PROJECT UPDATE

Project Relaunch

The project was initially active in winter/spring 2019, but was paused due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, Council recently directed Administration to make revisions to the Guidebook for Great Communities (Guidebook) and return to the Planning & Urban Development Committee no later than January 2021. The Guidebook is a key tool used by citizens, stakeholders and The City when a community plans its future growth through a local area plan. Due to the connection between the Guidebook and local area planning, the West Elbow Communities Local Area Planning project will remain paused—to allow time for refinements to the Guidebook to be made—and will relaunch in early 2021.

Working Group Application Process

Due to delays to project relaunch (resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic and need for further refinements to the Guidebook), the original project timeline and working group session schedule has shifted to such an extent that it is no longer aligned with what people applied for. With this in mind, the decision was made to dissolve the current working group application pool. When the project is relaunched, a new recruitment campaign and working group session schedule will be announced. Thank you to everyone who applied and we hope that you will consider reapplying in the future.

Staying Connected

To stay connected to the West Elbow project and future opportunities to get involved, please sign up for email updates.

While waiting for the project to relaunch, consider checking out the DISCOVER page to learn more about growth and redevelopment in our city. To learn more about local area planning in Calgary, visit calgary.ca/LAP.

Area 2: West Elbow Communities Local Area Planning project includes the communities of: Altadore, Bankview, Cliff Bungalow, Elbow Park, Erlton, Garrison Woods, Lower Mount Royal, Mission, North Glenmore Park (north of Glenmore Trail SW), Richmond (east of Crowchild Trail SW), Rideau Park, Roxboro, Scarboro (east of Crowchild Trail SW), South Calgary, Sunalta, and Upper Mount Royal.

Through the local area planning process, we’ll work together to create a future vision for how land could be used and redeveloped in the area – building on the vision, goals and policies outlined in Calgary’s Municipal Development Plan and the proposed Guidebook for Great Communities

Why is this happening?

Communities change and evolve over the years. Buildings gain character, community demographics change, trees mature, local amenities and businesses change ownership and offerings. A big part of a community’s life cycle is redevelopment, which often begins when communities reach a certain age and homes, buildings and amenities need to be refreshed and revitalized or renewed and replaced.

Looking more broadly, across the whole city, we need to consider where and how growth and development should happen. We need to consider the sustainability and our city’s urban footprint, we need to ensure existing infrastructure can be maintained and amenities and facilities in established neighbourhoods have the population needed to support them to ensure they continue to thrive. We also need to balance the need to grow and develop with the need to retain and enhance the unique character of our neighbourhoods, historical resources and the natural environment.

What is local area planning?

Through a local area planning, we look at the fabric of a specific local area, the community’s vision for the evolution of the area, the ideal places to accommodate growth, and how to make the best use of limited land – balancing the need to increase density, improve mobility and enhance places and spaces to live, work and play.

Increased growth and redevelopment is anticipated in the communities of Altadore, Bankview, Cliff Bungalow, Elbow Park, Erlton, Garrison Woods, Lower Mount Royal, Mission, North Glenmore Park (north of Glenmore Trail SW), Richmond (east of Crowchild Trail SW), Rideau Park, Roxboro, Scarboro (east of Crowchild Trail SW), South Calgary, Sunalta, and Upper Mount Royal, over the next few decades.

Working together, we will create a local area plan to help guide growth and redevelopment in a way that integrates and enhances existing community character and ensures the area is vibrant and thriving in the future.

The Area 2: West Elbow Communities Local Area Planning project is one of the 40-45 multi-communities areas in the city part of our local area plan strategy. This project includes the communities of: Altadore, Bankview, Cliff Bungalow, Elbow Park, Erlton, Garrison Woods, Lower Mount Royal, Mission, North Glenmore Park (north of Glenmore Trail SW), Richmond (east of Crowchild Trail SW), Rideau Park, Roxboro, Scarboro (east of Crowchild Trail SW), South Calgary, Sunalta, and Upper Mount Royal.

Through the local area planning process, we’ll work together to create a future vision for how land could be used and redeveloped in the area – building on the vision, goals and policies outlined in Calgary’s Municipal Development Plan and the proposed Guidebook for Great Communities.

A new local area plan will fill gaps in communities/areas where no local plan currently exists and replace other plans that are largely outdated. In this project context, the local area plan will cover multiple communities and will be a statutory plan adopted by Council as an Area Redevelopment Plan.

Currently, the Area 2: West Elbow Communities area has 12 local policy documents, each covering different portions of the area. These documents were originally created between 1981 and 2010 including:

• Bankview Area Redevelopment Plan (1981)
• CFB East (1998)
• Cliff Bungalow Area Redevelopment Plan (1983)
• Erlton Area Redevelopment Plan (1985)
• Lower Mount Royal Area Redevelopment Plan (1983)
• Marda Loop Area Redevelopment Plan (2014)
• Mission Area Redevelopment Plan (2006)
• Richmond Area Redevelopment Plan (1986)
• South Calgary/Altadore Area Redevelopment Plan (1986)
• Sunalta Area Redevelopment Plan (1983)
• Upper Mount Royal Area Redevelopment Plan (1996)
• West Village Area Redevelopment Plan (2010)

(date in brackets indicates year of original adoption or when an entire new version was adopted)

Updating, consolidating or rescinding policies in the above plans will provide a more comprehensive picture of where growth should occur in the future. This is particularly important for key growth areas such as our Main Streets (4 Street SW, 10 Avenue SW, 14 Street SW, 17 Avenue SW, 33 Avenue SW and MacLeod Trail SE) and primary transit corridors such as the; MAX Yellow and Teal lines and the Blue Line LRT in the area. Identifying local growth opportunities along these corridors and within communities is important in order to support existing schools facing declining enrollment, retain and expand the variety of commercial and retail services and support recent and future investment in transit infrastructure.

How are local area plan boundaries determined?

Local plan areas are primarily established by using large roads (such as Crowchild Trail, Deerfoot Trail, Anderson Trail, Mcknight Boulevard, Shaganappi Trail) or geographic features (rivers, major parks such as Nose Hill, Confederation or Fish Creek parks) as boundaries between plan areas. These features are not only easily identifiable on a map, they really shape the way we go about our daily lives. Our daily experience is not confined to our immediate community. If you see someone at the park, library or grocery store, you probably use similar amenities, face similar challenges and love the same things about the area you live. It only makes sense to plan communities with these shared experiences in mind. Prior to launching this project we met with community associations in the plan area to discuss the boundary. As a result we are currently in discussions with other communities for potential inclusion in this plan area and the boundary could be updated as a result.

What is a local area plan?

A local area plan is a plan that provides local specific direction to guide where growth and change should happen within a specific local area. Throughout The City these exist as statutory and non-statutory plans and include but are not limited to: Area Redevelopment Plans, Area Structure Plans, Station Area Plans, Design Briefs, and Land Use Studies. This plan would be adopted by Council as an Area Redevelopment Plan.

For those wanting to do further reading, here are some helpful background documents on the project, City planning processes and on growth and redevelopment. As the project progresses, this library will be added to with more resources.

Background Handouts:

• Why developed neighbourhoods need to grow and evolve
• How we will grow - MDP Map and Goals
• How we guide growth and redevelopment
• Raising a smart city - Smarter Growth Initiative
• Land Use Redesignations - How it works
• The Planning System Journey

Background Video:

• What is Urban Planning?
  

Background Maps:

• West Elbow Communities - Community Attributes & Amenities
• West Elbow Communities - MDP Map
• West Elbow Communities - Existing Policy Areas
• West Elbow Communities - Existing Land Use Typology Map

Other City-led projects in the West Elbow Communities Area (past & current):

• Guidebook for Great Communities
• Main Streets (2014)

Community Profiles

• Altadore
• Bankview
• Cliff Bungalow
• Elbow Park
• Erlton
• Garrison Woods
• Lower Mount Royal
• Mission
• North Glenmore Park
• Richmond/Knob Hill
• Rideau Park
• Roxboro
• Scarboro
• South Calgary
• Sunalta
• Upper Mount Royal

GET INVOLVED

• LEARN MORE about why developed communities need to evolve, how growth and redevelopment is managed and why local area plans are important – DISCOVER and learn more now.

• SHARE YOUR IDEAS – The launch of public engagement has been postponed, please check back for future engagement details to get involved and share your ideas.
  
  
• STAY CONNECTED by subscribing to receive information about upcoming engagement opportunities and key project updates

There will be multiple opportunities to get involved and provide input within each phase. Learn more about who can get involved and how public input will be used by clicking on the tabs below.

Opportunities to get involved online will be detailed in each phase, click the boxes above and details about events in the community will be shared in the "Key Dates" section on this page.

Anyone who is interested in the project can get involved. This includes anyone who lives, works or visits in the area, anyone who owns property or land, anyone who is considering opening a business in the area or proposing a new building or development in the area.

Having a broad range of participants and input will help ensure a variety of perspectives are considered in the development of the local area plan.

The City defines engagement as:

Your input, and the input of other citizens and stakeholders, helps City decision makers understand people’s perspectives, opinions, and concerns. Input collected in each phase of the project will be compiled and share through a What We Heard report.

Decision makers will consider public input and aim to demonstrate how input has influenced decisions or if decisions were not influenced by public input, explain why.

Although it would be a great outcome, the goal of public engagement is not to reach consensus or make everyone happy. Public engagement is also not about voting or collecting representative information. Public engagement is about considering the input, ideas and perspectives of people who are interested or impacted by decisions, before decisions are made.

Public input is an important part of local area planning, but is one of many areas of consideration in the decision-making process.

Who makes the final decision?

Council is the ultimate decision maker on the local area plan. City Administration will make a recommendation to Council and the local area plan will be adopted by Council through a Public Hearing of Council. Members of the public are invited to address Council and speak at the Public Hearing. When a Public hearing is scheduled details will be made available on this site.

Multi-Community Local Area Plan Engagement Program Overview

The engagement program created for the multi-community local area plans will provide the opportunity for citizens to participate in meaningful engagement and have input into the decisions that determine how their community will look and function in the future. As we developed our program the following considerations were made to help influence the overall process.

1. Phased Program

The engagement process for the multi-community plans has been designed as a multi-phased approach where we will collect input at key intervals throughout the planning process.

In phase one we will look to gain a high-level understanding of the strengths, challenges, opportunities and threats about future redevelopment in the area from the broader public. This high-level input collected will be used to inform conversations with the project working group where we will do a deeper dive into technical planning matters to develop draft concepts and ideas.

In phase two we will share the draft concepts that have been created by the project team and are informed by the public feedback in phase one. The public will be asked to provide feedback that helps evaluate the proposed concepts to inform the final plan.

In phase three we will share the final proposed plan and demonstrate how what we heard throughout the engagement process has been considered in the final plan.

2. Inclusive Process

Throughout our engagement we will ensure an inclusive engagement process that considers the needs of all stakeholders and seeks to remove barriers for participation. We will do our best to make public engagement accessible to all, despite their resource levels or demographics that might prevent them from being included in the process. We will ensure that, at the very least, they are aware of the opportunity to participate and know we are interested in hearing from them. Accessibility accommodations will be made available for engagement events by request. Participants can request accommodations in advance through 311.

3. Participation Interests & Intensity

Our engagement program has been designed to cater to the different participation interests and intensity that stakeholders are willing to commit to a project. This includes having a variety of communications and engagement tactics available for involvement so that people are able to get involved at the level that best suits their needs. Every project and its corresponding stakeholders require a different mix of online and in-person techniques. The techniques selected for a project will be informed by the local context of an area, where we will look to balance the needs of all of the stakeholders in the multi-community plan area, and how involved they are willing to get.

4. Grassroots Conversations

Throughout our engagement we will look to take a grassroots approach and create a sense of community, positive advocacy and grassroots community participation. We will look to achieve this by empowering stakeholders to have conversations and ignite interest about growth and redevelopment with their fellow community members. We will support this through the development of a conversation kindler tool. In addition, through our planners in public spaces program, we will look to engage with citizens while they are out at various destinations or events through the community and ignite interest in the planning process.

5. One City/ One Voice

During our engagement we will look to better serve citizens, communities and customers through our program approach in a way that is cohesive, collaborative and integrated and works together as “One” for “Calgary.” Where timelines and resources allow we will ensure coordination and collaboration with other City departments and projects to ensure a One City/ One Voice approach.

6. Clear Stakeholder Reporting

We will achieve transparency through clear stakeholder reporting and ensure that we connect the dots between the input being sought and how this is used to inform decisions through the entire process.