The second National Symposium of Canadian Urbanist (CanU2) took place in Montreal just ahead of the CIP conference. Organized by the Council for Canadian Urbanism (CanU), the event gathered of 60 professionals from across the country for animated discussions of key issues faced by Canadian urbanism.

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The Symposium took place at the Montreal Biosphere and started with a series of presentations from local urbanist including Rene Daoust (Daoust Lessage), Anne Cormier (Universite de Montreal), and Dinu Bumbaru (Hertiage Montreal) under the banner “Learning from Montreal”.

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The “Leading Edge Urbanism: Canada’s Largest Cities” session include brief presentations from former Ontario Planning Journal correspondent Brent Toderian (Vancouver), Thom Mahler (Calgary), Robert Freedman (Toronto), Aurele Cardinal (Montreal) and Andy Fillmore (Halifax). Keynote speaker Larry Beasley, a founding member of CanU, held the participants’ attention with an exciting presentation paralleling his work in Abu Dhabi with the Canadian urbanist experience. This was followed by a robust debate around “Urbanizing Suburbia,” anchored by tried presentations from Dan Leeming, David Gordan and Alex Taranu.

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The final session focused on the organization’s role, mandate, priorities and activities leading up to the next national symposium conference in 2011. The urbanization of suburbia was considered a key priority for organization in achieving its goals for a more sustainable and healthily Canadian  urbanism. The Symposium was followed by an urban design mini-charrette organize by CanU for the CIP Conference. Using a c charrette omplex site m Montreal, the demonstrated design and planning responses to the common issues and opportunities related to climate change and cities.