Across Western Canada, mobility is being reimagined, not just as a collection of roads and intersections but as an interconnected system designed for people. At the centre of this shift is a holistic way of thinking: safety first, responsiveness always, and long-term transformation as the ultimate goal.
At CIMA+, this philosophy is being brought to life through the work of Ellen McLaughlin. Ellen is a Transportation Project Engineer specializing in transportation planning and traffic engineering, working out of CIMA+’s Regina, Saskatchewan office. Her primary focus is multi-modal road safety work and active transportation design. Some of her recent work includes corridor planning, safety audits for both urban and rural clients, and managing travel demand models. Her technical experience is complimented by community engagement used to identify safety and operational traffic issues. Through projects that span Northern and Western Canada, Ellen is demonstrating how targeted interventions can evolve into resilient, integrated mobility systems that serve communities more safely, equitably and efficiently.
What emerges from Ellen’s work is not just a portfolio of isolated assignments but a coordinated strategy: start with safety, respond quickly, learn continuously, and build toward permanent infrastructure that reshapes how cities move.
Safety first: corridor reviews as catalysts for change
Every transformation begins with understanding risk.
CIMA+’s safety-led corridor reviews all took place in Saskatoon, a vibrant and growing hub for active mobility. Pivotal projects were guided by Vision Zero principles and rooted in a Safe System approach. These reviews recognize a critical truth: people make mistakes and transportation systems must be designed to absorb those mistakes without catastrophic outcomes.
Following the tragic death of cyclist Natasha Fox in 2023, the College Drive and Wiggins Avenue ISRSR became a defining moment. The review analyzed collision patterns, human behaviour and multimodal conflicts, prioritizing vulnerable road users.
“It’s important to remember that Natasha wasn’t just a statistic, but rather a cherished community member. While working on the project, I kept in mind that she was a woman my own age, biking the same intersection I do,” explains Ellen, “Critically, the old way of thinking about transportation—and a common view among the public—is that risk of serious injury or a fatality is an inherent risk to travel. Vision Zero maintains that fatalities be eliminated altogether, and Safe Systems gives us the tools to make those changes by tackling six elements with overlapping countermeasures.”
A similar review of the Clancy Drive corridor revealed a pattern that can be seen across communities: safety issues are recognized after high-profile incidents have occurred, and then they prompt urgent action. CIMA+’s role is to translate that urgency into structured, evidence-based solutions, balancing immediate mitigation with long-term planning.
“There was a fatal collision between a pedestrian and a bus on Clancy. The pedestrian was underage (so no name was released to the media) and needless to say, this senseless tragedy rattled the whole community,” remarks Ellen, “The corridor is very wide, with very few vehicles parked on the street, which encourages higher speeds entering and exiting the nearby Circle Drive expressway.”
There is also an emergency wellness centre in the area for people facing housing insecurity. Unhoused people rely on walking, biking and transit as cost effective ways to travel. They are also significantly more at risk of a collision because of their exposure. This audit paid particular attention to vulnerable road users, ways to temporarily and permanently allocate space to active modes, and methods to reduce vehicle speeds.
Turning insights into immediate action
Safety issues call for immediate response, but the response doesn’t always have to be costly or involved.
While clients may wait years for capital projects to see the light of day, CIMA+ offers its clients rapid, cost-effective interim solutions that can immediately improve safety while exploring future designs. The painted bike lanes, bike box, right-turn-on-red restriction, and leading pedestrian interval (LPI) along Wiggins Avenue are clear examples. LPI, in particular, allows cyclists to get a head start from the bike lane and through the intersection, reducing the chance of a conflict between northbound pedestrians and cyclists, and vehicles making a right turn: the type of conflict that led to Natasha Fox’s death.
These elements were implemented quickly in response to ISRSR findings to improve cyclists’ visibility and position at a high-risk intersection.
But, this approach extends beyond a single corridor. The Munroe Avenue Rapid Deployment Cycling Network builds on the Wiggins Avenue work by creating a parallel, low-stress cycling network to the University of Saskatchewan. Designed as an All Ages and Abilities (AAA) neighbourhood bikeway / bike boulevard, it incorporates flexible materials—signage, pavement markings and temporary curb extensions—to reallocate space and right-of-way, and calm traffic. Uncontrolled minor streets now have stop signs, increasing the perception-reaction time available for drivers to see cyclists. The route on Wiggins, in comparison, is higher stress. A popular route to campus, it is entirely on-street with mixed traffic, apart from one block between Eliott Street and College Drive, where the painted bike lane was installed.
“The City of Saskatoon distinguishes its cycling network between regular streets that a confident cyclist might choose versus the AAA network, which is designed to always be low stress, for people aged 8 to 80,” explains Ellen, “It might be a path, a protected bike lane or a shared low speed / low volume street, depending on the context.”
While rapid deployment is about speed, it’s also about adaptability. These projects are intentionally iterative, supported by monitoring strategies that track user behaviour, safety outcomes and public feedback to refine designs over time. They function as living prototypes, bridging the gap between concept and permanence.
Designing mobility within the complexity of high-speed corridors and constrained environments
Not all mobility challenges allow for simple solutions.
Projects like the College Drive Shared Use Path Feasibility Study and Circle Drive Shared Use Path Functional Design push the boundaries of what’s possible in constrained, high-speed environments. These corridors include interchanges, rail crossings and complex traffic operations, which are spaces traditionally dominated by vehicles.
The College Drive study explored whether a continuous shared-use path could even be constructed through such conditions, evaluating options across interchanges, intersections and grade separations while balancing safety, user experience and constructability.
Similarly, the Circle Drive functional design addressed critical gaps in cycling , connecting previously fragmented routes into a coherent network aligned with the safety audit findings. There are 10 locations running parallel to Circle Drive, Saskatoon’s perimeter expressway, that would connect two or more existing path segments. In the Google Map, project locations are indicated in green, existing paths in blue, and locations with approved functional designs awaiting funding for construction are shown in red.
These projects demonstrate a key principle: connectivity is not achieved by isolated improvements but by addressing the hardest links in the network.
“A bike network only becomes useable once it is widespread and interconnected. The same way that travel by car wouldn’t be possible or popular if we only had a couple of disconnected roads.” commented Ellen.
Designing connections that matter
Equally important to this systems approach is how CIMA+ closes network gaps within established urban corridors. Along Victoria Avenue in Saskatoon, Ellen and the project team delivered the functional design of a key walking and cycling corridor connecting Taylor Street to Ruth Street, linking into both existing and planned citywide infrastructure. Rather than applying a one-size-fits-all solution, the team evaluated multiple AAA facility types, including one-way and two-way protected bike lanes and a neighbourhood bikeway, carefully tailoring options to context. At the same time, the design respected community life, preserving recently constructed sidewalks and working within the existing right-of-way to deliver improvements that were both technically sound and publicly acceptable.
The result is a corridor plan that strengthens the broader network, demonstrating how thoughtful, context-sensitive design can turn individual projects into connected mobility systems.
Moving more people, not just vehicles
As cities grow, mobility systems must evolve beyond single-mode solutions.
CIMA+’s work on College Drive and 1st Avenue for Saskatoon's Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system illustrates how transit integration reshapes entire corridors. By introducing centre-running transit lanes, optimizing signal timing, and incorporating transit priority measures as well as transit stations, the design improves service reliability while maintaining multimodal balance.
This integration—overlapping and incorporating Wiggins and Munroe—extends to active transportation, as multi-use pathways, neighbourhood bikeways and cycling connections are embedded into the corridor design, ensuring that transit investments support broader accessibility, not just bus operations.
At a systems level, this reflects a shift from vehicle-focused planning to people-moving capacity.
Mobility as the foundation of urban expansion
The mobility transformation extends beyond individual corridors to entire urban regions.
In Edmonton’s Priority Growth Areas (PGA) study, CIMA+ applied a Multi-Modal Level of Service (MMLOS) framework to evaluate how streets perform for all users, not just vehicles, within Edmonton’s core. The result is a more balanced network where transit, walking and cycling are not afterthoughts but core components.
“The PGAs are within Edmonton’s core, near the City’s downtown, university and Light Rail Transit (LRT) expansion. City-led zoning changes now allow for significant densification to both residential and commercial areas, creating mixed-use zones.” clarifies Ellen.
CIMA+ assessed five PGAs expected to accommodate significant population increases in coming years. The study identified infrastructure gaps, forecasted multimodal travel demand and recommended phased improvements to support the intensification of these neighbourhoods with accessibility and safety in mind.
Crucially, the analysis showed that growth cannot be supported by expanding road capacity alone. Instead, success depends on coordinated investments in active transportation, transit priority, and pedestrian infrastructure, creating networks that move more people, not just more vehicles.
This long-range planning ties directly back to the earlier stages of the process: safety reviews, rapid deployment projects and functional designs all feed into a larger system that anticipates and shapes future demand.
A systems approach to mobility transformation
What connects these projects is not geography or scale but a philosophy. Ellen’s work reflects a consistent, systems-based approach:
- Start with safety through rigorous corridor reviews and data-driven analysis
- Act quickly with interim solutions that reduce risk and test ideas
- Design through complexity in constrained, high-speed environments
- Integrate modes to maximize people-moving capacity
- Plan for growth with scalable, connected networks
Each step builds on the last. A temporary bike lane informs the development of a permanent corridor. A safety audit shapes a network plan. A rapid deployment project evolves into city-wide policy.
This is how transformation happens. Not through isolated projects, but through a continuous process consisting of analysis, design, implementation and refinement.
Engineering for people
At its core, this work embodies CIMA+’s guiding principle: engineering for people.
By prioritizing safety, embracing adaptability, and thinking at a systems level, CIMA+ is helping Western Canadian cities move beyond reactive toward proactive and resilient mobility networks.
The result is more than infrastructure. It is redefining how our communities connect, grow and thrive, one corridor at a time.
