CANMORE – A resident along Palliser Trail in Canmore is hoping to turn the heat up on council when it comes to developing a pedestrian bridge across the Trans-Canada Highway.
Jessie Loucks moved into housing in the Palliser area last January and ever since she has noticed a steady stream of pedestrians risking their personal safety to take a short-cut across four lanes of traffic as a matter of convenience.
Loucks recently began an online petition to put pressure on locally elected officials to take action, saying it is only a matter of time before someone is injured or killed taking the short-cut into town.
She spoke out at the public hearing on the potential 2026 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games asking council to address the situation in the near future in advance of possible athletes village housing being developed on the lands along Palliser Trail.
“I am just taking it upon myself to say that this is something we really want and we want it as soon as possible,” Loucks said, noting a pedestrian bridge has been part of the conversation around the residential development in that area over the past 10 years. “Clearly it is something they want to do, why not make it faster for the people who live here.”
A pedestrian bridge was part of the plan for the first residential development on Palliser in 2006, however council of the day decided to spend the $6 million to develop an underpass at Cougar Creek.
At the time, council felt the need for connectivity and public safety was greater in the higher density area and several people had been killed crossing the highway in the other location.
While the Olympic bid hosting concept plan included a pedestrian bridge for the proposed village, it has not been cast aside with the defeat of the bid process through a plebiscite in Calgary last month.
The draft six-year capital budget for the Town of Canmore included $250,000 for design of a pedestrian crossing along Palliser in 2024.
Council debated the merits of waiting, or moving the project ahead in time at a recent finance committee meeting.
Mayor John Borrowman argued he was uncomfortable leaving the planning process for the bridge for another six years and put forward a successful motion to move the unfunded capital project to 2020.
General manager of municipal infrastructure Michael Fark said administration recommended 2024 as the year to undergo a design process because additional residential development on those lands is still uncertain.
He added administration has proposed in the 2019 capital budget $750,000 for improved connections from Palliser to Benchlands Trail and $550,000 for improvements to that overpass.
“In the budget there are dollars to improve that connectivity that will act as an interim step until such time as the pedestrian bridge becomes necessary,” Fark said.
Canmore Community Housing Corporation (CCHC) owns a large parcel of land along Palliser Trail along with Silvertip developer Stone Creek Resorts. CCHC also owns a serviced parcel on Palliser Lane where a temporary off-leash dog park is currently located. Recently, a high density rental apartment project was completed near the highway interchange by Northview Properties.
There has also been interest expressed by the YWCA Banff in a large parcel along the highway interchange opposite of the Northview project for the future site of its Higher Ground women’s shelter and community service hub. Currently Alberta Seniors and Housing owns that land and Bow Valley Regional Housing has also expressed interest in it for its future needs.
Borrowman argued that with all the potential future development along Palliser Trail, there is no reason to wait another six years to begin planning better connectivity with a design process for a bridge.
“It is sort of a cart before the horse thing of which comes first and I would suggest that the conversations we are going to have at the CCHC board level into the near future and likely at council, will hopefully result in planning for another project to be delivered by CCHC before 2026,” he said.
Next year, CCHC and the municipality intend on undergoing a review of the 2010 Canmore Housing Action Plan and a comprehensive housing needs study is currently in the works, with a final report expected in the new year.
Councillor Joanna McCallum argued that a comprehensive master planning process for the Palliser lands is needed first before a design process for a pedestrian bridge can move forward.
“I would like council to have a discussion at some point about a master planning exercise for those entire lands, so that we can look at some sort of local improvement levy at the front end to pay for the improvements,” McCallum said, noting a pedestrian bridge would cost a minimum of $5 million.
She said the location and design of a pedestrian bridge does not happen in isolation of where housing would and could be developed along Palliser Trail in the future. Considering all those variables would be part of a master planning process, McCallum argued the design process for a bridge should come afterwards.
“This is a real way for us to get some momentum and initiative and behave like a developer of non-profit housing and look at those lands holistically and plan it out,” she said.
