Prairie Sky Gondola | 76.2m | ?s | Prairie Sky | DIALOG

What do you think of this project?

  • Total voters
    56
cliffapotamus said:
I think the issue is there isn't a clear, defined location for the burial grounds. The monument you cite is deliberately incomplete; they knew there were other graves under the road. That lack of clear definition got spun into the 'All of the Power Plant site is a graveyard' thinking that we are seeing now. I don't have enough of the history to know if any graves were where the current plant is, (although there's absolutely no way there's anything under or around that building now though; the foundations are very deep, there is a huge amount of underground services running to and from the plant, and there were other buildings there before the current structure was built, all of which would have irreparably disturbed the soils at the site) but the lack of definitions surrounding what was there, and where precisely it was, created this ambiguity that i think a lot of people latched onto to pull down the project.
I've come off really callous here. I do think the site needs to be respected, but respect means figuring out what was/is there, through archeological means, surveys, better research, etc. having the site sit empty, decaying, behind chainlink, with no intiatives to change or resolve that state happening, is not an answer. and I do think there needs to be better, more commonly known background to the history of Rossdale. There very well may be more to the story, but the monument there is commemorating a post-contact burial ground of Fort Edmonton residents, both Indigenous and European, that wound down as Edmonton (the City) grew up around the fort. That's a much smaller site to commemorate than a lot of the commentary happening around the gondola would imply. there's been a power plant on the site since the 1890s. in 1924 it was a coal dump for the plant.
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There's been a ton of work done trying to recover residential school burials, and it's frequently not successful. We just don't have the technology yet. I think you're absolutely right.

I'm indifferent about Prairie Sky. I'm annoyed with the city though. I have a huge issue with developers, specifically downtown , sitting on brownfield lots that could be better utilized. But the city? Why? Rossdale has so much potential.

I feel like this situation is a lose loose. The project isn't going ahead, but Rossdale is still sitting empty. I keep seeing people celebrating online this not going ahead because of it's potentially it's history. That's awful, and not something to celebrate, because of right now, we still don't know it's history. So this could be a burial ground, that has cultural significance, but we are going celebrate even though we still don't know.. What? This still sucks.

I can't understand how the city can spend hundreds of thousands of dollars refurbishing that stupid Dove of Peace, which was nothing more than virtue signaling for the pope visiting. But actual reconciliation with indigenous people, nada. Why don't we know more about this site?

I feel bad for people that invested in Prairie Sky because this isn't their fault. I'm not postive the project should go ahead, but I think the city dropped the ball here.
 
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If Prairie Sky wants to revise their plans, relocate that stop from the Rossdale Power Plant to RE/MAX Field. The gondola stop can be SW or NW of the baseball diamond. From that stop, the gondola can sail above the power plant and across the river. The power plant is just a 1 or 2 minute walk from RE/MAX Field. The effects on the Rossdale Transportation project would be minimal at best. And it should be reasonably far enough from the indigenous sacred lands and burial site.
 
Gronk! said:
If Prairie Sky wants to revise their plans, relocate that stop from the Rossdale Power Plant to RE/MAX Field. The gondola stop can be SW or NW of the baseball diamond. From that stop, the gondola can sail above the power plant and across the river. The power plant is just a 1 or 2 minute walk from RE/MAX Field. The effects on the Rossdale Transportation project would be minimal at best. And it should be reasonably far enough from the indigenous sacred lands and burial site.
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Not a bad idea, but I think the uncertain future of RE/MAX Field could be an issue amongst other things. There are amazing plans for West Rossdale if all the pieces fall in place, but so far it seems none have and I wonder if they ever will.
 
Question for those who have knowledge of this specific concept: why has the city not established a real estate trust company with the sole purpose to develop the Rossdale lands? Or for that matter, why has the city not established a real estate trust company to develop Rossdale, Blatchford, The Quarters, Northlands?

The U of A has established its U of A Properties Trust to develop and re-develop several properties, Calgary has the Calgary Municipal Land Corp that developed the East Village. Why is the city intent on either 1. doing it themselves ala Blatchford or 2. sitting on more central undeveloped land potential (Rossdale, The Quarters, Northlands) when we could be advancing central communities that could tie into things like the Gondola?

Edit: I believe one of the council members ran on a platform to spur development in Rossdale and I havent heard a single thing on that...perhaps an indicative sign that the city has no vision in this area and will sit status quo for the next decade
 
CaptainBL said:
Question for those who have knowledge of this specific concept: why has the city not established a real estate trust company with the sole purpose to develop the Rossdale lands? Or for that matter, why has the city not established a real estate trust company to develop Rossdale, Blatchford, The Quarters, Northlands?

The U of A has established its U of A Properties Trust to develop and re-develop several properties, Calgary has the Calgary Municipal Land Corp that developed the East Village. Why is the city intent on either 1. doing it themselves ala Blatchford or 2. sitting on more central undeveloped land potential (Rossdale, The Quarters, Northlands) when we could be advancing central communities that could tie into things like the Gondola?

Edit: I believe one of the council members ran on a platform to spur development in Rossdale and I havent heard a single thing on that...perhaps an indicative sign that the city has no vision in this area and will sit status quo for the next decade
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I am guessing they might be waiting to see how Blatchford goes and gain knowledge from that experience. Arguably, it might have been better to start with something smaller. as the City seems to really struggle with larger projects, but it is too late to go back in a time machine and change that now. I'm also not sure if the City is very eager to be a developer/developer of last resort, although it may come to that eventually for such hard to develop central areas.
 
Why on earth are people celebrating the demise of an innovative transportation project...I don't know when things switched, but that is simply not "progressive". Being progressive means building forward for humanity, making the city safer and more pedestrian friendly, improving accessibility, building a city that has environmentally friendly modes of transport. And has everyone forgotten about the network effect in transit? There is simply no way this reduces ETS ridership. It will boost ridership on all other forms of transit, as the city becomes more pedestrian accessible as a whole. I mean, these are just such basic tenets of how cities work that it's frankly mind boggling, highly concerning, and shocking to hear city councilors apparently not understand this.
 
David A said:
I am guessing they might be waiting to see how Blatchford goes and gain knowledge from that experience. Arguably, it might have been better to start with something smaller. as the City seems to really struggle with larger projects, but it is too late to go back in a time machine and change that now. I'm also not sure if the City is very eager to be a developer/developer of last resort, although it may come to that eventually for such hard to develop central areas.
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emphasis added...

they did start with station pointe didn't they?

and they have been active with smaller single family residential and industrial land development parcels for decades.

on a larger scale, they have been working through the research park for 40 years so there should be lots of experience...

ps. there may be more sarcasm in the above than there probably should be.

pps. most of the city's greenfield ventures have been carried out by a dedicated internal team - the enterprise land development group - that has some very talented and knowledgeable individuals. that group has it's own operating and reporting parameters although it does, as everything else does at the city, take its direction from council. it is self-funded (if you put aside the holding/opportunity costs of the land in their inventory).
 
Yeah there is experience, although I suspect whoever worked on starting the research park is probably retired now. Maybe station pointe wasn't the best to start with, but they are all tricky.

Maybe more risk involved than a bureaucratic/political system wants stomach and more agility than the system allows would be required.
 
This is/was a serious social justice project. There's no two ways about it. Urban gondolas help those without cars, those who are not able to traverse steep paths, young people who don't drive or seniors, they create transit mode shift. Council needs to reopen this asap or very quickly risk losing its bona fides on these social issues.
 
Glenco said:
So I wonder what plan B the city has for accessing the power station that they are so keen to develop? I may have to write to Anne Stevenson to find out. What ever solution they come up with they are going to have to do the leg with consultations.
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My guess: There is zero political will to touch anything to do with this site going forward. Way too contentious and there isn't a cohesive enough vision (or any demonstrated vision really) on Council to move forward with anything Admin proposes.

I sure hope I am right and props to you for writing to your Councillor to push the issue.
 
CplKlinger said:
edmontonjournal.com

Keith Gerein: Edmonton gondola had its flaws, but so did council's changing expectations

A proposal to build a gondola across Edmonton's river valley was put in an untenable situation by the changing demands of city council
edmontonjournal.com edmontonjournal.com
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I think there is some fair comment that the political winds shifted, but I am not sure this should have been a total surprise. After all an outgoing council might not be too rigorous dealing with something that would ultimately be left to the next one anyways, so perhaps they were lulled into thinking it was smoother sailing than it was.
 
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