Make the city your classroom!
Explore The Bentway’s unique educational programs and resources to encounter the Gardiner Expressway like never before. Whether you’re the parent of a young urbanist or looking to deepen your own understanding of public space, all are welcome to learn with us as we continue to transform an environment built for cars into a vibrant site of connection and creativity.
youth programs
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Bentway After School: for curious and creative city explorers, ages 9-14
This winter, The Bentway invites young urbanists to explore and learn about their city with lots of fun, creativity, and outdoor discovery along the way! The program empowers participants to understand and influence concepts in urban design, city building, and placemaking through neighbourhood investigations, storytelling, and recreation.
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School Visits: Reimagining the Highway
Learn about the many ways infrastructure can serve our city! The Bentway engages planners, artists, educators, and local communities as active participants in the creation of new public spaces below the Gardiner Expressway and healthy communities across Toronto.
educational resources
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Understories: A Staging Grounds Listening Experience
On view nowUnderstories: A Staging Grounds Listening Experience is a series of short audio works that invite you to tune into the unique ecological, environmental, and design elements of The Bentway’s Staging Grounds – a public space pilot under the Gardiner. Engage with the features and functions of Staging Grounds like never before through a mix of…
recent publications
Cool by Design: The Power of Shade in Public Space
(with School of Cities – University of Toronto)
Discover key insights from Sun/Shade, The Bentway’s summer 2025 initiative, which explored how design, art, and community engagement can help cities adapt to rising temperatures. This new publication highlights creative, equitable, and climate-ready strategies for building cooler, more connected public spaces.
Rx for Social Connection
(with Gehl and the Dalla Lana School of Public Health)
What role can public space design and programming play in fostering connection and combating loneliness? Centered around learnings from The Bentway’s 2024 Softer City season of art and events, this report reveals the essential role public spaces play in fostering mental health and social connections.
Public Art and Sustainability Initiative
(with Bespoke Collective)
Over the last several years The Bentway has been working to better understand our role as public space operators and arts practitioners working in the midst of a climate emergency. In order to address the specific environmental challenges in public areas and in the presentation of public art works, in 2024 The Bentway seeded the Public Art and Sustainability Initiative – a collaborative partnership between a national network of fellow public art curators, organizations and public space operators.
Dive Deeper into Beyond Concrete
(with Frontier)
The Bentway’s 2023 Beyond Concrete summer season explored the urban ecosystem beneath the Gardiner Expressway, where human-made infrastructure intertwines with flora and fauna. In this story series, we heard from experts around the world who engage with these themes in their daily work and have unique perspectives.