It was once an under-utilized brownfield on Victoria's upper harbor, a 15-acre parcel of industrial land owned by the city of Victoria, the charming capital of British Columbia, Canada. While contaminated, it was prime urban real estate overlooking a working harbor, and the city and its citizens were adamant that it be sold to developers with a vision shared by the community.

After a call for proposals, the land that would become the future home of Dockside Green was sold to Vancity Credit Union, a corporate sustainability leader, and my firm Windmill West. Together, as owners and partners of the project, we have been transforming the city’s upper harbor based on shared values and progressive environmental, social and economic development principles.

The plan was ambitious: To create a 1.3 million-square-foot community that would include residential, retail and commercial businesses that would aspire to a LEED platinum rating. We were so committed to achieving our LEED goals that we even offered to pay a $1 million penalty to the City of Victoria as part of a Master Development Agreement if we didn’t succeed.

As part of the plan, Dockside Green would treat 100 percent of its own sewage onsite and create its own biomass gasification plant creating heat energy from waste wood. We would use lumber harvested from the bottom of lakes and submerged hydro sites. We would have flowing waterways, modern architecture, abundant public green space, locally owned businesses with common values, rooftop gardens and a car share co-operative, a mini-transit system, extensive secure bike storage and showers and a dock for the local harbor ferry.

We would have a housing affordability program that would sell condos at below-market prices to people in certain income brackets. We would enter into a memorandum of understanding with the First Nations communities that would involve a unique aboriginal community art program and an on-the-job training and apprenticeship program to address labor shortage issues and help First Nations persons develop skills in the growing field of eco-construction. It would hire and buy local to stimulate the economy.

It sounded too good to be true, but it wasn't and it isn't. Today, four years later, Dockside Green is indeed transforming this West Coast city and generating attention as a kind of whispered secret from eco-home enthusiasts and developers from across the border and around the world. It’s on track to meeting all its promises and then some, and continues to do so despite the declining economic environment that is challenging the North American real estate market.

The first residential phase of Dockside Green has achieved the highest LEED platinum rating in the world for new construction. Our goal is to continue to build all 26 buildings to Platinum LEED standards.

The onsite sewage treatment system is now operational and reusing the treated water for toilets and landscaping. This will save million 70 million gallons of water on full build out, equivalent to what Greater Victoria uses on the driest day of the year.

The gasification plant will produce more heat energy than Dockside Green will need and the extra will be sold to local businesses, making it the first green house gas positive community in North America. The first residents moved in last year and businesses have started to move in, including a law office, organic bakery, fair trade coffee shop and restaurant.

Urban ecology has also been reintroduced to the once contaminated site. From the naturalized waterway fed with reclaimed water that mimics a creek with crayfish, fish and plants, to a restored shoreline with native and adaptive species, life is sprouting up at Dockside Green. A variety of roof top gardens including sedum green roofs, community vegetable gardens and coastal landscapes all add to the urban ecology on site.

From the outside it looks like a fairly typical modern West Coast development, but it’s transforming this waterfront land and it’s changing the way developers approach development on Vancouver Island. It is proving that an eco-village doesn’t have to be a collection of mud huts or space-age domes, but that a beautiful community with stylish buildings and landscaping that wins awards for its eco-ecology, is entirely possible.

The first baby was recently born at Dockside Green. Noah Silzer came into the world in a home birth in his parents’ suite in the Synergy building. Another young family living at Dockside Green has just launched an online re-usable green diaper business. These examples are a poignant reminder to all of us about why we are doing this — to build a better future for generations to come.

As we continue this project, we now have a better appreciation and understanding of our obligation as developers to ensure that our children do not lose their connection to nature as we urbanize around the globe. When we opened our naturalized creek, geese and ducks arrived and we had a sea otter move up and down the creek in front the decks of our ground floor suites. Our green roofs, our new park and naturalized creek are demonstrating that ecology in urban settings is important not only in terms of biodiversity but that they are also of great benefit to human health and well being.

It is exciting to see the catalytic effect that the project is having as groups from around the globe come to visit the project to learn from our experiences.

Our local and provincial governments have worked closely and cooperatively with us in obtaining our necessary approvals. More importantly, government is modifying or adding new legislation to break down the barriers to sustainable development based on our experiences. There was no local opposition to our project and our approvals have been significantly faster than typical developments, reducing approval costs dramatically.

Something special is happening at Dockside. A sense of purpose and meaning has been added to our lives as result of this project and the commitment to the triple bottom line. We are realizing that we can build economically stronger communities as a result of embracing ecological and human capital, and vendors of the project are benefiting from the attention that Dockside Green is receiving as well as many of our exciting local environmental technologies.

This holistic approach has had the effect of improving and compounding the economic, environmental and liveability benefits and attributes of the Dockside Green community.

We hope in whatever small way we can assist that we can be an inspiration to other communities around the globe - just like how other triple bottom line communities around the world have been an inspiration to us.

Visit www.docksidegreen.com for more information.

Dockside Green’s Annual Sustainability Report can be viewed at docksidegreen.com/images/stories/bottom/itn/SustainabilityReport2007.pdf.