Springbank Hill | ?m | ?s | Multiple Projects

[TooBizzy]

I've been poking around with the numbers for an urban studies paper, aided quite a lot by @MichaelS's fantastic reporting and maintenance here.

Here's the headline: We're dealing with about half a Beltline in about half a square kilometre.

Post 2020 development in Springbank Hill is on track to nearly triple the population of the community as a whole in 5-10 years, especially if the Outline Plan in the SW is factored in.

As I suspected, development between 17 and 19 Avenues should be enough to constitute a separate census tract, which would be among the densest in Canada, certainly in Calgary. The remaining development will be about a quarter the density, though nothing to scoff at itself, still keeping the node as a whole above the density of the Beltline (even excluding Stampede Park).

Yet, to date, Blue Line extension is planned to skip completely over all this, to service a standard low-density suburban neighbourhood instead.

Note that unit counts flagged with (?) are estimates. In the case of the Shane Homes et al. portion, it's probably just a handful of units off, but for Indigo and the WCD projects, we don't have DPs or official design concept announcements, so I'm estimating by relating their built form, FAR, parcel size, to similar projects.

 

[MichaelS]

Well done. I will note there is the one more parcel between Aurora and Wolfberry that is not currently slated for development (I don't think it has been acquired by a developer yet) but will eventually see even more units added to your map at some point in the future.

 

[kora]

Yet, to date, Blue Line extension is planned to skip completely over all this, to service a standard low-density suburban neighbourhood instead.

Both the 69 Street and especially the 85 Street stations would be within walking distance. Otherwise none of this extraordinary density would be approved

 

[kora]

The bigger issue is when will the 85 Street station be built. 30 years from now?

 

[badc0ffee]

Both the 69 Street and especially the 85 Street stations would be within walking distance. Otherwise none of this extraordinary density would be approved

I'm sure there's little chance of it happening, but a 77 St station would be a lot closer to all the development. The planned 85 St Station is both north of 17th and west of 85th.

 

[kora]

I'm sure there's little chance of it happening, but a 77 St station would be a lot closer to all the development. The planned 85 St Station is both north of 17th and west of 85th.

A functional study still has to be done and the planned location can be changed. The 69 Street station is east of 69 Street, yet a pedestrian tunnel accesses that station from the west side of 69 Street. There are workarounds.

 

[CBBarnett]

The bigger issue is when will the 85 Street station be built. 30 years from now?

Whenever it eventually gets prioritized they should revisit where the station location at the functional study step.

Shifting the 85th Station to actually 85th Street would be a big win, instead of where it is proposed so far tucked into the neighbourhood to the NW about 500m walking distance from 85th to 17th Avenue SW.

Given signal timing to cross 17th Avenue and other frictions, circuitous routes that slow and dissuade pedestrians, much of this density cluster will be 10 to 15 minute walk from the LRT, where it could be closer to 5 minutes or less if the station was just placed at the intersection. Plus the actual track would be several hundred metres shorter overall, saving some costs.

 

[lemongrab]

Station should be at about 81st St, which is still about 1200 meters west of 69th station.

There is pretty much no point in crossing 17th and 85th to use the current ROW. The only sliver of a reason would be the new Catholic high school to go between Weber and Calgary Academy, but that's not much of a reason.

17th in its current state is a silly fast stroad (lanes are all at least 4 meters wide) that is incongruent with all of this development. Extending the blue line is probably the only catalyst to undoing that nonsense. It was twinned around 2004 - it's interesting that they didn't actually leave sufficient ROW on the south side...(or maybe they thought they did, but failed to account for sidewalks like the recently built 3 meter MUPs?)

 

[MichaelS]

There is sufficient ROW for the C-Train to extend along 17th Avenue. You can see the property lines shift as development occurs if you look at a City GIS map (like development map):

As part of all of this development, a study was completed by the landowners (Truman, Ronmor (who sold to Vesta) and Slokker) to confirm the required spacing and dedicate the land as subdivision occurs. On top of the 12ish meters (I think that is the dimension) there is also a 6m maintenance easement on all of the lots that front 17th Ave to allow future maintenance of a C-train line. So, space is there.

 

[lemongrab]

There is sufficient ROW for the C-Train to extend along 17th Avenue. You can see the property lines shift as development occurs if you look at a City GIS map (like development map):


As part of all of this development, a study was completed by the landowners (Truman, Ronmor (who sold to Vesta) and Slokker) to confirm the required spacing and dedicate the land as subdivision occurs. On top of the 12ish meters (I think that is the dimension) there is also a 6m maintenance easement on all of the lots that front 17th Ave to allow future maintenance of a C-train line. So, space is there.

I did wonder if property lines were further south based on some of the older satellite images, but didn't bother to check. It looks a lot tighter east of 77th, though?

It also seems like they've put the MUPs in a weird spot? Of course it's not a huge deal to redo paths/sidewalks, but it also seems it would have been easy to avoid? I guess these MUPs can at least stay open during all of the construction on these parcels...