Downtown Streetscape Guidelines

Downtown Streetscape

What are the Downtown Streetscape Guidelines?

Streetscape Guidelines are a part of a long-term strategy to revitalize how downtown streets look, function and feel for pedestrians who move through the area.

Why introduce new guidelines?

The City of Burlington's current streetscape guidelines were established more than 30 years ago. To better suit the changing needs and uses of Burlington's downtown streets, the City has been working, with input from the public, to evaluate and update its streetscape design guidelines.

Once finalized, the new downtown streetscape guidelines will provide the foundation for a consistent, unified, cohesive look across the downtown. The guidelines will also inform an appropriate level of service to maintain the streetscape through the years.

The downtown streetscape guidelines are an important piece of Burlington's committment to design excellence. As the city transitions from a suburban to a more urban community, a focus on urban design will help ensure that buildings, public spaces and streetscapes in the urban areas are functional, attractive, and sustainable.

Project status

On Sept. 23, 2019, Burlington City Council approved new streetscape guidelines for downtown Burlington. [PDF]

Thank you to everyone who took part in the public engagement opportunities to share their feedback. A summary of these meetings and the feedback that was shared is available on this page.

View the approved streetscape guidelines for downtown Burlington

Past Public Meetings

Sept. 23, 2019

On Sept. 23, 2019, Burlington City Council approved new streetscape guidelines for downtown Burlington. [PDF]

July 9, 2019

With input from the public about the types of improvements they’d like to see in downtown Burlington’s streetscape, a copy of the proposed new streetscape guidelines was presented to City Council for information at a meeting of the Planning and Development Committee on July 9, 2019.

May 17, 2018

On May 17, the city hosted two open house events to help gather input from the public on the draft Downtown Streetscape Guidelines. Thank you to the more than 30 people who attended the open houses, held at 1 and 6:30 p.m. at the Art Gallery of Burlington to share your feedback.

What we heard

General agreement with the defined character areas, particularly agreement with Lower Brant Street as a “main street”
Explore different colours outside of Lower Brant Street
Heritage theme of furnishings should extend beyond Lower Brant Street, but maintain a specific treatment for Lower Brant Street
Waste receptacles should have multi-streams for recyclables, compost, etc.

As a result of the feedback received, the following revisions were made to the proposed new downtown streetscape guidelines presented to City Council on July 9, 2019:

Reduce the total number of furnishing options (from three to two)
Add a new section entitled Design Priorities to inform the preliminary planning, design, and implementation of the guidelines (Section 3.2)
Add guidelines specific to Transit Stops (Section 3.3.3)
Recommend a colour for the Lakeshore Road Character Street streetscape elements (i.e. grey)
Add concept drawings to demonstrate a typical layout scenario for each of the Character Area streetscapes (Appendix A).

Saturday, June 25, 2016

The future direction for the street furnishings in the downtown were on display at Civic Square in front of City Hall. This included pavement options and street furnishing samples. Thank you to those who came by to provide their feedback.

Residents told us they would like to see:

wider sidewalks where possible in the downtown
an increase in the number of pedestrian crossings to help feel safe when crossing the street
more garbage, recycling and compost bins
more benches to sit and enjoy the downtown
more greenery and street trees on downtown streets
a greater number of bike lanes and bike racks in convenient locations
a style of furnishings that reinforces the mainstreet character along Brant Street.

Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2015

At this public meeting, participants had the opportunity to work in small groups and discuss potential improvements to downtown streetscape elements such as street lamps, benches, garbage cans, paving materials and sidewalk crossings.

If you have any questions, please contact:

Todd Evershed
City of Burlington
Tel. 905-335-7600
todd.evershed@burlington.ca