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Infill Development Discussion

CBBarnett said:
Ah yes, the family that introduced me to the existence of CanLII database of all legal proceedings in Canada. A piece of local Kensington history.
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Also legendary for Michael Terrigno's comments at a land use hearing where he said to the city admin planners/staff "I know where you live" after getting turned down. lol
 
Mountain Man said:
That was when the proposal for the building that looked melted was rejected I believe. Glad that thing didn't happen!! Would love to see the Osteria site developed, but not what was proposed!
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Yep, that was the one. Yeah, that corner is ripe for a low-to mid rise development.
 
MichaelS said:
So an interesting little project right in the heart of Kensington is going to CPC this week. It is located 212 10A St SW. Here is a link to the DP:
The CPC documents are here:
Report, Background, Applicant Submission, DP drawings, CA Feedback
View attachment 407052
View attachment 407053
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This one got refused by CPC yesterday. Required 18 (I think) substantial relaxations from the M-CG rules (the zoning for the property), that planning commission felt was just too much.
 
MichaelS said:
This one got refused by CPC yesterday. Required 18 (I think) substantial relaxations from the M-CG rules (the zoning for the property), that planning commission felt was just too much.
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calgaryherald.com

City panel rejects Osteria tower plan, weeks after alleged threats at hearing

Calgary Planning Commission rejected a restaurant owners’ plans for a 10-storey tower on their Kensington corner, two weeks after the hearing was cut…
calgaryherald.com calgaryherald.com
When do the threats and intimidation start again?
 
I live in the area of Enmax's old substation on Mission Road which is owned by Calgary housing (Calgary's low income housing government arm).

Assuming the low income housing gets built (i.e. the expected community opposition over this doesn't prevail), how would the fine knowledgeable people handle this lot?

  • Its up on the top of a hill above all surrounding houses, given it an extremely prominent position over the nearby communities. Increased height will be visible for miles.
  • It's on an busy road.
  • If on site parking is allowed - access from the south is a blind corner in both the horizonal and vertical planes (like the road turns right and goes over the hill) on a busy road (Mission Road). From the North is a residential street whose community (Erlton) protested the idea of access from that side saying the road can't handle the traffic.
  • If on-site parking isn't allowed, more opposition from community as means community parking.

I just feel this lot is a critical crux for the future development of the area and needs to be done right. Heck, its like the welcome mat to Mission never mind the communities of Parkhill and Erlton. I am concerned Calgary Housing won't have the planning resources or proper development resources to properly develop this site, but I don't know their capabilities. Not railing against low income housing here, not relevant to my point at all- just want this site to get the critical planning I think it deserves and I assume Calgary Housing doesn't have the largest planning budget to go with their developments. Also, they seem to have no desire to focus on this site at all based on my emails with them, it appears to hardly be on their radar.

Am I over complicating this site, or overstating its importance?
enmax1.PNG
enmax2.PNG
 
Access off of Erlton Terrace in the back seems like a no brainer. Very little community impact, as Erlton Terrace feeds directly onto 34th Avenue, which then intersects with Mission Road, so only about 15 homes would see any sort of increase in daily traffic (albeit, likely an overall minimal impact). For an affordable housing development, I would minimize parking as much as possible, and put a surface lot off the back of the building off of Erlton Terrace, given the grades of the property. To try to put in an underground parkade would be very difficult, given the ramp woudl be chasing the grade all the way down. Simply put a surface lot up at the top for a few vehicles, and call it a day. There is a bus stop (route 449) right at the front door that will take residents straight into downtown via 4th Street, or straight to the 39th Avenue C-Train station.
 
MichaelS said:
Access off of Erlton Terrace in the back seems like a no brainer. Very little community impact, as Erlton Terrace feeds directly onto 34th Avenue, which then intersects with Mission Road, so only about 15 homes would see any sort of increase in daily traffic (albeit, likely an overall minimal impact). For an affordable housing development, I would minimize parking as much as possible, and put a surface lot off the back of the building off of Erlton Terrace, given the grades of the property. To try to put in an underground parkade would be very difficult, given the ramp woudl be chasing the grade all the way down. Simply put a surface lot up at the top for a few vehicles, and call it a day. There is a bus stop (route 449) right at the front door that will take residents straight into downtown via 4th Street, or straight to the 39th Avenue C-Train station.
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Ha ha no disagreement regarding the access from Erlton. I just live on the Parkhill side and didn't want my bias to influence my post or others views. But since you said my very thought...
Would you put ground floor commercial here?
 
Mull said:
I live in the area of Enmax's old substation on Mission Road which is owned by Calgary housing (Calgary's low income housing government arm).

Assuming the low income housing gets built (i.e. the expected community opposition over this doesn't prevail), how would the fine knowledgeable people handle this lot?

  • Its up on the top of a hill above all surrounding houses, given it an extremely prominent position over the nearby communities. Increased height will be visible for miles.
  • It's on an busy road.
  • If on site parking is allowed - access from the south is a blind corner in both the horizonal and vertical planes (like the road turns right and goes over the hill) on a busy road (Mission Road). From the North is a residential street whose community (Erlton) protested the idea of access from that side saying the road can't handle the traffic.
  • If on-site parking isn't allowed, more opposition from community as means community parking.

I just feel this lot is a critical crux for the future development of the area and needs to be done right. Heck, its like the welcome mat to Mission never mind the communities of Parkhill and Erlton. I am concerned Calgary Housing won't have the planning resources or proper development resources to properly develop this site, but I don't know their capabilities. Not railing against low income housing here, not relevant to my point at all- just want this site to get the critical planning I think it deserves and I assume Calgary Housing doesn't have the largest planning budget to go with their developments. Also, they seem to have no desire to focus on this site at all based on my emails with them, it appears to hardly be on their radar.

Am I over complicating this site, or overstating its importance?
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Wildly overstating it's importance.

It's almost 150m back from the edge of the bluff, and in fact the ground slopes down towards it so it's around 10m below the edge of the bluff. You could probably build eight stories here before it's even visible from 30th Ave in Roxboro, and that's ignoring the plentiful mature tree canopy. From the Elbow River at 26th Ave in Mission, in theory you could see anything above around five stories built here, but in reality the large houses in Roxboro and the trees mean you typically can't even see the bluff. In fact, here's Mission Road heading southbound approaching 30th Avenue. If you look on the horizon just to the right of the dangerous and meaningless "share the road" sign, you might see that the horizon is a little flat. That? Is an eight storey apartment building; actually one of a complex of four, built right on the edge of the bluff -- not well back from it. And note this is without leaves on the deciduous trees. If someone were to propose 30 stories here? Sure, that's a big building that will stick out. But anything that is feasible will be basically invisible until you turn the corner halfway up Mission Road (or turn off Macleod), but if we start worrying about people being able to see buildings when they're within a block of them, then we've got a lot of buildings to rip down.

1655755672554.png


It's not on a busy road, it's on Mission Road, which is about as quiet as a road can be and still actually connect places in the inner city. The last count just south of here had around 8,000 vehicles a day, two-way. Of course, this is a road in a long standing community and so I would hope that the long standing character of the community should be acknowledged -- Mission Road had 11,000 vehicles a day in 1987, so it could handle almost a 50% increase and still be within long standing community traffic volumes. The traffic flow maps put out by the City don't label roads with volumes this low, so it's hard to find a direct comparison, but Memorial Drive in Sunnyside has high-end residential along it and four times the daily traffic volume of Mission Road. 5th St and 8th St both have higher volumes south of 17th Ave than Mission Road; Elbow Dr has twice the volume.

"The welcome mat to Mission?" Get over yourself. Let's just say I'm shocked that you revealed this potential development site is In Your Back Yard.
 
There used to be a larger project on that parcel and the adjacent ones, too bad it isn't proceeding. For that new DP, I suppose the shape of the lots make it too narrow to have the 2 car garage be accessed via the lane? Otherwise, why put 4 vehicle accesses off of 4th Street NE? I can maybe get why there are the two underdrive units, but at this point, why not just make them all that style, and squeeze in 6 units on the parcel?
1655762436707.png
 
ByeByeBaby said:
Wildly overstating it's importance.

It's almost 150m back from the edge of the bluff, and in fact the ground slopes down towards it so it's around 10m below the edge of the bluff. You could probably build eight stories here before it's even visible from 30th Ave in Roxboro, and that's ignoring the plentiful mature tree canopy. From the Elbow River at 26th Ave in Mission, in theory you could see anything above around five stories built here, but in reality the large houses in Roxboro and the trees mean you typically can't even see the bluff. In fact, here's Mission Road heading southbound approaching 30th Avenue. If you look on the horizon just to the right of the dangerous and meaningless "share the road" sign, you might see that the horizon is a little flat. That? Is an eight storey apartment building; actually one of a complex of four, built right on the edge of the bluff -- not well back from it. And note this is without leaves on the deciduous trees. If someone were to propose 30 stories here? Sure, that's a big building that will stick out. But anything that is feasible will be basically invisible until you turn the corner halfway up Mission Road (or turn off Macleod), but if we start worrying about people being able to see buildings when they're within a block of them, then we've got a lot of buildings to rip down.


It's not on a busy road, it's on Mission Road, which is about as quiet as a road can be and still actually connect places in the inner city. The last count just south of here had around 8,000 vehicles a day, two-way. Of course, this is a road in a long standing community and so I would hope that the long standing character of the community should be acknowledged -- Mission Road had 11,000 vehicles a day in 1987, so it could handle almost a 50% increase and still be within long standing community traffic volumes. The traffic flow maps put out by the City don't label roads with volumes this low, so it's hard to find a direct comparison, but Memorial Drive in Sunnyside has high-end residential along it and four times the daily traffic volume of Mission Road. 5th St and 8th St both have higher volumes south of 17th Ave than Mission Road; Elbow Dr has twice the volume.

"The welcome mat to Mission?" Get over yourself. Let's just say I'm shocked that you revealed this potential development site is In Your Back Yard.
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Ha ha, that was quite the emotional response.

It is... odd to say the least to be told to "Get over yourself" for overstating the importance of a site, when I asked "Am I overstating the importance of this site?" in the post. "Get over yourself" implies one has no self awareness they may be mistaken or others may disagree.

Not to mention.... I don't own the site, I live near it. It has no reflection of my ego if the site isn't that important to Mission. I do still think its important to the local community however.

I had no idea I would hit a nerve with my post, honestly didn't. Was just posting here and hoping for feedback from those in the know about city planning way more then me about a site I deem interesting to the area (and still do, despite your defensiveness).
 
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