Project Description

NIMBY (Nature in My Backyard) is an ongoing series looking at nature in the backyards of Southern Vancouver Island.

Over 75% of the urban forest is on what the municipality calls private property. Trees are essential at the neighborhood level. Recent land use changes, the decline of green infrastructure, combined with rising temperatures, is creating a substantial public health emergency.

Urbanist groups are active with local government in private and public, yet label local opposition to land use changes as NIMBY (Not In My Backyard), a term used in critiques of public engagement with local government. The term first surfaced in a February 1979 newspaper article in Virginia’s Daily Press, “agencies need to be better coordinated and the “nimby” (not in my backyard) syndrome must be eliminated.” The article is quoting Joseph A. Lieberman, a member of the United States Atomic Energy Commission, addressing nearly 500 health scientists in the Fort Macgruder Conference Centre about how to handle the “nimby” (not in my backyard) opposition to radioactive waste disposal.

 

 

The phrase ‘”not in my back yard”, without the acronym, also appeared in “Hazardous Wastes, an environmental journal discussing the disposal of hazardous waste in Alberta, Canada in February 1980. Over time,  the use of the word “nimby” went from being used by the energy, mining, and nuclear industry, which seriously out resources its critics, and was adopted by private market housing advocates in connection to residential land use at the municipal level.

 

Nature in My Backyard was first proposed in 2011 by David Suzuki to reclaim the term NIMBY, emphasizing genuine community care rather than being coined by the interests of those willing to impose harmful ecological destruction of residential areas.

Resources

Carollyne Yardley, “Urbanists vs. the Nature in My Backyards. District of Saanich – Special Council Meeting for Draft Quadra McKenzie Plan July 7th, 2025,” Squirrelformayor.com
https://www.squirrelformayor.com/2025/07/urbanists-vs-the-nimbys-district-of-saanich-special-council-meeting-for-draft-quadra-mckenzie-plan-july-7th-2025/