The Planning Partnership prepared a comprehensive, long-term vision and master plan for 4km of Prince Rupert’s shoreline on the Inside Passage, as well as 3rd Avenue, its historic main street. This included a framework for rejuvenating the downtown portion of the Brett & Hall plan, an historically important Beaux Arts town plan.

The waterfront plan focuses on a new civic space, Rupert’s Landing, incorporating new parkland, the potential airport ferry dock, a repurposed Terminal building, public art and a new marina. The plan provides many opportunities to view and engage with the water, through new trails, lookouts, piers, a reclaimed beach, and water’s edge terraces for seating and climbing.

The approach to 3rd Avenue is to create flexible, shared public space focusing on the city hall precinct and adjacent main street buildings, including the community college. We made specific streetscape recommendations that will reflect the spectacular surrounding natural landscape as a green spine for the downtown and allocate more space to pedestrians. Fundamental to the master plan is weaving together the entire downtown to re-engage the waterfront and its main street.

The plan can be achieved through incremental change, incorporating simple, inexpensive solutions and pilot projects to kick start transformation. We developed the master plan during an intensive, week-long design charrette in Prince Rupert, working with stakeholders and the public, achieving consensus in a very short timeframe.