The City of Airdrie held a second open house for residents of Reunion regarding plans for a 12.35 acre section of land that has riled those residents up in the past.
The land, that backs onto Veterans Boulevard, was originally zoned for seniors’ housing, however, Manager of Planning and Sustainable Development Tracy Corbett said the property owner was having difficulty making that kind of development work financially.
The developer, Slokker-West, presented a plan to residents at an open house in July 2014, that included the building of up to 240 residential multi-family units on the 12.35 acre site.
Approximately 100 residents turned up at that open house to voice their displeasure at the plan, citing issues around traffic and access.
Corbett said the developer took feedback from that first open house and revised the plan to include single family homes.
“It’s a very different proposal than what was shown to residents previously,” Corbett said.
“The previously shown proposal included multi-family so it was much more dense. People are still concerned around access and traffic loading onto Veterans Boulevard.”
One resident who said he’s concerned is Scott McIntosh.
“The density they are proposing is really high. It’s going to increase traffic volumes and affect our property values. It’s going to over-crowd the new school that’s already over-crowded,” he said.
“To put something like this in there when we were expecting a seniors’ home is terrible,” said Bernice Milley.
“I told my spouse, when we moved in here seven years ago, that I wanted to go volunteer there. I work six hours a day and I have all the time in the world to spend there. Why can’t we have a home to give back to the elders who gave us so much? Where are they going to go now? They say we don’t have a need for it. I don’t believe it.”
“It’s all the traffic. There’s lots of traffic already,” added her husband, Rob Wanhella.
“They say they’re going to put in 200 some houses. You’re going to have 100 more vehicles in there daily, maybe more.”
Some residents said they thought the new proposal was an improvement, though they still had concerns about the number of homes in the proposal.
“It is better. There was twice as many people in the last proposal as in this one. You have better traffic in and out, there’s more access. (It’s still a) minimum of 240 adults and 120 kids. Where are they going to go to school?” said Lyne Barnes.
“I know it’s not going to be built overnight but that’s also where all the water (in the neighbourhood) is collected. It’s a slough. There’s geese in there in the summer. Where is all that water going to go when they build that up? We have a problem now on our street (with ice build-up,)” she said.
Corbett said that Airdrie’s demographics do not typically support building of age specific developments. The average age of a resident of Airdrie is 34 with only five per cent of the population over 65 years of age.
“(The landowner was) quite legitimate about that, of trying to get a seniors’ facility (built in that area.) That was the landowner’s desire and that’s why it was zoned that way,” Corbett said.
“He could not get it to work from a market perspective and a financial perspective. It’s a very large size and that’s a lot more risk than would be involved in a smaller building.”
“Obviously, that will change over time as people age up, but right now it’s a smaller demographic,” she said.
“We’ve had discussions with a number of developers about housing mix and about accommodating a different demographic but there’s a very limited market right now.”
“They try to develop something that will appeal to all demographics to try to hedge their bets. It’s very risky to do something that targets a specific demographic.”
The proposal has not yet been submitted to the City, according to Corbett.
“Once that happens, it gets reviewed by the City, it gets into circulation and other departments review it, and then there’s a whole process for the decision. It’s far from a done deal.”
