Rocky View County (RVC) council recently voted to approve the spending of $310,000 from the County’s Road Program Reserve to upgrade the landscaping along Langdon’s Centre Street.
The vote came after County administration presented two options that councillors could choose that would direct upgrades to the sides of the existing roadway between Anderson Avenue and Third Avenue in Langdon.
Option One, which was administration's recommendation, would appropriate funds from the Road Program Reserve to landscape the section of Centre Street with ornamental reed grass and short paved sections at curb corners to maintain driving site lines. Under this plan, the two dry ponds along Langdon Park would also be reconstructed with a rock-armoured dry creek bed along the base and upper slopes, which in turn would be treated to a wildflower seed mix and limited plantings of ornamental reed grass.
A second option costing $505,000 was also presented to council. Option two was largely similar to option one except the soft-scaping along the boulevard would be replaced by hard-scape planters.
Division 7 Coun. Al Schule, who represents Langdon on council, was a vocal proponent of improving the landscaping along Langdon’s Centre Street, and ultimately supported option one.
“This has been going on for three years now,” said Schule of the landscaping issues along Centre Street. “I don’t know how much money we’ve spent on this already…we’ve done so many great things in this community [and] I do believe the $310,000 option will be good.”
County officials stated in their report to council that landscaping issues along Langdon’s Centre Street have been ongoing since it underwent roadway expansion renovations in 2020. According to the report, establishing grass has been difficult on that section along the roadway due to the high clay content mixed with gravel and salt in the soil.
Efforts to improve the landscaping were made by the County in the summer of 2023, with the addition of imported topsoil and seeding. The report states that some improvements were realized successfully in the fall, but full grass catch may still be a gradual process requiring several years.
RVC Director of Operations Byron Riemann stated that the County spends somewhere between $20,000 to $30,000 a year landscaping the specific portion of Langdon’s Centre Street.
Jeanette Lee, the manager of the County's engineering services, said that the difference in maintenance costs between the two options would be “minimal.”
County officials confirmed that $1.8 million currently sits in the County’s Road Program Reserve and that the money is specifically for road-related projects.
In the end, only Division 2 Coun. and Deputy Reeve Don Kochan opposed the motion, stating, "If we’re going to spend for something higher, perhaps the business associations should be kicking in accordingly.”
Schule responded to Kochan by saying that most of the occupants that neighbour this section of road are residential properties, and not local businesses.
