Pradeep is a Ph.D. candidate at the School of Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Alberta. He studies the intersection of colonialism, nationalism, and planning in regard to the planning and making of the first town in postcolonial Sri Lanka, i.e., the New Town Anuradhapura of 1949. He has been teaching introduction to human geography and planning to the undergraduate students at the University of Alberta. He has degrees from the University of Moratuwa, Sri Lanka, and Ball State University, USA, and also participated in CapAsia, Asia-based field semesters, in India and Nepal.
Adila is a Ph.D. student in the Urban and Regional Planning Program at the University of Alberta. Adila completed her Bachelor of Architecture from Anna University, Chennai, India, in 2011 and her Master of Planning, specializing in Housing, from the School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi, India, in 2022. She has over three years of architectural and planning experience in Abu Dhabi and India and nearly one year of teaching undergraduate students of Architecture in India.
Her research interests include housing issues of marginalized communities, sustainable development, and community planning. Her PhD research focuses on the housing experiences of the refugee population in Canada in terms of adequacy, suitability, and affordability factors. She is currently a research assistant for the Bridging Divides Project funded by the Canada First Research Excellence Fund (CFREF).
Jeongwon is a Ph.D. candidate in Interdisciplinary Studies at the School of Urban and Regional Planning and the Department of Sociology at the University of Alberta. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Architecture with a double major in Art History from Ewha Womans University, South Korea. Driven by her passion for understanding the intricate relationship between history, culture, and architecture, Jeongwon completed a master’s degree in Art History at the University of Victoria, Canada. With nearly three years of experience in art management and curation, Jeongwon has actively contributed to visual communication and research creation projects in her Ph.D. program, aiming to bridge academia and the general public. Her Ph.D. research focuses on utilizing drawing as a visual methodology to gain insights into urban surfaces. Jeongwon is currently a research assistant for the Bridging Divides Project.
Nimil is a Ph.D. student in the Urban and Regional Planning program at the University of Alberta. His educational background includes a bachelor’s degree in Architecture from TKM College of Engineering, India, and over two years of professional experience in architecture in both India and Qatar. He holds a master’s degree in Urban Planning from the National Institute of Technology Calicut. He served as the project coordinator for the Kozhikode City of Literature Project (UNESCO Creative Cities Network) aligning with the UN Sustainable Development Goals for urban redevelopment under the Kozhikode Municipal Corporation, Kerala, India. His research interests encompass demographic planning and policy planning, driven by a passion for understanding the complexities of population, migration, and policy issues. He is currently a research assistant for the Bridging Divides Project funded by the Canada First Research Excellence Fund (CFREF).
Michael is a certified chartered surveyor affiliated with the Ghana Institution of Surveyors. He has over four years of experience in property management in Ghana. Michael is currently pursuing a master’s degree in the urban and regional program at the University of Alberta. Michael earned his Bachelor’s degree in Land Economy from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana in 2017, and later completed a Master’s degree in Real Estate Development at the Nova Southeastern University, Florida in 2023. His research interest includes Housing, Sustainable Development, and Land Governance. Michael is currently involved in a research project focused on Natural Disasters and Migration.
Veira, is dedicated to sustainable urban development and housing rights. With a bachelor’s degree in architecture from the University of Panama and a master’s in construction project management from the Technological University of Panama, she has over a decade of experience in the housing industry. Driven by her passion for sustainability, Veira continued her studies, earning a Master’s Degree in Higher Education to deepen her knowledge and pedagogical skills focused on how the SDGs are applied in academia. In 2022, she was awarded a distinguished grant from the National Secretary of Science and Technology in Panama, enabling her to pursue a PhD in urban and regional planning at the University of Alberta. Her research focuses on the right to adequate housing and the challenges posed by informal urban expansion, aiming to create vibrant, inclusive environments that enhance the well-being of all individuals. Veira is committed to bridging the gap between policy and practice, contributing to the creation of sustainable, equitable cities that prioritize the fundamental right to adequate housing for every person.
Sandeep, currently a joint PhD candidate at IIT Roorkee and the University of Alberta, has an extensive background in urban planning and civil engineering. Between 2017 and 2019, he was teaching planning students and contributing to area development planning studio projects for petroleum industrial cluster. He earlier worked as a site engineer in Hyderabad from 2014 to 2015. He finished his Bachelors in Civil Engineering from JNTU, Hyderabad (2014), and a Master’s in Urban and Regional Planning from SPA Vijayawada (2017), he holds postgraduate diplomas in Geomatics, Urban and Environmental Law from NIRD and NLU, Delhi, respectively. Sandeep’s research spans industrial area planning, urban ventilation, and local climatic zoning. His current work as research scholar and project associate focuses on the spatial and temporal mapping of sensor and city building data for urban planning, leveraging SQL for the analysis of large datasets. Moreover, he is using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) for urban scale models to innovate ventilation techniques in urban neighborhoods near pharmaceutical industries. Sandeep’s interests also navigate the complexities of legalities in urban by-law planning, risk assessment for industrial clusters, and the application of simulations for legal validation in city permits.
Cody is a research assistant at the Urban Environment Observatory and a development services planner at the City of Edmonton. Cody graduated from the University of Alberta with a Bachelor of Arts in political science and an after-degree specializing in Urban and Regional Planning. Since 2018, Cody has been investigating matters relating to land use, municipal boundary adjustment, local governance, and intermunicipal conflict and collaboration. Cody’s other interests include planning ethics and zoning reform and enforcement.
Arshdeep Kaur is pursuing her Undergraduate degree in Human Geography at the University of Alberta. She has been working as a research assistant at Urban Environment Observatory for 2 years. Her research interests include land use planning, community building, sustainability, and climate change.
Ishrar is currently pursuing her master’s degree in Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Alberta. She completed her Bachelor of Urban and Regional Planning from Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) in 2019. She has more than 3.5 years of professional experience in the environment and housing sector. Her research interests include various aspects of environmental, housing and transportation planning. Ishrar is currently involved in research projects focused on wildfires, urban trees, and remote sensing.
Alumni
Jill is currently pursuing her Masters degree in Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Alberta. Her research interests include social equity, universal accessibility, and policy planning. She is currently examining the link between the arts and community revitalization for her Masters Research topic. Jill holds a BA in psychology from the University of Alberta.
Ghazal is pursuing her master’s degree in Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Alberta. She has a Bachelor of Science with a focus in Environmental Chemistry from the University of Alberta. During her undergraduate degree, she researched oxidant production by urban road dust to better understand its photoreactive behaviour. Her research interests include transportation, land-use, environmental, and community planning. Ghazal is currently involved in the research investigating the variation of urban heat islands with land-use changes in Edmonton neighbourhoods.”
Shaival is an Urban Planner with over three years of experience in consultancy as well as the research sector. His research interests include studying active transportation, land-use and zoning, and municipal annexations. He earned his Master’s degree from the University of Alberta in Urban & Regional Planning where he did a comparative study of Municipal Annexations in Alberta and British Columbia for his master’s Major Research Project. He earned his Bachelor of Planning degree from CEPT University, India, where he studied the rationale of people not using BRTS (Bus Rapid Transit System) in Ahmedabad for his final thesis.
Debadutta is a Ph.D. student in the Urban and Regional Planning Program at the University of Alberta. Debadutta has over three years of experience teaching undergraduate students of Architecture in India, and nearly two years of architectural practice in India. He completed his Bachelor of Architecture from College of Engineering and Technology, Bhubaneswar, India in 2010; and Master of Urban and Rural Planning from IIT Roorkee in 2014. He is a recipient of the Honorary Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst(DAAD) Scholarship in 2013-2014 wherein he carried out work as a researcher in Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany. His research focuses on the evolving policy and regulatory framework to build community resilience in Indian cities. His research interests also include climate-based adaptation, affordable housing and risk-based approaches to planning.
Hayley is a student in the BA Urban & Regional Planning Program at the University of Alberta who began working in the Urban Environment observatory in early 2018 as a research assistant. She is very interested in policy, sustainable development, and the impact of planning on social inequalities. Hayley has previously worked at Sturgeon County as a Planning intern, where she conducted research to inform policy on best municipal practices for cannabis legalization.