Solutions to fight Urban Sprawl in Edmonton

I get asked, daily, about Urban sprawl. I understand people’s concerns; it certainly appears that Edmonton has “Sprawled” haphazardly. People in Ward Five are particularly worried because we have so much available Land in the South West of the Zone.

I will address some of the City of Edmonton’s current responses to minimize future sprawl. I am in support of ALL of these attempts to direct growth into existing neighbourhoods and I plan to simplify City Zoning and Ordinances to allow for faster approval of new high density housing (as long as it meets all of the appropriate requirements) and as long as the housing does not infringe on Edmonton’s Green Spaces.

Firstly let’s talk about some facts. Edmonton’s current population according to the capital region board is 827,512. In 2018 it is estimated that it will be 900,833. In 2028 it will be 1,019,420. This is Edmonton alone NOT including the remainder of the Capital Region. http://capitalregionboard.ab.ca/-/reports/appendix1_population_e.pdf

This means that, realistically, within 5 years we have to make space for 80,000 new people. Keep that number in mind.

The city of Edmonton is currently engaged in a number of creative processes to increase infill in usable land in existing neighbourhoods. Here are a few.

The City has created a program that recycles old school spaces (used or never used) and turns them into “First place” homes, seniors centers and others, as yet not decided. Please see the following: http://www.edmonton.ca/city_government/urban_planning_and_design/surplus-school-building-sites.aspx

Grey circles represent new senior’s centres; Red circles “First Place” centres and green are undecided. (I have downloaded and rejigged these images). I would like to insert an aside here that the city seems a little gung ho about rezoning green spaces and frankly we need green spaces so I will look into whether we are being too aggressive with this program). For now, however, let’s say that these 36 sites, combined manage to house, say, 10,000 people.

Now let’s look at some other new developments. In the next image, the top Orange shape is the Airport Lands (and I quote from the website) “The associated residential population was established to be in the order of 24,286 people.” http://www.edmonton.ca/blatchfordedmonton/documents/Airport-Land-Market-Impact-Assessment.pdf#xml=http://search1.edmonton.ca/texis/ThunderstoneSearchService/pdfhi.txt?query=airport+lands&pr=www.edmonton.ca&prox=page&rorder=750&rprox=250&rdfreq=0&rwfreq=0&rlead=750&rdepth=0&sufs=0&order=r&cq=&id=5224eaea7

For simplicity, let’s say it is finished by 2018.

The bottom Orange square is Century Park, known as a “Transit Oriented Development” because there is LRT nearby, which will house between 5,000 and 10,000 people. The Orange circle is the new high-rise downtown, the Pearl, which will supply housing for (my estimate based on the website) 350 people. Add a few similar new ventures.

That means that within five years these developments and a few others will achieve, roughly, numbers in the range of  40,000 to 50,000 people (Please feel free to correct me if my numbers are off). So we have approximately 30,000 people that we do not know what to do with.

So my simple question is: where shall we put all of these people if not for houses? Well, we need more high density housing but sometimes that can take years or even decades to get off the ground. We need to simplify and speed up city processes that will allow for more high density housing, especially where close to existing and planned LRT lines. This must be council’s priority.  I am committed, fully and completely committed, to doing everything reasonable to help draw people into the center of the city. The new Arena will help. The Galleria will help. Expanded LRT service will help. Making more housing available will also keep the cost lower which will help dramatically. And more people make life in the center more entertaining, creating more of a draw.

Eventually the draw to the core, itself, will be “The Core”. We are close, another couple years and we won’t need incentives. It will just draw people in.

Now, for part two, minimizing sprawl in new Urban areas.

While I will try to minimize sprawl there will always be an argument for new housing. Many new immigrants, young families and others want houses. These people deserve the same rights to homes that our parents and grandparents had. Let’s not forget, while many decry new growth, our ancestors came here for the dream of better lives; a home for children in a safe, clean, free democratic country. Not all of our new immigrants can afford apartments downtown. New developments are usually more affordable and more spacious for large families.

I could never deny a newcomer the right to their own home. But as a councillor, I will do my best to assure that those homes are being built in well designed neighborhoods with green spaces, properly designed schools, reasonable amenities, bike paths and access to mass transit ready when they arrive. As I mentioned before, my ancestors came here for a better life. I honour their memory by trying to make that same, better life available to the people that choose to join us and share our wonderful city and province.

As your councillor I will do everything I can to make Edmonton a greener, more urban, sustainable city by finding every means available to draw people to a higher density core. At the same time, I accept that our growth requires a certain number of new houses and that the people who choose those houses deserve equal access to amenities.