Railtown

Our thanks to Goole Earth for the photo. 'Not one condo development, but a number of buildings proposed to spread over 22 acres, and perhaps eventually to replace the city of Calgary's bus barns (centre right in photo), for another 11.5 acres. "The Remington Lands", as they are known, would be developed jointly with the CPR, which has for decades been phasing out many of the sidings here and north of the main line along Ninth Avenue S.E., between Second Street (north-bound Macleod Trail) and Fourth Street S.E., where the city plans an underpass of the CPR tracks, finally linking Victoria Park and East Village. In fact, this parcel along Ninth Avenue S.E. on the downtown side of the tracks will likely develop first with four office towers, as there continues to be strong demand for new office space, and these require less planning and co-ordination than condominium buildings.

The south side of the tracks was in the news in June of 2007 when the Province bought a parcel from the CPR to house the future station for a possible high-speed rail link between Calgary and Edmonton. This meshes with the city's plan for a south-east leg of the C-Train, which must pass through here parallel to the CPR tracks, and probably with a Victoria Park station consolidated with the high-speed rail terminal. It's nice to see such long-term planning by our various levels of government.

The Railtown plan is an enormous undertaking requiring extensive planning, but the company is eager to proceed quickly. Initial concepts call for a large pedestrian overpass of the CPR tracks to supplement the planned Fourth Street S.E. road link to the north, perhaps a dozen condo towers similar to Arriva just to Railtown's west, plus extensive mixed-use functions such as at-grade retail space, office functions above those, topped by condo homes. Development would probably turn its back to the CPR tracks, perhaps with multi-level parkades. A longer-range plan calls for relocation of the city's huge bus maintenance facility so that land can be developed more appropriately, which would also allow new road links so that Seventh Street S.E. along the Elbow River can be closed for conversion to riverside park and pathways.