These are the principles that guide our decisions at Strong Towns YEG.
Strong Towns Principles
As a Strong Towns Local Conversation, our principles build on top of their 6 Strong Towns Principles:
Financial solvency is a prerequisite for long-term prosperity.
The goal of a town or city is to endure.
To do that, cities have to be solvent. In fact, solvency must become an absolute obsession for communities.
Land is the base resource from which community prosperity is built and sustained. It must not be squandered.
Land is a finite resource and, as the literal foundation of a community’s success, it has to be stewarded well.
We must use the land we have productively.
A transportation system is a means of creating prosperity in a community, not an end in itself.
North American cities need to evaluate every transportation decision by whether or not it will build enduring prosperity.
Job creation and economic growth are the results of a healthy local economy, not substitutes for one.
A Strong Towns approach to economic development looks less like big-game hunting and more like gardening. If you build a strong town using the principles laid out here, employers (and prospective employees) will beat down the door to move there.
Strong cities, towns, and neighborhoods cannot happen without strong citizens (people who care).
Places endure when residents assume ownership of their cities. This is quite different from the passive role conventionally played by residents.
Local government is a platform for Strong Citizens to collaboratively build a prosperous place.
Local government isn’t the implementation arm of state and federal policies. Yet too often, local government finds itself looking up the “food chain” for money and direction.