Inglewood Brewery Lands | 60m | 20s | Matco Group | FAAS Architecture

I really hope this project gets some momentum as that area sorely needs some love. Inglewood is already great but when I go by used car lots, storage lots and auto detail shops, I can't help but feel like the neighbourhood's potential has flown under the radar with developers
 
I really hope this project gets some momentum as that area sorely needs some love. Inglewood is already great but when I go by used car lots, storage lots and auto detail shops, I can't help but feel like the neighbourhood's potential has flown under the radar with developers
Agreed. It's a really great neighbourhoods for visiting but never has had the local population or development base to support it. Looking at the 2021 census data, Inglewood only grew by 300 people (~7%) since 2016, with Ramsay at around 100 people (~4%) over that period. Respectable, but hardly a stand-out community considering the overall city grew by 5.5% and many areas are faster growing that has far less amenities to offer. 2021 total between the neighbourhoods are around 6,500 people, which isn't a lot considering how well served the area is with retail and also how isolated the area is from any other population centre (Bridgeland, East Village, Victoria Park etc.)

It's a good idea for the Inglewood/Ramsay to lock in some of it's retail destination popularity with a stronger local population foundation. Retail tastes change, Inglewood might not always be as popular as it has been recently. Buy some insurance and become a more resilient neighbourhood by adding some core local population to keep demand high.

Looking at density, we can control for neighbourhood physical size. Inglewood/Ramsay is a lagard in redevelopment compared to other popular urban neighbourhoods. Beltline and Marda Loop are the big trends here, but even Bridgeland is finally trending strongly up. Only Inglewood/Ramsay has yet to reach and surpass it's previous peak-density which likely occurred prior to 1968. Projects like this one would go a long way to help them out.

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Thanks for the chart @CBBarnett! I feel like Ingewood's time is coming. It's easily the most quirky area of the city and yuppies like quirky these days. I could see a flood of new developments coming in the coming years, especially with the Green Line gets going and condo prices continue to improve.
 
It's not for lack of proposals that there has been little residential development. I am surprised that Inglewood grew by only 300 people in 5 years. I can think of at least 4 new multi-family projects added in that time span. A 5th one is under construction by Cairo Developments
On top of that there have been at least 4 proposals .... RNDSQR, Landstar and two by Hungerford that have languished. Another one by Torode was up for sale.
 
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There is a surprising lack of proposals in my opinion. The Hungerford strikes me as a density grab in anticipation of the Green LIne. The RNDSQR proposal is pretty ambitious so it doesn't surprise me that they are taking their time. The Landstar site is definitely going nowhere in a hurry seeing as they are renovating the old appliance store. But when you look at all the under utilized lots on 9th and the light industrial sites scattered around Inglewood, there doesn't appear to be much interest by seasoned developers even though Inglewood has been a pretty hot market in the last couple of years and has a lot of potential.
 
Inglewood has seen a pretty good amount of development in the past decade, on par with the amount of buildings of significance Marda Loop and Kensington have seen I think.
Atlantic Avenue Art Block in 2012, Southbank in 2020, Avli in 2020, Torode's first one in 2016, Torode's second in 2020, Sarina's ID project in 2017, and YWCA in 2019 and SoBow in 2015.

Under construction we have Konect, and the big proposals already mentioned above plus The Grid, which I think has gone stale. Not to mention the build out of Matco's remaing SoBow lands. Just shows how much time and effort is needed to move the needle on densifying Calgary.
 
I guess the difference between Inglewood and other communities is that the development in Inglewood is a relatively recent phenomenon. Whereas Kensington and Mardaloop have been seeing slow densification over decades, Inglewood has seen virtually no new developments until recently.
 
Inglewood has seen a pretty good amount of development in the past decade, on par with the amount of buildings of significance Marda Loop and Kensington have seen I think.
Atlantic Avenue Art Block in 2012, Southbank in 2020, Avli in 2020, Torode's first one in 2016, Torode's second in 2020, Sarina's ID project in 2017, and YWCA in 2019 and SoBow in 2015.

Under construction we have Konect, and the big proposals already mentioned above plus The Grid, which I think has gone stale. Not to mention the build out of Matco's remaing SoBow lands. Just shows how much time and effort is needed to move the needle on densifying Calgary.
True - the pipeline of development is long and big projects take time. Hopefully some of these more material projects start being realized.

It's not for lack of proposals that there has been little residential development. I am surprised that Inglewood grew by only 300 people in 5 years. I can think of at least 4 new multi-family projects added in that time span. A 5th one is under construction by Cairo Developments
On top of that there have been at least 4 proposals .... RNDSQR, Landstar and two by Hungerford that have languished. Another one by Torode was up for sale.
Also keep in mind when thinking about longer-term (30 - 50 years) density/population trends is the collapse in family size being a huge factor. I probably could look it up somewhere, but Inglewood in 1968 was likely in the 3 or 4 people/unit, where it's closer to 1.8 people / unit today. That's a huge decline in local population simply because people are having smaller families.

There's a few factors at play here, but the decline in family size post-1960 is a main reason for the lower population compared to the past. However, the lack of significant redevelopment to increase the housing supply/diversity is a main reason for why Inglewood stays low for longer than other areas.

This single project would change all that if it comes to fruition

1,300 units are proposed, that works out to ~2,000 - 2,500 people assuming something close to 2021 Inglewood people/units. Because the neighbourhood is so small to begin with, this development will materially increase the supply of every unit type in Inglewood substantially (+52% unit growth, +40-60% population growth over the Inglewood 2021 totals). The added housing diversity will help stabilize and insolate the community against future demographic changes as more housing diversity that will be available for whatever family size/type/lifestyle trends emerge.

The scale of the development will also create phases, so units will be built over many years with different price-points, amenities and definitions of "modern" living design. This helps create a continuum of prices and promotes long-run affordability options in the area. What was once a modern kitchen, but has since become outdated is a subtle way to accidentally make some units in popular areas $100K cheaper than others.

In many ways Inglewood is the same story as all Calgary's inner city neighbourhoods. They were designed as nuclear family mono-cultures, optimized for a world of two parent and 2+ kids per unit. That is no longer is how the average or even majority of families work, so areas that haven't adapted their housing stock to the new trends sees major population declines. Combine with long-term house price growth, almost every popular neighbourhood is at risk of emptying out and calcifying to high-income single-family only if we fail to add housing diversity.

Uniquely important for Inglewood - retail trends also shift. Popular neighbourhood retail districts that are ultra-dependent on visitors from outside the community have it in there best interest to strengthen/diversify their local ecosystem with more people and diversity nearby. Creates a small but important captive consumer market and keeps the lights on during the quieter days of the week or when a weekend snowstorm stops tourists from journeying from the burbs to the area.

A great local case study on this is the Beltline. The Beltline's retail scene highly benefits from outside visitors - but many businesses are profitable on the quieter days of the week simply because there's so much local traffic all the time now. Other destination retail areas need to lean into being pro-density and residential growth so they don't go extinct when trends or events shift the destination consumer elsewhere.
 
What do you think about the area around the truck stop? I heard it changed hands recently, is anything going to happen there? Is that a good area to develop? Sobow looked like it was going to kickstart that area but Matco seems to have pulled the plug on it.
 

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