City of Lethbridge - Sustainable Community Planning

The City of Lethbridge is working towards a sustainability strategy for the municipality as a whole and, as a starting point, it will look at implementing sustainable actions and practices on a smaller scale in Sun Ridge, a new 158 hectares residential community. The results will be incorporated into the community-wide Muncipal Development Plan (MDP) that will provide municipal guidelines and standards for developers and builders in the City, including its Real Estate and Land Development (RELD) department. The project will address the first two phases of the development: Phase 1 comprises the development and compilation of a plan to implement green principles and practices at a residential scale for approximately 33 hectares of the Sun Ridge site; Phase 2 entails the development of approximately 25 hectares of the Sun Ridge community, incorporating sustainability at the neighbourhood scale. Feasibility studies conducted in this phase will consider broader level innovations such as district energy, renewable energy sources, naturalized stormwater management, and pedestrian-oriented and mixed-use development. In addition, regulatory, insitutional and perceptual barriers to implementing sustainability will be examined. Four to five model eco-homes will be built in Phase 2 to demonstrate best practices in green building and design, with one demonstration eco-home serving as an interpretive centre.