Residents wanting to have a say in how downtown Airdrie is developed in the future will have multiple chances to provide input as the City of Airdrie outlined its process for public consultation Jan. 16.
Stephen Utz, co-ordinator of planning and development, said the city will hold two public workshops and three focus groups, possibly more, starting Jan. 30.
“The last time there was comprehensive downtown visioning and public consultation was in 1999 so this is an excellent opportunity to kickstart this campaign,” he said. “When we were looking at the themes or the brands for it, we were looking at opportunities to talk and connect and share, and what we landed on was, Airdrie, let’s connect. Let’s connect downtown.”
A public visioning exercise to look at what Airdrie’s downtown might look like was approved by city council Nov. 21, 2016.
Plans for a major redevelopment of Airdrie’s downtown, known as The Square, were halted Nov. 7, 2016 after public outcry about the way the project was announced and how the Airdrie Main Street Square (AMSQ) board functioned. Questions arose about the cost of the project, possible conflict of interest and the lack of public consultation on the proposed project.
According to Utz, the city’s existing Downtown Plan was adopted in 2008 and is somewhat out of date. His department had planned to begin work on a new plan in 2017, regardless of the controversy surrounding the AMSQ lands. Council approved up to $100,000 in the 2017 operating budget for the development of the new Downtown Plan.
The public workshops will take place Jan. 30 and Feb. 1 in council chambers beginning at 6 p.m. Utz said residents and stakeholders are invited to attend these sessions.
“The second opportunity (to provide feedback) is community conversations. Council may use the term focus groups because they’ll be done in a focus group format,” he said. “We’ll be looking at…potential land uses and SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis of the downtown.”
These sessions will take place Feb. 8, 9 and 15 in the Vincent Room at City Hall. Utz said each session can accommodate 12 people and residents will be able to register online. Extra spaces will be added and extra focus groups run each night if there are more than 12 people registered.
Different topics will be discussed on each date. On Feb. 8 the topic is land uses and services in the downtown. On Feb. 9 the topic is defining downtown boundaries. Creating downtown vision statements will be discussed Feb. 15.
Starting Jan. 30, an online questionnaire will be available for all residents.
“The questionnaire will replicate, in large part, the questions that will be asked during the public workshops themselves,” Utz said. “We encourage any individual that came out to a workshop or not to participate at airdrie.ca/downtown”
Residents can also provide their feedback, comments and concerns by e-mailing [email protected] or calling 403-948-8848 between Jan. 30 and March 1.
“They can also use that phone line to set up a one-on-one meeting with an individual person or small group in order to meet with myself and members of the planning team,” he said.
Councillor Darrel Belyk asked if the concept drawings from The Square would be included in the visioning exercise.
“The real focus of this exercise is to hear what the community has to say about the downtown and what it means to them,” said Lorne Stevens, director of community infrastructure. “The concept plans for AMSQ, for the purpose of this visioning exercise, I don’t believe they have any specific bearing.
“We certainly recognize that AMSQ is a landowner in the downtown but the reality is that we’re trying to engage with the broadest possible spectrum of stakeholders and residents in this particular forum.”
More information about the process can be found at airdrie.ca/downtown.
