Calgary’s rezoning plan about housing choice
If you’ve been wondering what Alberta Premier Danielle Smith thinks of blanket rezoning in Calgary, she gave us a hint during her radio appearance last weekend.
Her main beef related to Ottawa inserting itself into civic matters by making upzoning a condition for cities to receive housing funds for housing. She has proposed a law barring municipalities and universities from signing deals with Ottawa without provincial consent.
To be fair, the idea of slowing growth around a city’s edges and diversifying the housing stock within existing urban footprints is hardly new. The feds appear to have merely hastened cities’ smarter growth objectives.
But let’s focus on Smith’s thoughts on housing.
People should be able to choose neighbourhoods that suit them, she said. She prefers mixed-use neighbourhoods for convenient access to services, but added it would be unfair to impose that on everyone.
But transpose that discussion into older residential-only neighbourhoods, which is what Calgary’s rezoning debate is about, and what we have is a near-total absence of housing choice.
Most housing in low-density areas of most North American cities, including Calgary, is single-family and sometimes semi-detached homes. This is because decades ago, leaders decided it was the best way to accommodate car-centric life. This runs counter to the people-centric, fiscally sustainable growth patterns cities had followed for centuries.
Currently, one practical side-e ect is this: If someone wanted the space provided by a single-family house but not the yard work or gardening, the next best choice likely would be an apartment-style home, sometimes in a superdense highrise. There’s little in between. For anyone in the situation, their housing choices have been unfairly made for them.
Calgary is already doing a great job at building better suburban communities, o ering a mix of single-family homes, semi-detached homes and row houses. And there’s no risk of that stopping, with council having approved more greenfield development than city bureaucrats recommended.
But cities are finally facing up to the fact post-second World War-style suburban growth is fiscally unsustainable.
And while we will still need to grow at the edges, it also would be prudent to let older neighbourhoods develop naturally and gently over time, o ering more housing options without stretching civic resources to accommodate ever-growing city limits.
Upzoning is not about transforming cities overnight, but about letting them evolve slowly and naturally. It’s also about giving people more choice in housing.
With Calgary’s proposed rezoning, there are building height limits and minimum suite sizes. Apartment buildings are out. Parks are to be untouched. And development oversight remains, that’s especially stringent for townhomes, city documents say.
Nothing happens unless a homeowner chooses to replace what’s already there, or sells to someone who wants to do likewise. Nothing is being imposed.
By allowing replacement of low-density housing by slightly less low-density housing, blanket rezoning is nowhere near the dramatic change described even by Calgary itself. Frankly, there would be less controversy if the city had more accurately and realistically framed its plans.
Now, about a week before a public hearing on rezoning, Calgary ocials find themselves waging a public opinion battle partly of their own making.