Summary
Yet dominant urban climate strategies often prioritize technocratic solutions that neglect deep-rooted social inequities. Climate change is already changing life in Canadian cities, but its impacts, and the benefits of climate action, are uneven. We need to understand how we can design climate action that is not only low-carbon, but also equitable and community-centered.
This report shares some of the findings of the Just Transitions in Action (JTIA) project, a community-based research and action initiative rooted in Scarborough, Toronto, Canada. The project was about rethinking climate action by placing equity and lived experience at the center. It asked a simple but transformative question: What if climate actions were designed not only to reduce emissions, but also to meet the everyday priorities of communities, particularly equity-deserving populations in underserved areas?
From 2022-2025, we held a series of activities and workshops with communities across Scarborough about their visions for the future of their neighbourhoods and city. We used pop-ups at a farmer’s market, arts-based workshops in green spaces, a walking tour and more. We worked with communities to understand people’s priorities for the future of their community and how climate action can address these priorities. For example, communities are struggling with food insecurity. There is a pressing need for increased access to healthy, organic, and local food options and more spaces and opportunities for local food production. Addressing food security is not only a climate resilience measure so that people have affordable food as climate impacts increase, but it is also a greenhouse gas emission reduction measure to support more local, organic food.
