Know someone who lives in a Secondary Suite?

As mentioned at the General Membership meeting last week,  the City of Calgary is taking a look at the secondary suite debate once again.  Do you or someone you know living in a secondary suite?   If so, the city would like to here from you.

What’s a secondary suite?  Glad you asked!

To quote Wikipedia:

Secondary suite is an urban planning term for an additional separate dwelling unit on a property that would normally accommodate only one dwelling unit. A secondary suite is considered “secondary” or “accessory” to the primary residence on the parcel. It normally has its own entrance, kitchen, bathroom and living area. Such a suite often is one of the following types:

• A suite above a rear detached garage,
• A suite above the main floor of a single-detached dwelling,
• A suite below the main floor of a single-detached dwelling (a “basement suite”).
• A suite attached to a single-detached dwelling at grade, or
• A suite detached from the principal dwelling (a “garden suite” or “guesthouse“).

So if you, or someone you know lives in a situation such as this, fill out this survey the City of Calgary has commissioned and have your voice heard!

Rockyview snubs Calgary Regional Partnership

Lois Habberfield, reeve for the Municipal District of Rocky View and Bob Coon, chief administrative officer for the Municipal District of Rocky View, at their office in Calgary. Photograph by: Leah Hennel, Calgary Herald

Rocky View County council formally decided Tuesday to withdraw from the Calgary Regional Partnership, following the move Foothills district made last week in protest of the regional growth plan.

And really, this should not come as a surprise to many.  Effectively, the City of Calgary is saying to the municipalities, “Hey, we’re more than willing to provide you with access to water and sewer servicing…but we have some conditions regarding future development that you’ll have to agree to first.”

Residents of these municipalities, as well as their Reeves-persons, clearly do not like the idea of having to be constrained by agreements that the City of Calgary is setting.  Rockyview has gone on record saying that this plan would “…take away the rightful municipal autonomy of Foothills, its land-use authority and the rights of its residents…”    The Alberta Government has hinted that it would get involved and wield its mighty MGA (municipal governance act) sword to make things happen.  And Rockyview Reeve Lois Habberfield  is calling for this, stating that she would like to see a mediator introduced to “break the impasse.”

This power struggle over regional planning issues is not new.  In the Edmonton vs. Strathcona County (and a few other dissidents) drama surrounding the formation of the Capital Region Board had a rather similar story.  Edmonton spearheaded the push to form a regional partnership in 2007.  Strathcona County led the resistance by withdrawing from the partnership,  stating concerns that Edmonton would have too much influence and power within the partnership.  The province stepped in and effectively, forced Strathcona County to come back to the table and afterwards, the partnership went into effect.

Given this past precedent, it seems to me that Rockyview (and the other potential dissidents) are banking on Provincial political support that their Reeves may never receive.

Read on…and comment!

M.D. Foothills withdraws from Calgary Regional Partnership

Rural partners to pull out of Calgary regional plan

Rocky View snubs Calgary regional partnership

DIRTT Calgary Invites UrbanCSA

To our mounting  surprise, Calgary has been graced with a modest Architectural  firm that will make you wonder what became of that poorly assembled IKEA corner desk you threw away last month. DIRTT (doing it right this time) is in the business of environmental solutions, rethinking the way our buildings resonate sustainability to their inhabitants and the ecology. The creation of interchangeable and energy efficient interior spaces,  known as Modular Interior Construction, virtually eliminates the enormous waste created by conventional building renovation. This is achieved through specially designed walls, flooring, utility connections and various products; all manufactured in a replicable and sustainable way. Typical office remnants often spill out into a dumpster after only a few years of use, but creating ‘agile’ solutions to this issue is just one part of DIRTT.

All members of UrbanCSA have been invited to view these innovations and attend a media event on Tuesday August 11th at DIRTT Calgary head office where they will be unveiling the cities largest commercial solar array atop their magnificent southeast office. More information about DIRTT can be viewed on their website at www.dirtt.net.

More details to come, hope to see you there.

~Jon

A Call for Coordination & the Bigger Picture

Now-closed methadone clinic in Braeside (CTV.ca)

Karin Klassen expressed her sympathy for the patients of the Braeside methadone clinic in this letter published in today’s Calgary Herald. She goes on to say that simply because the issues are pushed out of the community doesn’t mean they disappear, and that we should be working together as a whole city to solve our problems.

We don’t just live in our community — we live in the whole city. Every time we take the bus, go shopping, see a movie, take the kids to their hockey game, we step out of our protected zone and wade into the dark morass of the infected, the perverse, the poor, the addicted. Them.

Read more at CalgaryHerald.com.

Tsuu T’ina Reject SW Ring Road

The Tsuu T’ina Nation have voted to reject an offer from the province to build the southwestern portion of the city’s ring road through their territory. These negotiations have been ongoing for nearly half a century, but after seemingly reaching an understanding, the members of the nation shut it down with a majority vote.

Now the city is scrambling to come up with viable alternatives that still strive to maintain automobile connectivity; many of these plans will revist the controversial idea of bridging or tunnelling under the Weaselhead Flats on the Elbow River. (Read more about possible “Plan B’s” via The Calgary Herald)

But some aren’t sure that it’s even necessary to build more roads. The following link will take you do a documentary hosted by CNN’s Miles O’Brien while he examines the way various mobility options have dictated the form of Denver, Portland, and New York. It’s an excellent film, and one that presents compelling evidence for smart growth from several different viewpoints.

Click here to watch PBS’ “Blueprint America: Road to the Future”.

What do Calgarians think about Plan It?

The letters sent in by Calgarians about Plan are now available to the public. There were 585 letters sent to the city either in support or not in support of Plan It. After reading a portion of the letters it looks like some of the main opposition to Plan It involve the River Crossings, the Airport Tunnel or people from within the development industry.

We encourage you to check out the submissions for yourself.

Public Submissions 1-26

Public Submissions 27-52

Are we facing the Connelly-gate?

Last week, the Calgary Herald published an article regarding the difficulties which Aldermen were facing to fundraise in times of economical crisis. The article focused on Ald. Joe Connelly, who specifically addressed the Urban Development Institute for donations. It is well known that most aldermen accept donations from developers and specific-interest groups. However, limiting the funding sources to a certain lobby group while facing the Plan It Calgary Public Hearing on June 23rd rises some issues. While not being an illegal move, his financial strategy casts a shadow of suspicion on his position towards Plan It:

Will his vote be influenced by the donations received?

Should he recuse himself from the vote to avoid a conflict of interests?

Is it healthy for our City Council to accept donations from the industry?

The Connelly situation finally rises a bigger issue: aldermen funding. A funding system that accepts donations from any source, without a balanced origin and, in some cases, with dubious purposes, will keep casting doubts on the objectivity of our City Council.

Finally, a nice quote from a related article by Naheed Nenshi in the Calgary Herald:

What ruined by mood, though, was the story around Ald. Joe Connelly. As reported in the Herald over the last week, Connelly, like all aldermen (me, too, when I ran for Council in 2004), accepts donations from the development industry. Where he went further is that he asked the umbrella group for the industry–the Urban Development Institute– to advertise a fund-raising event for him.

They did so. Indeed, the head of UDI, Mike Flynn, implied that some of his members would no longer support all aldermen, as they had done in the past.

“It will definitely lead to a larger discussion down the road, whether we want to look at who’s been supportive of our positions and who hasn’t,” he said.

Guillermo Guglietti

 

Planning for a resilient city – Byron Miller’s opinion piece on Plan It

June 18th, 2009. Byron Miller’s opinion piece at the Calgary Herald:

When it comes to planning cities, we frequently act as if the future will simply be “deja vu all over again,” to borrow a phrase from the great social analyst Yogi Berra. In many ways it would be nice if it were so. The future would be clear and we could keep doing the same old things that worked pretty well in the past.

But, as Berra also insightfully observed, “the future ain’t what it used to be.” Turn the clock back 60 years and the future was large families with lots of kids, fuelling the growth of the suburbs.

By contrast, today the average Calgary household has about two-and-a-half people and that number is dropping. Six decades ago marked the beginning of our largest demographic cohort, the baby boom generation. Now baby boomers are nearing retirement and looking to downsize their housing.

Sixty years ago we didn’t think about the environmental effects of our lifestyles. Now we know our greenhouse gas emissions threaten the integrity of the planet’s life-support systems. And sixty years ago we thought cheap fossil fuel would go on forever. Now we know expensive energy is right around the corner. No, the future is not what it used to be.

To continue reading, please click here.

Ottawa – Live in the past or plan for the future

Jeffrey Simpson’s editorial for the Globe and Mail.

A decision will be made in the chambers of Ottawa City Council that speaks to whether tomorrow’s city will look like yesterday’s. Cities across Canada make decisions like this all the time. Too many have made the wrong one, as Ottawa might do tomorrow.

At issue is urban sprawl, or the spreading suburbia of single-family housing.

Cities of yesterday planned for and encouraged sprawl.

Developers liked sprawl, because they made more money on single-family dwellings. Families liked sprawl, because it provided space for kids.

Municipal councils liked sprawl, because councillors believed in letting market forces prevail and market forces (developers and consumers) wanted sprawl.

To continue reading click here.

UrbanCSA endorsement to Plan It

The City of Calgary is facing in the next few days one of the most important decisions in the last decade: the Plan It Calgary initiative. UrbanCSA endorses the proposed transportation and development plan, regarding it an important step towards the shaping of a socially, economically and environmentally sustainable city.

We do wish, however, for our tax dollars to subsidize spaces that can accommodate a multiplicity of uses and varying densities. We want higher levels of transit service, and communities where all citizens can walk or ride to the basic services, empowering the public’s ability to subsist through sustainable means. These ideals can exist in healthy, natural environments which stimulate active communities and dynamic public spaces.

It is our opinion that Plan It can steer growth in Calgary towards meeting these objectives. It is also our belief that Plan It is being threatened by the voices of special interest groups who stand to profit from further development on the fringes of the city. These special interest groups do not have our mandate, nor do they represent our interests.

Fragment of the Official UrbanCSA Position

On June 10th, UrbanCSA presented the official endorsement for the consideration of the City Council. The letter can be found in the Opinion Section of the website.

Tour de Nuit – A voice for the commuter cycling in Calgary

Bicycles as viable commuting system in Copenhagen. Calgary counts with one of the most extensive recreational bike paths in North America. However, daily commuting cycling in Calgary remains an utopian ideal. Cities like Portland, Paris, Freiburg and Copenhagen, have developed dedicated infrastructure, allowing their citizens to effectively use their bicycles as their main medium of transportation.

Calgary tour de nuit Society constitutes a newly formed organization in Calgary, which focuses in getting more people cycling more often. As stated in their website:

The Calgary tour de nuit Society is employing a community-based social marketing approach for its program to develop sustainable and active transportation options in Calgary through on-street, closed-road bicycle rides that offer a glimpse of what dedicated bicycle commuting infrastructure can achieve, offering citizens real alternatives to single occupant automobile commuting.

We encourage all those interested in cycling in Calgary to visit their website and, from UrbanCSA, we extend our support to Calgary Tour de Nuit.

Guillermo Guglietti

Updates: Plan It, Memorial Drive, and Civic Camp Calgary

The past week has been fairly eventful with regards to city council taking action (or at least postponing it only slightly) and the voices of citizens lobbying them to go further. First, a motion opposing the closure of two of Memorial Drive’s four lanes on Sundays in August was defeated. This expansion of the pedestrian realm onto our city’s riverfront parkway should provide an interesting experiment that will hopefully spur further pedestrian-friendly zones.

Also, the date for Plan It Calgary to go before council was pushed back a week to June 23. This gives all citizens of Calgary additional time to prepare to speak before council, and we encourage everybody to send in their written comments to the City Clerk’s office by 10 am on June 11 and to prepare a few words for the public hearing on the 23rd. The City Clerks office can be reached at Mail Code #8007, P.O. Box 2100, Station M, Calgary, AB T2P 2M5. We’ll keep you updated about Plan It!

One of the most driving forces in support of Plan It and a new direction for the city in general is the newly formed Civic Camp. What is it, and what is the organization’s stance on Plan It?

“Plan It Calgary,” Calgary’s new municipal development and transportation plan, has finally arrived. As most of you involved in imagineCalgary already know, PlanIt is the direct outcome of the imagineCalgary process and reflects a great many of the wishes Calgarians have expressed for our city. Foremost, PlanIt seeks to guide the growth of the city in a way that is sustainable. As infrastructure, maintenance and service costs rise, peak oil approaches, the population ages, and housing affordability becomes an ever-bigger issue, it is clear that we need to chart a new and better course for Calgary. The new municipal planning documents that will shape how the city grows for the next 50 years will go to Council for approval in late June, but that approval is not assured. Getting City Council to listen to the voices of its citizens is now more important than ever. Please consider taking part in the public discussions around PlanIt. If you would like to join a group of concerned citizens concerned with PlanIt and other civic issues, consider joining CivicCamp Calgary, a non-partisan citizens’ organization asking Council to support a more fiscally, environmentally, socially responsible city when it votes on Plan It this June.

If you still have questions or would like to get involved, check out the Civic Camp website, join the mailing list at Google Groups, or follow them on Twitter. The time for action is NOW.

Coming soon: Gaining Ground

May 5 and 6 will bring the second Gaining Ground Summit in Calgary. Those of us who have volunteered have received our work schedules, and it looks like there will be some highly interesting speakers and material for all attendees.

We’ll be sure to post a full recap of the conference as soon as we can!

Photos from Plan It on Campus

A big thanks to all of you who came out on April 2 to see what Plan It has to offer Calgary! This was hands-down the biggest event put together by the UrbanCSA and the culmination of a whole bunch of hard work. It was great to see so many people showing up to see what the future of the city might hold, and also how much free pizza can be handed out at a single event. Check out some of the photos below!

Also, word on the street is that our hoodies have arrived, so be on the lookout next week. Enjoy your Easter weekend, and be sure to check your inbox to see the status of the UrbanCSA’s first year-end party.

Plan It opinions

There have recently been some great letters in the Calgary Herald about Plan It. UrbanCSA encourages everyone to voice their opinions on this plan whether negative or positive. This is a time when your opinion can make a huge difference.

Here are some of the letters:

Plan on Plan It
Road map for the future

Youth participation urged in planning

Guillermo Guglietti wants a say in his future.

As the president of the Urban Calgary Students Association at the University of Calgary, Guglietti said he was dismayed by the overwhelming ratio of senior citizens to youth he’s seen at open houses for Plan It Calgary, the city’s long-term urban development strategy.

“We always saw the same faces and a lot of them were in their 60s and 70s,” said Guglietti.

“But I’m 23 right now and I’ll be 83 when this finishes, so I am the one inheriting this plan.”

Urban CSA approached Plan It Calgary last week, saying city planners should garner more feedback from teens and 20-somethings, as they will be affected by the 60-year-plan for most of their lives.

“We thought, ‘Why not bring this to the youth?’ ” said Guglietti.

To continue reading click here

Event: UrbanCSA @ Mount Royal College

Looks like students from other institutions besides the University of Calgary have decided to get involved in raising awareness for this city’s potential new development plan. The UrbanCSA will be joining Plan It down at Mount Royal College at their presentation the day after the one at the U of C.

The event will be Friday, April 3 from 12:30-2:00 pm in the food court of Wyckham House, located at the west gate entrance of Mount Royal College.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Big Event: UrbanCSA Presents Plan It on Campus

What: The UrbanCSA is proud to present Plan It Calgary at the University of Calgary. There will be displays outlining not only the purposes of the document, but the reasons for its implementation, the role of the students, and a way to provide feedback to the city on just how we want it to look in the future.

Who: On hand to give presentations will be Pat Gordon, project manager of Plan It, and Dr. Byron Miller, the head of the Urban Studies program on campus. Members of the UrbanCSA will be there as well to give further information on the document and to answer any questions you might have.

Where: The event will be held in the South Courtyard of MacEwan Hall (between the Campus Security Office and the SU office).

When: This Thursday, April 2 from 8:30 am to 3:30 pm.

This event is not just for students, but rather is an opportunity for all Calgarians to get educated about the potential this city has and to get involved in directing its future. Feel free to come by at any time, and a few other displays will be set up around campus to get more people interested. We hope to see you there!

Here’s a small preview of one of the displays we’ve created:

For further details, or if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to e-mail us.

So It Begins

The Canadian Home Builder’s Association of Calgary and the UDI have used their collective heaps of money to un-ironically plan the arrival of Randal O’Toole in town today. Mr. O’Toole is a long-time anti-planner who touts the supremacy of the free market (an inherently unstable system that, according to pure capitalists, has the ability to not only meet our needs for today but provide unlimited growth and prosperity for the future without any regulation or coordination whatsoever) and a key part of the CHBA & UDI’s war against Plan It.

Since he’s in town, the Herald’s opinion section has come up with a new piece to offend the common sense in us all. Before I detract it too much, I should note that they do make one good point in that the city’s approval process for the medium to high-density developments proposed in Plan It need to be seriously overhauled to give priority to the new forms of building.

That doesn’t make up for the completely contradictory argument you’ll see in the following article; notably that they complain that the future is ethereal and unknowable, yet definite policies and concise direction are needed. I guess it doesn’t matter where we go as long as we do so with boldness and decisiveness.

Forgive me for not having faith that those with vested interests in greenfield, low-density, suburban development will somehow magically create a city I want to live in.

-Derek

Read the story here.

Apparently no planning = smart growth 

Transit is bad, we need more roads.

Renderings of Calgary’s Future Skyline

If you hadn’t noticed, that banner up at the top of our site contains a few buildings that haven’t actually been built yet. It’s an image created by Devin Henry, who works as a graphic artist for Buss Marketing. They have a pretty cool flash presentation showing the locations and heights of buildings that will be added to the skyline by 2012. Check it out at BussMarketing.ca.

Devin has done a bunch of work in his free time to visualize what the skyline could potentially look like in 2030. Some of the buildings added to the pictures have been put on hold due to the recent financial “incident”, but it’s pretty interesting getting to see images of our city’s future. The images can be found at SkyscraperPage.com, a busy message board with plenty of information on current local construction projects, and pictures of the work sites every few days.

Also, links in the right column to BikeCalgary and CentreCity Talk have been added. CentreCity has a really interesting story about urban agriculture from the Toronto Star; I’ll add it to the links section in the next update.