Sarah’s journey to urban and regional planning began at the University of Toronto, where she completed an honours B.A. in Sociology, minoring in Political Science and Spanish. After completing her degree, she spent two years travelling and working. During this time, she worked for a term as Student Life Coordinator at the Queen’s University International Study Center at Herstmonceux Castle.
Her desire to study urban planning came from her experiences while travelling. Sarah claims, “I chose to study urban planning after a year of travelling, looking at the similarities and differences between the cities I was visiting, looking in particular at what made each city unique.” Queen’s was particularly appealing to her as the School of Urban and Regional Planning (SURP) program allowed students to take land use planning, urban design and real estate development courses in the same stream.
In her final semester at Queen’s University, Sarah Bingham embarked on a four-month exchange to the University of Western Australia, taking classes at the Australian Urban Design Research Centre and further refining her skills in urban design.
Following her graduation from SURP in 2012, Sarah returned to her hometown of Vancouver, working in multi-family residential development. She is now the Vice President of Development and Sustainability at Adera Development Corporation, which specializes in designing and constructing multi-family mass timber communities in the Lower Mainland of BC.
In addition to her corporate role, Sarah has acted as Chair of the Urban Development Institute’s (UDI) Under 40 Committee and of the City of North Vancouver Liaison Committee. She has served as a member of the UDI Board of Directors, the BCIT Mass Timber Education Advisory Board, and the British Columbia Mass Timber Advisory Council.