Business View Magazine | September 2019

163 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE SEPTEMBER 2019 studies for lower-tier municipal governments. Because SvN works with public-sector agencies, we are uniquely positioned to serve private developers who value this knowledge. Our unique understanding of the market allows us to maximize public and private investments, and unlock the development potential of underutilized sites.” Scorgie adds that all three divisions of the company – planning, urban design, and architecture – work together on transit-oriented development projects. “Recently, we have negotiated complex agreements between multiple stakeholders, including provincial government authorities, municipal governments, and private land developers to integrate development with new transit infrastructure.” It is that combination of expertise that Scorgie believes gives SvN a competitive advantage. “We’re a truly integrated, multi-disciplinary planning and design practice,” he states. “We collaborate inter-departmentally on quite a few different projects, even for services which would typically be provided by a single discipline. For example, when our planning team is assisting a developer with their due diligence process, we bring in members of our urban design and architecture teams to advise on certain design matters, upfront (e.g. parking, loading, and amenity space configurations), for the sake of improving efficiency, minimizing risk, and creating greater certainty down the road. It helps us anticipate issues early on, creating a more defensible approach to master planning. “The multi-disciplinary nature of our company also allows us to undertake a greater breadth of work, beyond what many of our competitors are able to offer. There is efficiency, in terms of time, financing, and coordination, in having all these services offered together. It is one of our main competitive advantages. “We come from a very strong social mandate, and we apply that lens to all of our work. We also tend to engage in complex projects with unique SVN ARCHI TECTS & PLANNERS INC .