Team ExpandedMinds: Charna Perman, Kaylee Hartigan-Go
Note: This GitHub folder contains all the data used for the 'Halifax Emerging' App for the Esri ECCE App Challenge 2024.
Public-facing link to Halifax Emerging: https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/08e54cabb58c434bba2eb29ff231c5ab
Canada is becoming increasingly urbanized. With most Canadians living in urban centers, and new arrivals to the country flocking to cities, understanding how cityscapes have evolved to support such growth is crucial.
Halifax is currently one of Canada’s fastest growing urban centers, which allows for its urban expansion to be examined as it is emblematic of larger changes seen across Canada (Statistics Canada, 2022). Over the past three centuries Halifax has experienced massive transformation from its birth as a colonial military outpost, and emerging over periods of industrialization and suburbanization into the city as we know it today. Our mission is to showcase urban expansion through the lens of urban historical geography, where Halifax can be used as a case study to highlight the processes that have transformed Canadian cities. In doing so we will explore the colonial, industrial, and modern evolutions of the city, and gain a deeper understanding of the issues surrounding urban expansion that planners face as they design cities of the present and future.
Our app, Halifax Emerging, utilizes Esri’s ArcGIS Experience Builder to bring to life the evolution of Halifax, allowing users to better understand how this urban space has transformed and expanded through archival photographs, interactive maps, and additional linked resources (such as documentaries and websites). We chose Experience Builder because it is accessible through different devices – including computers and mobile phones – and because it allowed us to incorporate a wide variety of media and data to tell the city’s history. Users can scroll through Halifax Emerging at their own pace, revisiting resources we have linked and the maps we have created.
Our maps were made using open spatial data made available by the Government of Canada, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, and the Halifax Regional Municipality. They showcase characteristics of Halifax’s population, infrastructure, land use, and urban expansion over time.
Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. (2018). AAFC Land Use [Data set]. Government of Canada. https://open.canada.ca/data/en/dataset/fa84a70f-03ad-4946-b0f8-a3b481dd5248
Buggey, S. (1980). Building Halifax 1841-1871. Acadiensis, 10, 1. https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/Acadiensis/article/view/11541
Canadian National freight train passing through Africville. (1965). In Bob Brooks Nova Scotia Archives 1989-468 vol. 16 / negative sheet 5 image 8. https://archives.novascotia.ca/africville/archives/?ID=6
Clayton & Sons, Halifax, N.S. – Work Room, about 1900. (1900). In Jean Holder Nova Scotia Archives 1980-195 no. 24 / negative: N-0172. https://archives.novascotia.ca/halifax/archives/?ID=22
Dubé, S. (2014). The Master Plan for the City of Halifax, 1945: Its origin and impact. http://theoryandpractice.planning.dal.ca/_pdf/history/sdube_masterplan_2015.pdf
“End Africville Blight Welfare Expert Advises: Calls for Early Start to Shift Negro Residents”, Mail Star excerpt. (1963). In Africville Nova Scotia Archives MG 100 volume 100 number 44 T. https://archives.novascotia.ca/african-heritage/archives/?ID=600&Page=202005531
Government of Canada. (2023). First Nations Locations [Data set]. Government of Canada. https://open.canada.ca/data/en/dataset/b6567c5c-8339-4055-99fa-63f92114d9e4/resource/559e9138-f818-46e3-8875-3efca9361413
Grant, J. L., & Gregory, W. (2016). Who lives downtown? Neighbourhood change in central Halifax, 1951-2011. International Planning Studies, 21(2), 176–190. https://doi.org/10.1080/13563475.2015.1115340
Grant, J. L., Vissers, L., & Haney, J. (2012). Early Town Planning Legislation in Nova Scotia: The Roles of Local Reformers and International Experts. Urban History Review, 40(2), 3–14. https://doi.org/10.7202/1009193ar
Gregory, W. (2014). Who Lives Downtown? Population and demographic change in downtown Halifax, 1951-2011. http://theoryandpractice.planning.dal.ca/_pdf/neighbourhood_change/mplan_projects/wgregory_thesis_2014.pdf
Halifax Regional Municipality. (2022). Census 2021 Census Tracts [Data set]. Halifax Data, Mapping & Analytics Hub. https://arcg.is/1OHqPn1
Halifax Regional Municipality. (2024). Growth Control Areas [Data set]. Halifax Data, Mapping & Analytics Hub. https://arcg.is/0Ofi9
Halifax Regional Municipality. (2024). HRM Parks [Data set]. Halifax Data, Mapping & Analytics Hub. https://arcg.is/0mH9X
Halifax Regional Municipality. (2024). Street Centrelines [Data set]. Halifax Data, Mapping & Analytics Hub. https://arcg.is/0DyKXL0
Halifax Works Department. (1965). Building Demolition Statistics [Photograph]. City of Halifax. https://cdn.halifax.ca/sites/default/files/documents/about-the-city/archives/102-3-L-1Demolition%20totals1958-01-01%20to%201965-03-31.pdf
Halifax Works Department. (1961). Buildings in the Central Redevelopment Area [Photograph]. Flickr. https://flic.kr/p/T8G7Qq
Halifax Works Department. (1970). Demolition and Irving Commercial Equipment [Photograph]. Flickr. https://flic.kr/p/TiUxuA
Halifax Works Department. (1968). Scotia Square excavation site [Photograph]. Flickr. https://flic.kr/p/Thf3cu
Mackenzie, S., Gray, D., Board, F., & Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. (1990). Remember Africville (pp. 1 videocassette (35 min.): sound, color; 1/2 in. (VHS)). National Film Board of Canada; WorldCat. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BE0FoVCZJzM
Master Plan for City of Halifax. (1945). Halifax Regional Municipality Archives. https://cdn.halifax.ca/sites/default/files/documents/about-the-city/archives/711.45.H17-1945_MasterPlan%5BNewPg5%5D.pdf
Moses Harris, & D'Anville. (1750). A View of Halifax Drawn from Ye Topmasthead. In Nova Scotia Archives Map Collection: S.B. 4. https://archives.novascotia.ca/maps/archives/?ID=60
Natural Resources Canada. (2017). Aboriginal Lands of Canada Legislative Boundaries [Data set]. Government of Canada. https://open.canada.ca/data/en/dataset/522b07b9-78e2-4819-b736-ad9208eb1067
Oh The Urbanity!. (2023, January 21). Urbanism: Not Just a Big City Thing! [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/mxNoPe5xSQM?si=mFiwOxdaEyNxzUyv
Province of Nova Scotia. (2011). Office Of L’nu Affairs: Facts sheets and additional information. Novascotia.ca. https://novascotia.ca/abor/aboriginal-people/demographics/
Ruger, A. (1879). Panoramic View of the City of Halifax, Nova Scotia. In CR10-066. https://www.halifax.ca/about-halifax/municipal-archives/source-guides/reference-maps-plans
Rutland, T. (2018). Displacing Blackness: Planning, power, and race in twentieth-century Halifax. University Of Toronto Press.
Sketch map of Africville. (1949). In Nova Scotia Archives Library Brookbank 1990-191. https://archives.novascotia.ca/african-heritage/archives/?ID=666
Statistics Canada. (2016). Built-up area, Halifax census metropolitan area (CMA) and census metropolitan area-ecosystem (CMA-E) [Data set]. Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/16-201-x/2016000/m-c/map3.8-eng.htm
Statistics Canada. (2022, February 9). Canada’s large urban centres continue to grow and spread. Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/220209/dq220209b-eng.htm
Sutherland, D. (1975). Halifax 1815-1914: Colony to Colony. Urban History Review, 1-75, 7. https://doi.org/10.7202/1020577ar
Webster, T. (2015). Halifax Harbour Sunset Skyline, Nova Scotia. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Halifax_Harbour_Sunset_Skyline,_Nova_Scotia_(24237034620).jpg
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Wooden box factory owned by E. M. Comeau and Sons. (1912). In Harold Robichaud Collection Centre Acadien Series B, photo 15. https://archives.novascotia.ca/communityalbums/Sainte-Anne/archives/?ID=1057