Michael von Hausen brings more than 30 years of teaching, training, facilitating, and working across North America in the areas of land development planning, finance, and urban design. He is President of MVH Urban Planning & Design Inc., an international consulting practice in sensitive land development planning, sustainable urban design, and community partnerships in Canada, United States, China, Russia, and Mexico. He is Adjunct Professor in the Graduate Urban Studies Program at Simon Fraser University and curriculum coordinator of the award-winning Urban Design Certificate Program. He is a graduate of Harvard University with a Masters in Urban Design and a specialty in real estate development economics.
In 2012, Mr. von Hausen was recognized as an honored member of the Heritage Registry of Who’s Who for Executives and Professionals. His 2013 book – Dynamic Urban Design: A Handbook for Creating Sustainable Communities Worldwide, describes the theory, practice and potential of urban design as a catalyst for sustainable development. In July of 2013, his firm won the international eco-city design competition for Huangshi, China that will expand the city by 1.1 million residents.
Ken Greenberg is an architect, urban designer, teacher, writer, former Director of Urban Design and Architecture for the City of Toronto and Principal of Greenberg Consultants. For over three decades he has played a pivotal role on public and private assignments in urban settings throughout North America and Europe, focusing on the rejuvenation of downtowns, waterfronts, neighborhoods and on campus master planning, regional growth management, and new community planning. Cities as diverse as Toronto, Hartford, Amsterdam, New York, Boston, Montréal, Ottawa, Edmonton, Calgary, St. Louis, Washington DC, Paris, Detroit, Saint Paul and San Juan Puerto Rico have benefited from his advocacy and passion for restoring the vitality, relevance and sustainability of the public realm in urban life. In each city, with each project, his strategic, consensus-building approach has led to coordinated planning and a renewed focus on urban design. He is the recipient of the 2010 American Institute of Architects Thomas Jefferson Award for public design excellence and the author of Walking Home: the Life and Lessons of a City Builder published by Random House.
Claude Potvin graduated from the Université de Montréal's School of Landscape Architecture in 1979. He worked briefly as landscape architect in the private sector, then for Parks Canada for a period of five years, and was responsible for projects within National Parks and Historic Sites, Ontario and Quebec Region. For the last 26 years, he has been with the National Capital Commission, the Crown agency responsible for the planning, design and stewardship of Canada's capital in the Ottawa-Gatineau region. He is currently Chief of the Landscape Architecture and Urban Design section of the NCC. Claude has had longstanding involvement in the Association des architectes-paysagistes du Québec, has served as board member and recently as President of the Canadian Society of Landscape Architects and has participated in various congress organizing committees for the CSLA. He was on the jury for the CSLA Awards of Excellence for three consecutive years.