A city is often like a rolled-out sheet of cookie dough. Shapes are sculpted and placed into the oven for baking. The next step is to add design details, like icing or sprinkles. But what happens when the baker decides to make every cookie star-shaped with white icing? It’s the same with a city. If every building was a 20-storey high-rise, the community would start to look all the same – like a large batch of cookies.
The development question that’s come up in recent years isn’t about how we can change our cities from top to bottom; it’s how we can enable our cities to encourage and inspire shapes and human-oriented spaces. And in Edmonton, policymakers, architects, homebuilders, designers, and developers are the ones answering these questions.
Rebuilding the City
The City Plan, Edmonton’s plan for growth in the city, identifies a concept called “A Rebuildable City,” which orients the gaze of city builders towards communities and how they can be reshaped to better serve future residents. It asks how spaces and places can be reimagined, rebuilt, and redesigned overtime to meet the needs of those who came before us, and those whose lives are only beginning.
Because after all, what’s left for the rest of us after a business leaves a place? The character, features, and quality of the location. One of the reasons in which we would want to rebuild the city is to make room for new residents and to ensure they have the amenities and services they require to live meaningful and fulfilling lives. By rebuilding our city, we can make room for new housing. Edmonton’s goal is to see 50 per cent of housing in mature neighbourhoods, to accommodate 600,000 residents. To do that, we will need to rethink older building stock, vacant and underutilized sites, and derelict spaces.
“In a rebuildable city, residents respect the legacy of the city that’s been built to date, but (they) also build upon it to adjust, to be creative, and to be open to new possibilities that make our community thrive,” said CEO of BILD Edmonton Metro, Kalen Anderson. “The strategy is premised on preserving unique assets from the past while deliberating making more room to grow in the
future.”
This new lens of development flexibility and reimagination of space is being stewarded by the real estate development industry in a host of creative ways – all to welcome more residents and investment, and to ensure more intense and efficient land. Redeveloping new spaces in existing places takes a lot of creativity, and the pathways to success are not always straightforward. In fact, they very rarely are straightforward; it works as a two-way street. When we put our personalities into a city, the city gives us personality back. So, what it all comes down to is simple: some spaces just need a little imagination.
Soaring House
The University of Alberta Properties Trust (UAPT) is an arms-length organization of the University of Alberta, tasked with redeveloping university lands that are deemed non-essential for teaching and research. In 2010, Soaring House, and the 10-acre site of which it sits, was donated by the late owners of Maclab Enterprises. Over a decade later, in 2022, UAPT began work on the site.
Keaton Seaby, Director of Development with UAPT, described the 1950’s site as a challenge, working to build around the provision of storm and sanitary infrastructure.
“Modern standards require that we retain stormwater onsite, but Soaring isn’t big enough for a conventional storm pond,” said Seaby. “So, what can we do? Store underground? We can’t afford to lose revenue from a lot or two to store storm water, so we are exploring box culverts in the public road right-of-way. We believe this is an efficient use and meets the utilities’ needs. It has never been done under a public road in Edmonton to our knowledge, but we are going to try.”
“There are so many weird sites in our cities,” he said. “Soaring (House) is an opportunity to think and do things differently, to see promise, and to find potential in spaces that we often overlook. There is both fear and excitement in pursuing novel solutions.” Moving forward, he pointed towards two opportunities: revisiting municipal standards with an infill lens and exploring engineering details earlier in the development process to better validate costs and revenue projections. Some spaces, much like Soaring House, are an investment in the future.
Mercury Block
One of Autograph’s newest developments is The Mercury Block – a six-storey residential and commercial project that broke ground in December 2022, and opened its doors in December 2023. Located on the edge of downtown in the West Village, The Mercury Block sits along the intimate and tree-lined streets of Wîhkwêntôwin . “The Mercury Block was an inception of an idea, and we believed in this neighbourhood from the start,” said Development Manager at Autograph Group, Katie Schneider.
“I am very proud of The Mercury Block. This was my first (Autograph) project that I was involved with from inception to completion, and I’m so passionate about what it means for the city.” “I strongly believe that the way we’re viewing building new developments is reflective of the change of human behavior,” she revealed. “I think that humans are not interacting or appreciating spaces the way they did in the past. When it comes to choosing where we live and work, we have ever-changing needs…We don’t believe in the one size fit all, and development needs to be reflective of that.”
When you consider a place like The Mercury Block, “a person sleeps in their unit, but lives in the building,” said Schneider. Sitting on a community patio, picking up a coffee from a local café on your street, or watching children play in the courtyard are all small pieces of your daily routine. You may be sleeping in your unit, but if you take the time to look around, you’re a part of something bigger. Is there a formula for making buildings work? According to Schneider, it’s placemaking. “It’s a driving factor to create a building that makes people feel something, and we need to be understanding and empathetic to how people are living and breathing in these spaces.”
When it comes to bridging the gap between private and public areas, retail plays a huge role. Offering shops, amenities, and interesting architecture all plays into the goal of human-centred development. Not only does it help to develop relationships with local businesses, but it also creates interest in the community and allows residents to establish a personal connection to a
place. “It allows them to be a part of the growth of something,” Schneider said. “Because I think a sense of place is really just feeling like you belong, and we all belong in different ways.”
Autograph Group often cultivates their vision of a neighbourhood through strategic land assembly, and Mercury Block is a perfect archetype of a community that starts from the ground, even before entering the units. Built around a central courtyard, the layout of the building allows for open air and light to come in from all directions. “We view the courtyard as the nucleus of this development,” said Schneider. “It’s where the life starts.”
Tipton Building
On the other side of town near Old Strathcona lives the Tipton Investment Building – a structure originally built no later than 1907, and one of the few remaining boomtown-style façade buildings in the area. Now, this building has been retrofitted, leaving both a historical and modern design. The Tipton Investment Building is located directly on Whyte Avenue; which is an area widely recognized as a main shopping and entertainment district, defined by its mix of historic buildings, lively streets, festivals, farmers markets, restaurants, and a variety of independently owned and national retailers.
Chris Dulaba, now Manager of Placemaking and Entitlements at Rohit Group of Companies, shared that the Tipton Investment Building was an effort to give locals a glimpse into the future of rebuilding the city, and posed as a recipe for success, imagination for a new vision, and a foresight into new trends.
A willingness to tackle tough projects and unlock the potential of location is a lens that Dulaba applied in his previous roles with both GoAuto Group and Beljan Development, not only helping to retrofit the century-old Tipton Investment Building, but also lifting and relocating the structure to the west of the site, creating room for a new, large pedestrian alleyway.
“We could have easily kept the building in its existing orientation,” Dulaba said, “but moving it allowed us to create a dynamic space for pedestrians, to link the back lane to the front of the building, and to create a focal point or gathering space for businesses.” Now, you may know this walkway as the gathering point for the longest line-up to get ice cream in the city – Made by Marcus. Edmonton is home to a handful of unique spaces, ripe for change. Yet, these won’t just appear. We need to develop a community consciousness of creativity, and that means thinking differently.
West Block
Another local development, located within the Glenora community, is West Block Retail and Office Spaces. The two buildings that bring together residential, retail, and office were completed in 2019, with hopes to become a central hub for living, working, and engaging. Taken over out of foreclosure in 2016, this project was designed around an urban square and provides a unique patio with heated concrete, an open-concept public area, and a high-end space of 60 condos and 200 office and professional employees – all with pedestrian-oriented and transit-friendly design in mind.
Ryan Smith, President at Cantiro Homes, explains that the goal behind West Block’s shape and size wasn’t just for looks, but also for functionality. “It was a unique project because there was work completed onsite already,” said Smith. “We had a different vision and re-design for the building…Our intent was to design spaces that accommodated your daily life from where you live, to where you work, to where you shop. We wanted to create a community within a community.” West Block is one of those spots where you can live, work, and shop – all in one place. It’s a way for locals to grab a coffee and jump back on the train without missing a beat. With its heated surface for winters, easy access to bike lanes, and designed walkways that connect to public walkways surrounding the buildings, it’s the perfect destination for those of us who enjoy getting out, without going too far.
“We are a winter city, but we wanted the plaza to be usable year-round…so the focus was on creating vibrancy and activity 24 hours a day,” said Smith. “We’ve dedicated spaces for people to hang out and spend time in that feels natural and easy.” He also revealed that Cantiro aims to ensure that their sites feel big, bright and cheery. And beyond the space’s good connectivity and convenient features, it was also built to embody a sense of place.
“For me…it comes down to what other public spaces feel like. Is it inviting?” questioned Smith. Creating an inclusive space is not just deemed by its size and shape, but by factors such as its location, colours, and lighting. “Glazing is incredibly important for us,” said Smith. “We put a lot of focus on natural light in our spaces, making it feel like you’re integrated with those public spaces both inside and out…so there’s very, very good connectivity to all four corners and everything in between.”
“We really just envisioned the plaza as a vibrant public space,” he added. And that’s exactly what West Block is.
Shaping the City
Rehumanizing the city begins by creating great places and spaces that give people opportunities to connect, to feel safe and supported, and to feel a sense of conviviality, play and belonging. How we plan and design our communities involve creatively thinking about shapes and colour. And according to local professionals like Katie Schneider, Ryan Smith, Keaton Seaby, and Chris Dulaba, Edmonton residents seem to have priorities just the same. Shapes define our cities like a puzzle, by fitting pieces into one another and, sometimes, getting lost along the way. They inspire how we feel, where we choose to live our lives and invest our money and resources, spend our time, and grow our businesses. Shape isn’t just the pretty picture that hits the eyes when you step off the sidewalk and into a front door. Shape is everything.
Written by Payton Phillips
Originally published by Building Magazine.