created a methodology that can be adapted to plan complete communities in ways that include extensive consultation and engagement.
“We have also created applications that apply various AI tools and methods in ethical and inclusive ways. (AI is not only Large Language Models),” she says.
ABOUT DR. DIAMOND
Dr. Diamond is a computer scientist, historian, artist and designer who holds deep interest in the relationships between human practices, diverse cultures, technologies and environments.
She brings decades of collaborative research and has led major research networks. Her recent projects include wearable mobile support for seniors; searchable cultural databases; audience engagement and impact tools for screen media; a digital platform for collaboration across archives, complete community developments to support affordable, healthy communities supported by visualization technology, and support for Indigenous-led AI.
Earlier in her life, she enjoyed a career as a video artist, curator and historian. From 1997 to 2007, she created a turn-of-the-century creative neural network. She founded and led the international Banff New Media Institute from 1995 to 2005.
She served as OCAD U president from 2005 to 2020 and is now a faculty member of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and a University Research Chair. She led OCAD U in its transition to full university status, to retain our traditional strengths in art and design, and become a research leader in creative technology, Indigenous visual culture, Black Canadian diasporic culture, and many other fields.
“I am so happy that I can dedicate this phase of my life to research and teaching and supporting the next generations of research talent,” says Dr. Diamond who is the recipient of the Order of Canada, the Order of Ontario, and the Queen’s Jubilee Medal for Service to Canada.
OCAD U caught up with Dr. Diamond to learn more about iCity2.0: Urban Data Science for Future Mobility.
What is the main focus of this research project?
I am the co-principal investigator of this project with Dr. Eric Miller from the University of Toronto. I lead our research in “complete communities” which are mixed-use affordable communities that include employment, housing, cultural infrastructure, a wide mix of amenities, green and blue spaces, access to transit and active transportation.
Our research has used strategic foresight to expand the “complete” criteria and imagine future scenarios. We develop personas based on current and future demographics and their needs and apply generative design and procedural visualization, in collaboration with developers, municipalities and potential site users.
What drew you into this field of study in the first place?
As OCAD U’s past president, I was very involved in dialogues with the City of Toronto about ways that technologies could support democratic urban planning and a series of initiatives (Student MoveTO, looking at better mobility for students, and StudentDwellTO, looking at student housing), which we funded as a university consortium.
I have also led successful research projects in data visualization. I was invited to join iCity1.0 to lead the visualization stream of that network which focused on transportation and transit innovation, as well as building tools to engage people in imagining and planning future communities. iCity2.0 is the project that followed and is focused on equity, inclusive and healthy communities and neighbourhood building.
What question is this research is trying to answer, and why is this important?
There are five key questions we are addressing:
How do you see the research findings contributing to your field or affecting people’s lives in the real world?
Our research will help to plan communities that are more resilient, equitable, affordable, and healthy and have excellent cultural resources.
We are working with real-world partners, municipalities, developers, not-for-profit organizations, etc. who are applying our recommendations and scenarios. We have worked or are working on three specific projects with a new project under development with the City of Toronto.
We have developed a methodology that is unique to our research group and has been presented at international and Canadian conferences and in industry contexts. It begins with strategic foresight, includes the creation of personas, a series of mapping processes and comparative case studies, and then visualization and interaction outputs that allows different scenarios to be considered. We are also working on a flexible scorecard. This methodology is an innovation in its own right.
We have developed actual tools that can be used, including an open-source generative design tool (for scenario planning), a persona creation tool, and inventive applications of existing tools.
Dr. Roorda and I co-supervised engineering student Sara Wager’s successful PhD. The outcomes are an open-source Generative Design tool that uses a genetic algorithm to optimize neighbourhood layouts based on stakeholder goals and constraints (for example the adjacencies between housing, green spaces and mixed-use development).
The tool accepts neighbourhood-specific data inputs and provides solutions as geodatabase features so that users can visualize prototypes in 2D or 3D using urban modelling software. OCAD U Research Assistant Samah Kamalmaz developed applications for park and neighbourhood Generative Design planning that used Autodesk tools. The two projects allow helpful comparisons of GD systems.
Our automated persona creation tool is very exciting, and we continue to perfect it. Personas are fictional representations of actual demographic groups. We carefully curate data, test its accuracy, and then apply a series of AI language model queries which allow us to build identities for these segments. We are diligent about inclusion – including not only large segments but marginalized groups as well. Personas’ qualities (such as transportation systems they use, employment) and needs (for childcare, dance facilities, specialized foods, etc.) are then computed in relation to amenity lists. These can be grouped and spatial alternatives to meet these needs tested.
Are you working with any collaborators, institutions, or funding bodies on this project?
I am co-leading the project with Dr. Eric Miller, director of the University of Toronto Transportation Research Institute and professor in the Department of Civil and Mineral Engineering at the University of Toronto. OCAD U Professor Jeremy Bowes is a long-term collaborator. Professor Robert Wright, at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design at the University of Toronto and I continue to collaborate. I also work closely with Professor Dr. Matthew Roorda who is the associate chair, Civil Engineering Undergraduate Program at the University of Toronto.
We have multiple collaborators: Autodesk, City of Toronto, City of Mississauga, City of Brampton, DiamondCorp, Environics, Esri Canada, Northcrest Developments, The Daniels Corporation.
The Ontario Research Excellence Fund, Mitacs, Autodesk, Northcrest, and Esri Canada have been our major funders.
There are many OCAD U, University of Toronto students and alums, Mitacs Globalink international students, and a postdoctoral fellow who have or are currently contributing to the research.
OCAD U research assistants and interns include Dr. Gowthami Satyavarapu; Bonnie Leung, Sanya Mathur, Anita Robles, Shipra Balasubramini, Huda Hasan, Ava Xia, Samah Kamalmaz, Prashant Matta, Catherine Xayabanha, Fiona Mawuenyegah, Annapoorane Rajagopal Valarmathy, Amin Foorotan.