On May 14, 2024, Calgary city council voted to approve blanket rezoning of the city. After almost four weeks of the largest public hearing in Calgary’s history, where a record 736 Calgarians spoke, 6,101 written submissions were received and more than 50,000 people tuned in for some of the live-streamed hearings (62 per cent of written submissions and 88 per cent of oral submissions opposed blanket rezoning), eight councillors plus Mayor Jyoti Gondek voted yes to blanket rezoning. Six councillors opposed.
When the rezoning goes into effect on August 6, thousands of properties in over 100 neighbourhoods in Calgary will be converted to R-CG designation. This allows for two buildings, an increase in height from 10 to 11 meteres, an increase in lot coverage from 45 to 60 per cent, reduced front setbacks and no side setbacks.
Where once single family homes sat, up to eight units can be built (four main units plus four secondary suites). A building bonanza, unconstrained by pesky zoning rules, will no doubt ensue.
The city’s rationale for the move is the need for increased housing availability and affordability given our rapidly growing city. Yet many argued these goals will not be met by blanket rezoning. Instead, many unintended consequences will ensue.
“A chair designed for the average person is uncomfortable for everyone, just in varying degrees,” says Jon Himmens, president of the Lakeview Community Association. Himmens and his community association opposed blanket rezoning. “The same is true of any blanket policy. There are much better solutions to the city’s issues, they simply require a little more work.”
To Himmens, the risk with blanket up zoning is the loss of controls to prevent over-construction, homogenous construction that is dull and uninteresting, and poor quality construction inconsistent with location.
“For me the question is: what kind of city do we want to leave to generations we may never meet? We want to leave a well-planned city with heritage, differing community designs with strategies and planned amenities. I want a city where you choose to live in the community that matches what you want.”
Roy Wright, a Registered Professional Planner who was employed as a neighbourhood planner (among other duties) at the City of Calgary until 2000, and was a Calgary Planning Commissioner from 2011-2017, has been a planning consultant in Canada and the U.S. for the past 24 years. He suggests R-CG designation will result in communities with reduced privacy and sunlight, increased noise, congested streets and significantly more people.
“Residents may start to leave established areas because they do not feel comfortable investing in their houses because indiscriminate redevelopment will undermine the stability of their street with town houses or apartments that are inappropriate,” Wright says. “They may realize it is their land rather than their house where the value lies and ‘cash out’. These changes will not address affordability but rather will destabilize our neighbourhoods.”
Wright spent 20 years working in Calgary’s established neighbourhoods (from 1979 to 2000) helping repair damage resulting from the dis-investment and speculation that was experienced in the 1950s and ’60s. This happened when many families moved to the new suburbs, and many older neighbourhoods saw speculative up-zonings, deterioration of housing stock, school closures and a general lack of re-investment.
“We downzoned thousands of properties and collaborated with neighbourhood groups,” he says. “The result is the vibrant and healthy established neighbourhoods of today.”
“With blanket up zoning, in 20 or 30 years, Calgary will be facing the same challenges neighbourhood planners faced in the 1970s and 1980s,” he warns.
Himmens echoes Wright’s concerns: “The worse case scenario is a range of inappropriate construction across the city, and in 10 years from now, we say, oops – – sorry about that – – bad idea! I had expected much more joined- up thinking from Council.”
His two primary concerns are an influx of building and planning applications, and the stress and difficulty of residents trying to understand what is and is not permitted, and how the new by–law will be administered and controlled. “I worry it will cause further friction between neighbours and the overall relationship with the city,” he says.
“Blanket up zoning abdicates planning by effectively disregarding the very essence of the established streetscapes, architectural guidelines, and the scale of new homes to existing homes,” echoes Humaira Palibroda, a realtor with Re/Max Real Estate Central. “It eradicates a homeowner’s right to weigh in on what is built next to them and in their communities, creating great uncertainty and anxiety about their quality of life and their single largest investment.”
The city’s rationale on affordability is unconvincing. Wright points out that the city’s own report outlines new construction costs at $1.6 million for a single, $0.9 million for a semi-detached and $0.6 million for townhomes. “Those are not affordable and will not help the 84,000 households, including my children, who are struggling to find affordable housing,” he says. “Unfortunately, blanket up zoning will, in some established neighbourhoods, displace existing affordable housing such as older single detached homes, some with basement suites, and post-war low rise apartments.”
For example, if a single family home is torn down and replaced with two semi-detached homes, each side is typically listed for sale at a price higher than the original purchased home.
“There is affordable housing and then there is affordability and this speaks to neither,” says Marvin DeJong, architect and principal at Dda Architecture Ltd. “The only way affordability works is if it is situated along established transit lines. I think of trains when I think of transit and there is a woeful inadequate lack of development along our established train lines. There are properties that have remained undeveloped for generations. Why must we redevelop communities if there is so much empty, and developable, land in Calgary already?”
Wright points out that there is presently zoning in place in established areas for an additional 262,451 units in appropriate locations. Greenfield sites that have vacant land capacity can accommodate another 178,235 units. “That’s more than 440,000 units that could be built under existing zoning,” he says. “Even if only half of that is developed, that is an awful lot of new homes. If we up zone another 216,117 properties to RCG, all we are doing is destabilizing many neighbourhoods with the uncertainty of what will be built next door, and avoiding the affordability issue.”
“There is no specific evidence I have seen which suggests affordability will be improved,” Himmens agrees. “That requires housing stock in specific categories to be increased. Is it profitable for builders to generate affordable housing? I doubt it, and I cannot logically connect re-zoning to availability either.”
Palibroda points to other Canadian cities that have proven that density alone does not translate to affordability. “In fact, increasing the allowable density inflates land prices eroding all hopes of affordability,” she says. “This is the current reality in Calgary’s established neighbourhoods. Purpose built, transit-oriented development and non-market housing would be the most expeditious way to tackle the affordability and housing inventory crunch.”
It’s not that increasing density is bad per se, DeJong adds, just that a blanket approach is flawed: “Planning should never be arbitrary. Good design is never random. This also does not go far enough in many instances. Busier roads can, and should, have an even higher density and this will sterilize blocks from getting an appropriate density. Grade oriented housing should be reconsidered if there is no parking available in front.”
Wright notes council approved the Municipal Development Plan in 2009, a logical document that lays out a strategy for redevelopment: “Council has an obligation, in fact a duty, to indicate to industry that, ‘If you want to build in Calgary, follow the Plan’.”
City council’s decision to up zone the city flies in the face of what many Calgarians have expressed. It is a fundamental change to the fabric of this city that worries a large number of people. Let’s hope that once it goes through on August 6, everyone’s worst fears aren’t realized.
