Last year, we started a new program, coLabs, where neighbourhood groups apply to work with us to revitalize their laneway. People often assume the selection process is about choosing the best ideas for murals, lighting, or greening. But the application does not ask for any design ideas. There are no questions about murals, lighting concepts, or planting plans. At first, this can seem odd. If the goal is to improve a space, it feels natural to start with ideas about what should go there.
What matters most at the application stage is whether a small group of neighbours is willing to hold the process together, and whether the laneway itself can realistically support change. What we are actually looking for is community readiness. Because our process is co-design, and you can’t co-design without a community to design with.
Instead of asking for design ideas, we ask applicants, what we call Neighbourhood Leads, to begin the work of outreach. Who have they spoken to? How? Is there broader interest beyond a small group of engaged residents? A handful of motivated neighbours can start a project, but they can’t carry out a co-design process on their own.
After applications are reviewed, we move into shortlist interviews. Again, the focus is not on design. It’s about understanding whether there is real interest, beyond the Leads, in participating in a shared process. This isn’t a project where we come in and make a laneway “nice.” It’s a project where a group of neighbours, sometimes strangers, work together to shape a shared space. Laneway coLabs works partly because of how the process begins. Communities apply. In a very real sense, they invite us in.
That starting point changes the relationship from the beginning. Residents are not reacting to an idea that has already been defined. They are asking for support and facilitation to help realize something they believe could improve their shared space.
Once a laneway is selected, the first focus is not the design, it’s the community. We map who is connected to the space and, just as importantly, who isn’t. The people who submitted the application may have initiated the project, but a laneway belongs to far more people than those who filled out a form. Renters, nearby residents, adjacent buildings, and people who pass through regularly all have a relationship to the space.
We deliberately broaden the definition of community and examine barriers to participation: language, accessibility, safety, time, and whether people feel welcome or comfortable participating. Not everyone engages in the same way, and we are still learning how to do this better with each project.
At the same time, relationships begin to form. Most people start out as strangers. Trust, both between neighbours and with us, does not exist at the beginning. It builds slowly through conversations, walks, small meetings, and sometimes disagreements.
Co-design is a term that appears frequently in city-building, but it is often used loosely. In many cases, what is described as co-design is really consultation, where a project already exists, and the public is asked to comment on it. Under those conditions, it is very difficult to shape something collectively. Real co-design asks for a different kind of beginning.
In practice, co-design looks quite different. Ideas develop gradually through observation and conversation. One neighbour may be focused on safety and traffic. Another may care about greenery. Someone else may see the laneway as a place for art or gathering. These priorities rarely align neatly at the beginning, and working through those differences is part of the process.
In fact, disagreement is often a good sign. It shows that people feel comfortable enough to speak honestly, and that trust is beginning to form. And more often than not, the solutions overlap. A laneway that feels safer for kids walking to school and a laneway with more greenery are not competing ideas. Visual disruption, through planting, signage, or art, can slow traffic while improving safety.
Over time, the project's direction begins to take shape. Community voices come forward to identify problems and priorities. Our role is not to determine what the laneway should become, but to listen carefully and translate what we hear into something that can work technically and spatially. Community needs, preferences, and constraints gradually become a design that is feasible, safe, and buildable.
Laneway revitalization eventually produces murals, gardens, lighting, and other visible improvements. Those elements are important and often the first things people notice. But what we are really doing is something else.
We are creating the conditions for people to come together, build trust, and take shared responsibility for a space they all use. The physical changes are the outcome of that process, not the starting point or even the primary goal.
When a group of neighbours moves from passive users of a space to active stewards, something shifts. The laneway changes, but so does the community around it. And that, more than any single design intervention, is what makes the work last. In the end, the goal is a more connected, more resilient community. The beautiful space is just a bonus.