Re-Connecting the Humber River Through Design-Based Research Solutions in Planning

The watercourses of the Humber River Watershed have influenced pollinator paths, trails, and roads from the Niagara Escarpment and the Oak Ridges Moraine downward towards Lake Ontario. The Carrying Place, an Indigenous trail and portage route, is a manifestation of the Humber River. However, over the past centuries, as Western land-development and infrastructure practices were implemented, the Carrying Place Trail slowly disappeared (Turner, 2015). Fractured remnants of the Indigenous route have influenced the contemporary trail system of the Humber River Watershed. The Watershed is a significant cultural landscape, however, due to the cross-jurisdictional nature of the Watershed, the cultural, abiotic, and biotic layers of the landscape are acknowledged differently by each Municipality within its boundary. Through design-based research, the Major Research Project intends to re-connect fragmented sections of the Humber River Watershed’s existing trail system to celebrate the cultural and natural heritage of the watercourses through time and space.