A massive new industrial park east of Calgary announced earlier this year by the City of Calgary and Rocky View County couldn’t come soon enough, say experts.
The Prairie Economic Gateway is being hailed as a much-needed inland logistics hub and rail transload facility that will enable greater interprovincial trade and access to global markets while unlocking new opportunities in manufacturing, logistics, processing and distribution.
Projected to generate more than $7 billion in economic activity and create more than 30,000 jobs across the region over the next 10 to 12 years, the park is expected to play a crucial role in strengthening supply chains and enhancing market access for Canadian businesses.
“When I think about the lessons that we have learned over the last couple of months with the threat of tariffs and then the actual implementation of those tariffs, it’s that Canada is lagging behind when it comes to investing in infrastructure that provides us with different supply chains, provides us with access to different markets and really strengthens our internal trade opportunities,” says Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek.
“We need to be investing in things like inland ports. We have underinvested over the last couple of decades, and this puts us back.”
The Prairie Economic Gateway is expected to initially span 886 hectares (2,190 acres) of land in Rocky View County east of Stoney Trail along 114th Avenue S.E. A key feature of the park is its direct access to the existing Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) rail network. The Class 1 railroad offers an opportunity to enhance the region’s position within North America’s trade network by strengthening the Canada-Mexico trade corridor, as well as being able to offset high demand from busy B.C. ports.
“This project is … a big deal for us,” says Oyin Shyllon from the City of Calgary, who will act as project manager for Prairie Economic Gateway. “We have a feature of industrial development that not many locations have, which is direct access to rail.”
Paul Marsden, Calgary-based executive vice-president and partner at Colliers, believes any infrastructure that services industrial land is going to be a net-net benefit to the region, especially when it involves direct rail access.
He notes that while the area has long served as a distribution hub, interest has surged post-pandemic as companies look to strengthen their supply chains. He points to longtime incumbents such as Home Depot and Canadian Tire being joined more recently by companies such as TJX, Dollarama and Princess Auto.
“These are very large buildings that have tens of millions of dollars of inventory, and they are churning through them on a day-in and day-out basis. So, when we talk about more infrastructure coming into the market – whether it’s highways, additional runway capabilities or rail capabilities – it gives occupiers more opportunities to say, ‘what is the art of the possible in Calgary?’” says Marsden.
“What else can we do? Oh, we can now manage our own freight and our own rail? … This has the potential of really opening up how companies operate their supply chain here differently.”
Beyond the rail-served hub, Gondek believes the park has the potential to be even bigger, pointing to the industrial land that surrounds it.
“If we had just looked at that single development opportunity of the smaller rail-served hub, we would have missed the opportunity to do bigger things around it,” says Gondek, citing examples such as attracting data centres, which have shown continued interest in the region.
In fact, Shyllon believes the Prairie Economic Gateway’s $7-billion impact is a conservative estimate, emphasizing the uncertainty surrounding the size of the workforce the park will attract.
“So, yes, it’s a big number. But I may surprise you because, in the end, there’s a good chance it could be an underestimate,” he says.
Rocky View County Reeve Crystal Kissel believes this announcement comes at an opportune time for the region, especially in the wake of U.S. tariffs implemented on Canadian goods and supply chain issues that emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Given what’s going on south of the border and what we’re seeing in the world, I would say the timing couldn’t be better,” she says.
“This is a time when Alberta needs to start thinking about how we can make Alberta stronger. How can we work together to ensure that we are more resilient? It’s projects like this that will help us get there.
“These are really big steps for the future of where Alberta can go.”
Shyllon sees an opportunity to get even faster rates of industrial production beyond the 1.8 per cent compound annual growth rate that the region’s experienced over the last 25 years.
“The timing couldn’t be better. We probably can’t build this thing fast enough,” he says.
Casey Stuart, Calgary-based executive vice-president for JLL Capital Markets, notes the Prairie Economic Gateway also comes at a time when industrial land in the region remains in high demand.
“There’s a common misconception that the Calgary area has a vast abundance of land available for industrial growth. The truth is we’ve been quite constrained in our industrial land offerings going back at least 20 years,” says Stuart.
“Generally, industrial demand has outpaced the supply of land. … What this offers is an ability to offer critical mass. We haven’t seen large tracts of industrial land available for occupiers and businesses to purchase or lease to build out large enterprise.”
Combine that with the price advantage that Calgary offers over locations such as Vancouver, and you have a compelling case for businesses.
“Industrial land in Vancouver is $4 to $7 million per acre. In Calgary, industrial land is $600,000 to $1 million an acre. That’s a big difference,” says Stuart, which, when combined with lower real estate and labour costs, are attractive to businesses looking to set down roots.
The inter-municipal partnership is being hailed as a first-of-its-kind in Canada. Initially approached as an annexation of lands by the City in late 2021, it uniquely evolved into a shared effort between the City, County and private developers through several years of discussions.
“We worked our way through that process and … we found that we actually had a lot more in common than we believed – that we could both benefit from working together rather than working our way through an annexation,” says Kissel.
“I don’t think five to 10 years ago this could have happened. For that, I am very grateful.”
Next up for the project is to establish governance structures and secure funding. The municipalities announced in late March that it has signed an early-stage memorandum of understanding with the Canada Infrastructure Bank to explore an investment partnership.
Both Gondek and Kissel emphasize the importance of obtaining provincial and federal support for the project moving forward.
“(We need to) make sure that we are getting in front of the right people both federally and provincially to allow our government partners to step up with their commitments. I think that’s really important,” says Gondek, noting there has also been significant private sector interest so far.
Looking further ahead, the work will shift to finalizing planning policies, securing land and regulatory approvals and advancing a preliminary infrastructure design. Shyllon expects more detailed planning approvals and infrastructure will begin in 2025, with visible site work expected by 2027 and major construction phases extending into the late 2020s.
“It’s going to take us a while to get there. It’s a multi-million-dollar project – a decade-long and perhaps even longer piece of work,” he says.
“But the plan is that, at the end of the day when we get there, it’ll be a state-of-the-art opportunity to move goods effectively … through Calgary, through the Prairies and to the rest of the country.”
Adds Gondek: “This is a long game. Anything that’s going to benefit future generations is always a long game. So, we need to stay together on this, make sure we’re bringing more partners to the table and get the work moving as quickly as we can.”
