FAQs

The City is committed to maintaining strong and healthy communities through safe and accessible infrastructure – like sidewalks. This is something that has been emphasized in multiple Council-approved policies and principles, dating back to the early 2000s. 

Your community has been identified as one of about 20 neighbourhood “pockets” in London that would benefit from the improved accessibility and connectivity that sidewalks provide. 

To develop a Neighbourhood Connectivity Plan for your area, we will be gathering information from a variety of places:

• Community feedback from you and your neighbours, which will help us understand your community-wide goals, mobility needs and travel patterns
• City of London information and policies, which will include considering factors such as requests for sidewalks and traffic calming measures in your neighbourhood and traffic and pedestrian volume data
• Input from various outside agencies and partners, which could include schools, London Transit Commission and police, to help us get a deeper understanding of travel patterns and mobility in your neighbourhood

With input from these areas, the goal is to develop a plan that is holistic and considers the needs of the entire community from a 360-degree perspective.

Right now, staff are looking at sidewalks from a high-level, neighbourhood-wide perspective. We’re going to be consulting with you, the community, as well as gathering info from key stakeholders and City divisions, to understand where sidewalks might make the most sense within your neighbourhood.

Once we’ve engaged with your community and gathered info from key stakeholders, we will make recommendations to Council as to where sidewalks and connectivity should be prioritized in your neighbourhood. Our recommendations will come in the form of a Neighbourhood Connectivity Plan. Council will review the plan, and decide whether the plan will move forward as a “blue print” for where to add sidewalks in your neighbourhood. 

After that, staff will come back to the specific streets where sidewalks have been recommended to consult with those residents. At that point, we will be focused on finding the best fit for the street and helping residents understand the design considerations available to maximize the benefits, and mitigate impacts of, adding a new sidewalk.

To assist residents in deciding on a sidewalk design for street, City staff will consider factors such as trees and vegetation, existing driveways, on-street parking, access to amenities, better connectivity, emergency vehicle access, winter road maintenance and streetlighting to develop design options.

The London Plan – the City’s official plan – states sidewalks should be installed on both sides of most streets  - and this is standard for many Ontario municipalities. However, as we’ve moved forward with planning to add sidewalks in this manner in recent years, this ‘blanket’ approach has led to significant debate within communities. 

Our goal is to develop a “Neighbourhood Connectivity Plan” that will look at the whole community, and recommend sidewalks where they will provide the greatest benefit, without automatically assuming sidewalks on every street. 

If your street is identified as a place where sidewalks should be added, that work will likely be timed to coincide with other road work that is planned for your area or street (for example, repaving the road or fixing underground infrastructure.) The City tries to combine this type of work in order to minimize disruption for residents.

If a sidewalk is recommended for your street, you will receive a letter in the mail, alerting you to the expected timing, and letting you know when City staff will be back to consult with residents to help determine the best fit for a sidewalk on your street.

Everyone who lives on the street will have an opportunity to provide feedback on proposed sidewalk options for the street, to help us refine the designs so we can add the sidewalk in a way that makes the most sense for the street.

Yes. If a sidewalk is recommended for your street, you will receive a letter in the mail, alerting you to the expected timing, and letting you know when City staff will be back to consult with residents to help determine the best fit for a sidewalk on your street.

At that stage, staff will look at your street in a much more detailed way, to help determine the best fit for a sidewalk on your street. We’ll consider factors such as trees and vegetation, existing driveways, on-street parking, emergency vehicle access, winter road maintenance and streetlighting to develop design options for a sidewalk for your street. 

We’ll also consider how we can minimize or mitigate some of the impacts of adding a new sidewalk – so, for example, where the sidewalk is located, whether there will be grass between the sidewalk and the road, etc. 

Everyone who lives on the street will have an opportunity to provide feedback on our proposed options, in order to help us refine the designs so we can add the sidewalk in a way that makes the most sense for the street.

Trees and the natural landscape are extremely important to the City, and we know they are important to residents as well. 

When it comes time to implement a sidewalk on a specific street, staff will be looking at your street in a much more detailed way, to help determine the best fit for a sidewalk on your street.

As part of that process, an arborist will inspect trees within the project area to determine their health condition, review potential conflicts with sidewalks, and develop a tree protection plan. 

Where it appears that sidewalk infrastructure might impact an existing tree, staff will explore a wide range of possible solutions to avoid damaging the tree if possible. 

However, the difficult reality is that sometimes necessary infrastructure work can have impacts on trees or their root systems. In cases where alternative solutions aren’t feasible, the City will undertake a process that involves arborists, as well as representatives from the City’s Forestry team, to determine a plan for tree removal and replacement. 

If removal is deemed necessary for any trees – whether for health reasons or for conflicts with the sidewalk – the trees will be replaced, either at the same site, or at a suitable site nearby, in a way that fits the local natural environment. 

For context, in previous years, the City has planted over 5,000 trees annually to compensate for these factors and increased our canopy goals under The Urban Forest Strategy.