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Infill Development Discussion

In the Herald today, one I haven't seen mentioned here yet
https://section23.com/projects/homes/seniors-residences-edward/
https://calgaryherald.com/life/home...te-the-multi-generational-community-at-cspace

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Alex_YYC said:
Calgary needs thousands of those.
Click to expand...
Agreed. I think the City needs to think seriously about getting rid of RC2 zoning in most inner-city hoods and replacing it with this modified MCG (d111) zoning like this. RCG zoning respects existing home setbacks too much, this form is much more urban and much better. Neighbourhoods like Banff Trail and Capitol Hill should be basically exclusively this form. RC2 and RCG have unnecessary suburban setbacks, if Calgary wants genuine urbanity in established neighbourhoods it is time to reduce setbacks and allow Wall-to-Wall rowhomes with almost no setback from the sidewalk. This is why i think MCG (d111) zoning with reduced front and side setbacks should be the de-facto inner-city zoning for anything that is RC2 today. Calgary is in a really good position to start allowing ground-oriented multi-family forms, and to kick Vancouver and Toronto's ass at actually building for the 'missing middle' in the inner-city at reasonable price points.

When is the last time that a North American city has successfully built blocks of street-oriented rowhomes/brownstones? If they could sell units like this, in places like Killarney, Capitol Hill, Mt Pleasant, etc. in the 475k-550k range, you would start actively pulling buyers away from single and semi-detached homes in the new suburbs. RC2 homes don't have the density to hit decent price points. RCG has side and front setbacks that make doing mid-block development unfeasible. That seems to be why there are almost no examples on RCG anywhere but on corner lots, developers can't make sense of the assembling mid-block parcels and making that form work. we need to make it easy to build to zero lot-line on the side setbacks, and to push front setbacks much closer to the curb to bring efficiency to an urban rowhome form to the inner-city in Calgary.

If the City of Calgary can figure this out, we can start to see a form of housing in the inner-city and established neighbourhoods that isn't so suburban, and i think that would lead Calgary to have more affordable forms of inner-city housing like Montreal does. Best way i can think of to stop having people buying in the new suburbs is to allow a housing form in the inner city that can be relatively competitive in terms of size and price. If this was the norm, voila less outward suburban expansion and more real urbanity. And it is a market-based solution, if the city could make land-use bylaw work for developers to build this rowhouse form.

TLDR?

No more of this shit:
https://www.google.ca/maps/@51.0172...4!1sPAUn4UYU14MdV45F0oqsUA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

We should be be building a Calgary version of this to replace older ranch style bungalows:
https://www.google.ca/maps/@39.9817...4!1sFTrPVdEWgox6vc5dNTp7FQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656
 
Zoning is definitely something that needs to be looked at more aggressively. The city is moving in that direction with their main streets initiatives, and some of the zoning increases in places like Sunnyside or 17th ave NW, buit the city isn't taking advantage of what's out there.
For example, I've noticed a couple of duplex projects underway on 20th ave NW and of course both have the large setbacks. Totally blown opportunity.
A street like 20th ave is a obvious one for increasing the zoning for townhomes or small multi-family projects that come up to the street. There are lots of other inner city streets in the older middle ring neighborhoods where that could be done, but the city is too slow to take advantage.
 
Calgcouver said:
I love this proposal. Six townhouse units, all purpose-built rental. I want to see this absolutely everywhere.
https://static1.squarespace.com/sta...12509486751/20171205_Sunnyside+Panels_WEB.pdf
Click to expand...
More of these would be great, especially for attracting families to the inner city. There are families in the inner city neighborhoods, but generally in detached homes, or townhouses. Detatched homes are too expensive for most, but townhomes work, we just need more of them. One of the issues is developers would rather build something bigger than a townhome, kind of the 'go big or go home' mentality. I don't blame them, but if zoning was to increase on the back streets of neighbourhoods like Renfrew, Capitol Hill, Tuxedo, etc.. developers would go more for the townhouse.
 
Rndsqr is doing lots of great work, i'm liking everything they are doing right now. Problem is assemblies for RCG often don't make a lot of sense mid-block, that is why you tend to see them specifically on corner lots, i think it is a bit too restrictive of a zone to allow for good mid-block development.
 
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