For decades Calgary’s new neighbourhoods have been criticized for being a sea of cookie-cutter homes that all look the same. In the ‘60s it was Kelvin Grove, in the ‘70s it was Canyon Meadows, in the ‘80s it was Midnapore and ‘90s Scenic Acres in the ‘90s. Today it is new communities like Skyview Ranch in the northeast or Waldon or Legacy in the deep south.

One of the things I have learned in my 40 years of living in Calgary, is “don’t judge a community until the trees are taller than the houses.”

Typical Calgary suburban street that is 25+ years old. The trees dominate the streetscape.

Typical new streetscape in anew neighbourhood. The houses dominate the streetscape.

Old vs New

Of course the houses “stick out like a sore thumb” in a new community, as it takes decades for the trees and shrubs to become high enough to buffer the starkness of the new homes, create a street canopy and turn the neighbourhood parks into the pastoral public spaces we all love.

If you look at old photos of Calgary’s 20th century communities – Mount Royal, Sunalta, Ramsay or Bridgeland, their treeless streetscape were also stark, with cookie cutter homes (some purchased from catalogues).

However over time the homes have been renovated, or torn down replaced with new infills and trees have grown to give the community their charming character.

What I observed this past summer wandering the streets of Calgary’s old and new communities is they really aren’t that different. If you wander Sunalta you will find lots of large two-storey single family homes, hidden behind the trees, that are not that different in scale from the two storey homes being built in the burbs today, or built in the new communities of the ‘60s, ’70 and ‘80s.

If you wander Calgary’s new communities like Brookfield’s Livingston you will find new homes on narrow lot homes that look similar to the modern infill homes being built in Calgary’s inner city communities like – Capitol Hill or Shaganappi. You will see lots of clusters of town houses and row housing, that resemble the corner conversions so popular today in places like Montgomery and Banff Trail.

Single Family vs Multi-Family

You will also find Calgary’s new communities have lots of low-rise condo buildings (4-storey) strategically located near transit, retail and other amenities. Some of these buildings are not much different than what is being built along 33rd and 34th Avenues in Marda Loop or in Kensington or Inglewood. Truman’s West District in the community of Wentworth on 85th St SW is an example of how developers are building new communities that mimic some of the attributes of early 20th century neighbourhoods i.e. main street with retail along the street and residential above.

What you won’t see in new communities are lots of mature trees. You also won’t see any telephone poles and wires as all of the services are buried and there aren’t any messy back lanes that you find in older neighbourhoods.

The unintended consequence of burying all of the services and eliminating the back lane means there is no room for big trees, with their large root system on the front lawns in new communities and no garages hidden behind the house. As a result the front of the house becomes an ugly concrete parking pad with a postage stamp lawn with small ornamental tree. And, unfortunately, the trees will never be taller than the houses and the streets will never be canopied.

One of my favourite places to walk is in Point McKay, which is like a huge park with its mature trees and manicured gardens, but look beyond the greenery and you will see it is just a sea of cookie-cutter townhouses.

While Calgary’s early 21st century new communities at the edge of the city may never had the lovely tree canopy of our early 20th century communities, they will improve with age, as the home owners add their personal touch and the trees in their boulevards and parks mature.