Blatchford

December 9, 2025

2025 stats & facts: Land development flying in Blatchford

Sunset-drone400x400-1.png

This former airport’s 2025 flight path included a leap in land development, working with homebuilders on their plans for the first multi-storey apartments with ground-floor retail space, and marking the renewable energy system’s sixth operating year.
As the year comes to a close, the Blatchford redevelopment has landed an impressive milestone – approximately 57% of the 536-acre site’s developable land is now constructed, under construction or in the planning and development stage. That’s up from about 42% this time last year and included work on a new 19-acre stage that will add nearly 200 townhomes.
Aerial view of Blatchford in summer 2025
A drone captures an aerial view of the Blatchford development in summer 2025

Where else did Blatchford see momentum in 2025?​

First, a quick refresher:​

  • The City of Edmonton is Blatchford’s land developer, responsible for developing the land and selling it to homebuilders. Land development includes strategic plans and policies, rezoning and subdivision, planning and engineering design, and oversight of infrastructure construction like utilities, streets, bike lanes, landscaping in public areas, and parks.
  • After developing a stage of land, the City sells land parcels to homebuilders. These sales generate revenue for the Blatchford redevelopment, allowing the community to grow without affecting the property taxes of Edmontonians. There is no direct tax levy support for the Blatchford redevelopment or for the Blatchford District Energy Sharing System — the renewable energy system that provides homes with heating, cooling and hot water.
  • Homebuilders are responsible for building their homes according to their construction timelines and for setting the sale prices of their homes – just like they do elsewhere in Edmonton.

And now, a run-down of 2025 in Blatchford​

Our work (City of Edmonton’s Blatchford Redevelopment Office)​

  • Approximately 57% of the 536-acre site’s developable land is now constructed, under construction or in the planning and development stage. That’s up from about 42% this time last year and included work on a new 19-acre stage that will add nearly 200 townhomes.
  • Nearly 100% of the land that’s ready for builders in the first stages is either sold, has a sale agreement in place or has active builder interest.
  • Designs were completed to transform the base of the former airport control tower into a community space, with construction anticipated to start next year.
  • Progress on Blatchford’s renewable energy utility includes: reaching its sixth year of operation, connecting more floor space than anticipated, advancing design work on two new renewable energy centres (sewer heat recovery and geoexchange), and preparing for new, larger building connections like the recently opened Blatchford Fire Station No. 8 and upcoming multi-storey apartment buildings.

Blatchford homebuilder updates​

  • Blatchford’s first apartment-style building is under construction, bringing with it the community’s first main-floor retail space. Sale agreements have been signed or are underway for six additional 4-6 storey buildings – several of which will also have main-floor retail space. This includes the community’s first affordable housing development.
  • Blatchford’s first purpose-built rental projectPilot, a 90-unit rental townhome development – is now leasing units.
  • There are now nearly 400 homes (units) either completed or under construction. That’s an increase of about 150 homes since this time last year.
  • Homebuilders have another approximately 780 units planned on land that’s been sold, is pending sale or has active builder interest.

Track Blatchford’s progress​

As you can see, it’s certainly been another busy year in Blatchford! You can track the site’s land development progress on this regularly-updated map.
Blatchford Development Map 2025
New map just came out, with minor changes. A few more plots in the northwest are now in the planning stage, along with the parcel bordering the energy centre to the east. Most notably though, they finally marked NAIT's land so that it's clear whose court the ball is in.
Blatchford-Development-Map-2026-1.png
 
^I think you're confusing density with zoning. You could still have a coffee shop in low-density area with the right zoning. Also it was always the intention of the City Plan to have density around nodes and corridors, especially as we spend billions on LRT.
Maybe I'm misunderstanding your reply, or maybe I phrased my question poorly. As an example, at the far end of Alpha Blvd, let's say they wanted to make a mixed-use development with a coffee shop below and loft apartments above. Standard dream home for sitcom fans. My understanding is that the lot would need to be rezoned from RSM (or whatever it is) to MUN, a Neighborhood Mixed Use zone.

Since the end of Alpha is 600m away from Blatchford Road and even further from Kingsway, wouldn't blocking upzoning of a parcel this far from a corridor make the project impossible?
 
New map just came out, with minor changes. A few more plots in the northwest are now in the planning stage, along with the parcel bordering the energy centre to the east. Most notably though, they finally marked NAIT's land so that it's clear whose court the ball is in.
View attachment 710256
One note: I believe it is Encore that is already building on some of the blue areas where the infrastructure is not yet finished. For townhome plots, the builders are now pushing the city to move faster instead of the city begging for builders to come in.
 
One note: I believe it is Encore that is already building on some of the blue areas where the infrastructure is not yet finished. For townhome plots, the builders are now pushing the city to move faster instead of the city begging for builders to come in.
Yeah, I’m a bit surprised the city isn’t throwing more resources at this to get it built faster. Might be budget or cashflow constraints? But if land is being bought, why not move at the pace of sales? Sort of feels like not a lot of new land was opened up this year for building if the claims that all land is sold/underway/serious interest are true. Hopefully we see a jump this year in paved roads ready for new homes.
 
Yeah, I’m a bit surprised the city isn’t throwing more resources at this to get it built faster. Might be budget or cashflow constraints? But if land is being bought, why not move at the pace of sales? Sort of feels like not a lot of new land was opened up this year for building if the claims that all land is sold/underway/serious interest are true. Hopefully we see a jump this year in paved roads ready for new homes.
The development is self funded; they pay for building out future stages with the proceeds from selling developed land to builders. The district energy system is funded by user fees and grants from other levels of government. So in order to speed this up with city money, we'd be putting an added burden on the tax roll that doesn't currently exist. Not to say it's a bad idea (I'd always love to see things move faster), but it's a tradeoff we need to consider.

Given that the newest stage will have slightly less than 200 townhomes, which is nearly as much as the total number of townhomes build until recently, I think it serves as evidence that the growth here is exponential. I'm sure the proceeds from the multi-family buildings that finally got sold are a nice boost too.

Speaking of Encore's houses in the new stage: I don't have any recent pictures, but the windows and doors are installed and they're currently doing the roof.
 

Back
Top