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Urban Development and Proposals Discussion

Apologies if this has been discussed already but does anybody know anything about this potential redevelopment of Heritage Plaza (the plaza with London Drugs) on the corner of Heritage Dr and Macleod Tr?

If you click on the shadow study they have a very rudimentary rendering.

conceptside.png
 
Considering the towers are pushed as far away from the train station as possible, I think calling it transit Oriented development is being generous. More like transit Adjacent development, which sadly seems to be standard when it comes to how Calgary builds next to transit.
 
The density is good, and it's a good place for some towers with height - nobody to complain about the traffic and shadowing. If the lot across Macleod to the east ever got developed, it's possible a pedestrian overpass could be built across Macleod, that continued over the tracks to the Heritage station.

1698155347501.png
 
Surrealplaces said:
The density is good, and it's a good place for some towers with height - nobody to complain about the traffic and shadowing. If the lot across Macleod to the east ever got developed, it's possible a pedestrian overpass could be built across Macleod, that continued over the tracks to the Heritage station.

View attachment 515209
Click to expand...
Drove by the other day, you can build to suit on that site if you're so inclined.
 
I'd like to see grade separation of Heritage Drive and the tracks, but I'm not sure how to achieve that in this location without also making some ungodly interchange.

(Actually I do know how to achieve that - rails go in a 400 metre long trench, and Heritage station is rebuilt. But I'm sure that won't happen)
 
Looks like north is to the right.

So, Heritage is elevated over the tracks, and then dumps into a huge traffic circle elevated over Macleod? And quite a few ramps rising to meet Heritage on the west side. Looks absolutely terrible for pedestrians heading between the London Drugs plaza and Heritage station. I wonder if a pedestrian overpass at Hull Ave is also in the cards.

If this absolutely has to be done, I would have preferred to see a SPUI à la 14th Street/John Laurie Blvd.
 
MichaelS said:
Here is the functional planning design for the Heritage/Macleod interchange:
www.calgary.ca

Heritage Drive/Macleod Trail Interchange

www.calgary.ca www.calgary.ca
Click to expand...
It looks like they will be reviewing pedestrian connections, and have a potential plan similar to my suggestion. If they implemented this pedestrian connectivity to the Heritage LRT station, there would be some hope for the area. The development at Heritage Plaza wouldn't be TOD, but at least Transit adjacent, and that would still be far better than what it is today. Even better, maybe someday the city will get it's head out of the sand and build the TOD proposed in the diagram.

1698171183243.png
 
MichaelS said:
There is also a still a planned interchange on the books for Heritage/Macleod, so they likely need to consider that in the site design.
Click to expand...
The site west of Macleod had a development put on ice by the city indefinitely due to no interchange. Proposing development on the east side could be a tactic to get the city to finally build something.
 
Surrealplaces said:
It looks like they will be reviewing pedestrian connections, and have a potential plan similar to my suggestion. If they implemented this pedestrian connectivity to the Heritage LRT station, there would be some hope for the area. The development at Heritage Plaza wouldn't be TOD, but at least Transit adjacent, and that would still be far better than what it is today. Even better, maybe someday the city will get it's head out of the sand and build the TOD proposed in the diagram.

View attachment 515262
Click to expand...
This will never, ever be built as designed. It checks Calgary's box for a unconventional one-off interchange design that consumes as much land as possible that is a design local requirement, but is otherwise outdated and impractical.

Bonus points for the engineer who thinks a triple-stack pedestrian bridge over an interchange is feasible or useful. That's like a +60 level bridge - will never happen!

Of course, just because a wildly impractical design won't happen doesn't mean it's not on the books and can't screw up all the development potential nearby as we see occurring. The city should scrap the whole thing and either sink McLeod Trail down or keep at-grade and spend about 1/10th of what this will cost to actually pedestrianize these arterial car sewers with half-decent sidewalks, reduced slip lanes and free up development lands for real development.
 
Personally I would just leave the Macleod/Heritage intersection itself alone, and focus on putting the tracks in a trench. I'd even eliminate that huge overpass that carries MacLeod over the tracks, and the ridiculous 78 Ave/Fairview Rd frontage roads. Then deck over the tracks in the NW corner of the intersection. We could unlock so much land.
 
CBBarnett said:
This will never, ever be built as designed. It checks Calgary's box for a unconventional one-off interchange design that consumes as much land as possible that is a design local requirement, but is otherwise outdated and impractical.

Bonus points for the engineer who thinks a triple-stack pedestrian bridge over an interchange is feasible or useful. That's like a +60 level bridge - will never happen!

Of course, just because a wildly impractical design won't happen doesn't mean it's not on the books and can't screw up all the development potential nearby as we see occurring. The city should scrap the whole thing and either sink McLeod Trail down or keep at-grade and spend about 1/10th of what this will cost to actually pedestrianize these arterial car sewers with half-decent sidewalks, reduced slip lanes and free up development lands for real development.
Click to expand...
For sure. If they don't build the pedestrian section across the intersection it won't be a huge loss, but hopefully they build the section highlighted in red. Its one that I'd like to see built, especially if they develop on those parcels.

If the city put as much effort into getting a proper pedestrian corridor for this location as they have for getting walkways built for the +15, it shouldn't be a problem.
 
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