News + Insights
We Love Walkable Cities!
Writing a Walkable Design Guidebook and Model Code for Oregon was a real labor of love. As a company, we care deeply about how our work shapes the spaces and places where we live – not just today but far into the future. We love walkable cities and know you do too. Walkable cities are more accessible, equitable, climate resilient, and just plain fun. We are now helping multiple cities around the state implement these required code changes to improve walkability.
You can check out the guidebook here.
Making ADUs More Accessible in Sacramento
How can we make housing development for small scale housing projects like Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) more accessible and easy to understand for everyday people? We led a team to develop an ADU program and a Housing Development Toolkit for the City of Sacramento that serves as a comprehensive one‐stop‐shop resource website where the public can navigate the myriad of regulations and permitting processes in developing an ADU, in addition to a Housing Development Toolkit that identifies developable sites and outlines resources for development.
Planning for What's Next in Juneau
Cascadia Partners is honored to lead a multidisciplinary team —including Corvus Design, SALT, and DOWL —to guide the City & Borough of Juneau’s Comprehensive Plan Update. Framed around scenario planning, our work will help CBJ navigate future uncertainties such as climate change, economic transitions, and demographic shifts by identifying resilient, adaptive policies.
At the heart of our approach is inclusive public engagement—ensuring that residents and business owners have meaningful opportunities to shape a shared vision for Juneau. As Alaska’s capital, Juneau is a place of extraordinary natural beauty, deep cultural roots, and unique geographic challenges. Our goal is to deliver a comprehensive plan that reflects the city's distinct character and stands the test of time. We kicked things off recently with our first round of listening sessions - read more about those here!
Using TestFit to Demystify Zoning
TestFit is one of our most valuable tools for land use analysis - it allows us to consider all the options, identify the most viable scenarios, and make informed decisions about how to maximize the potential of our project sites. So we were thrilled that TestFit featured us as a use case on their website - check out this article featuring Cascadia partner Jamin Kimmell and how we use this software.
Cascadia Partners Sponsors Building a Better Bend
What if Bend’s aging strip malls and big box stores became vibrant, walkable “mini-downtowns”?
Cascadia Partners is proud to be a supporting sponsor for the Building a Better Bend lecture series! Last week urban designer and author Ellen Dunham-Jones shared bold, inspiring ideas on how communities can retrofit car-centric suburbs into livable, people-friendly neighborhoods. You can watch her lecture on YouTube!
Cascadia Partners' Allison Platt and Alex Joyce are both residents of Bend, and as board members of Building a Better Bend, they are helping to bring these transformative conversations to the region.
Our involvement with events like these reflects our commitment to designing livable places and spaces. We're also grateful to be in good company—thank you to the many like-minded colleagues and organizations who helped sponsor this event!
Let’s Play: Building Games for Public Participation
This September, CP community engagement specialist Ayano Healy facilitated a workshop called “Let’s Play: Building Games for Public Participation” with Giovanni Pérez Kelly Guthrie and Sara Dechter at the IAP2 USA International Association of Public Participation (IAP2) conference in Seattle.
This approach to community engagement is not only effective, but it’s creative and fun! The workshop covered how and why gamification can enhance public involvement. Workshop attendees got to brainstorm gaming ideas and created prototypes of games to use for problem-solving and building community for their own projects.