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

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

Young People’s Vision For A Better City; Forum urges foresight

When city officials promote a vision of Calgary’s future and developers jeer the long-range blueprint, they often jokingly admit they probably won’t be alive long enough to see that denser city which the document envisions 60 years from now.

Twenty-something university students are more likely to survive to see that future.

At a University of Calgary campus event Thursday, dozens of them embraced Plan It’s new vision for limits to further sprawl and a quadrupling of the transit system’s service levels.

To read more click here

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.

Audio of Tom’s interview on CBC Radio One

Jim Brown’s “Calgary Eyeopener” on CBC Radio One held a discussion this morning regarding the proposed Brentwood TOD plan. His guests were Craig Maxie, a resident of the community and opponent of the plan, and Tom Howard, urban studies major at the U of C and VP Academic of the UrbanCSA.

Click here to listen the interview:

Urbancsa on CBC radio one

Today the UrbanCSA’s own Tom Howard was interviewed by Tom Spear of CBC Radio and given the chance to voice our organization’s support for the Brentwood TOD.  Sound bytes will be played during CBC Radio One’s news segments this evening and anybody interested can listen in at the bottom of every hour. The webcast can be found here, while those of you feeling old-school can tune your dial to 1010 AM or 99.1 FM. Be sure to listen in at 5:30, 6:30 or 7:30 to hear from Tom!

Even better than this exposure is the invitation for Tom to be interviewed again, this time during the CBC’s live on-air morning segment shortly after 7:00 am on Monday, December 5th. The station will be doing a piece exploring both sides of the Brentwood TOD plan, with both supporters (that’s us!) and opponents getting to voice their thoughts, giving the city a final dose of information before the plan is presented to City Council later in the day.

Because of the vociferous opposition to this redevelopment, the UrbanCSA will be preparing a short presentation of our support for the plan and will also be speaking on behalf of the U of C’s chapter of the Institute for Transportation Engineers. If you’d like to get involved, or for more information, just send us an e-mail.

-Derek Pomreinke