The Push to Launch a New Way of Life
A sustainable community project in Calgary
by Scott Rollans

Like many people today, Calgarian Ida Tjosvold is faced with a paradox. Although she lives in a pleasant, modern apartment building, surrounded by neighbours on all sides, she sometimes can't shake the feeling that she's all alone.

"I'm sure we all feel isolated at some times. I certainly have a network of good friends, and I'm not isolated in that sense, but I do live alone in my apartment. My neighbours are excellent, but urban apartments aren't community. We smile at each other in the hallway and we're very pleasant, but we wouldn't go over and say, 'You want to have a cup of coffee? I had something super happen to me today,' or, 'I had a miserable day. Come in and let me tell you about it.'"

Unlike most of us, however, Tjosvold is not content simply to bemoan her isolation. Instead she's a member of the Sustainable Community Housing Society, a group of everyday Calgarians assembled by the University of Calgary's Department of Environmental Design. Together, they're working to create a whole new kind of community-the "Affordable Sustainable Community (ASC) Project"- literally from the ground up.

Although at this point it's only a dream, the tiny residential development the group proposes for the Inglewood district, on the banks of Calgary's Bow River, may ultimately change the way many of us live. Picture a neighbourhood where the single family dwelling has made way for closer, more integrated housing. Neighbours from all walks of life spend much of their time together in common work and recreation spaces, and cooperate in caring for the vegetable garden and other green spaces. Cyclists and pedestrians rule the narrow, intimate streets, even though many residents still own cars. At street level, blended in with the housing, you find an assortment of small cafes and shops. The community looks after its own storm and waste water treatment, and works together to promote conservation, recycling and composting.

This vision might be dismissed as utopian, except for the fact that similar communities already exist in Europe. David Van Vliet, ASC Project coordinator, travelled to Scandinavia in 1988 while working on his Master's Degree thesis. He studied a wide array of residential communities, ranging from 16 to 600 units in size, and was struck by the way they combined practical, social and ecological considerations. While he points out, "There's many lessons to be learned from each of them," Van Vliet describes one particular project as an example.

On the surface, "Tusenskönan" in Västerâs, Sweden, looks like a typical inner-city apartment complex: a 70-unit, U-shaped structure overlooking a partially enclosed courtyard. When he first stepped into it, however, Van Vliet sensed that he was in a special place. "It's just a beautiful thing: very simple and very well-conceived, and it feels good when you're in it."

In one, tidy package, Tusenkönan manages to accomplish a multitude of ecological and social goals. High insulation, good window design and heat exchange from the air and water systems combine to dramatically boost the complex's energy efficiency. The residents, through diligent recycling and composting, generate 80% less waste than their neighbours. The project's few parking spaces are all underground, freeing the courtyard for other uses, including a community garden, rainwater pond, and play areas.

Like most of the Scandinavian projects Van Vliet visited, Tusenskönan has been physically shaped by the users themselves. "The residents are empowered to make changes in the courtyard as they see fit, even though it's a rental arrangement. They can expand the garden, they can have more trees, they can create new play areas, or take them out."

Van Vliet was struck by the high level of public involvement he saw in the Scandinavian projects. People have a stake in their community, simply because in many cases they designed it themselves.

Inspired by his initial study, Van Vliet, along with Urban Design professor Dr. Bill Perks, launched an effort to design a similar project for Calgary. "We wanted to try to break the inertia that has seemed to exist for the last decade or so, in terms of environmental planning," says Van Vliet. "Industry was saying, 'We're waiting for some direction and guidance from federal and municipal government,' and the municipality was saying, 'Geez, isn't it up to the private sector?'" Looking to break the gridlock, Van Vliet and Perks brought together a forum of experts from the City of Calgary and the housing industry. The ASC Project was born.

Three years later, however, it still exists only on paper. For one thing, you can't turn the sod until you have chosen a site (Inglewood, the best current prospect, is far from finalized). City planners will need to be convinced to stretch countless codes and regulations in order to accommodate the scheme. Developers, a notoriously conservative lot, will have to participate financially in a radical and potentially risky venture. Houseseekers will be asked to abandon their suburban preconceptions, and commit themselves to a completely different lifestyle.

Yet, despite the endless delays and intimidating hurdles, the project remains very much alive. Ida Tjosvold and her fellow Society members have begun to hammer out the physical details of the project. At the same time, despite their lingering reservations, more planners and developers have come to recognize the project's potential value.

"If they were able to get this project built, or even a variation of it, and we could see what it could represent, I think it would be a tremendous benefit for everyone," says Greg Brown, who represented the Canadian Institute of Planners on the ASC advisory panel. "People could look at the results and say, 'Here's another way of thinking, or another way to do things.' As it is now, they're making various people think about the concept, which in itself is positive."

Perks remains determined to see the job through. "It's a long and complicated process, but we won't get any change in the Canadian context until we can build demonstration projects. We need a partnership of senior government, municipality and industry to build a few of these to demonstrate, test and monitor the results."

With the help of a grant from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, the department thoroughly documented five specific Scandinavian housing projects, expanding upon Van Vliet's initial research. When they presented their findings to Calgary's municipal and industry experts, however, Perks and Van Vliet confirmed their own suspicion: not everyone shared their enthusiasm for the proposed Canadian trial version.

"There's a standoff among the municipality, the regulatory people, and the industry," observes Perks. "The industry says, 'We will build whatever the consumer wants.' The only problem with that is that consumer doesn't have any images of 'the possible'. Their only frame of reference is what they see already. We don't have residential projects conceived around sustainability."

At the same time, says Perks, people in the housing industry see city regulators as an insurmountable obstacle. "They'll say 'Look, we have tried to get innovative projects going, but we get a hell of a lot of resistance from the municipality about changing the standards of development and the codes. It costs us a hell of a lot, because there are big long delays in getting these changes through the system.'"

Finally, Perks describes a third element in the standoff. "The politicians are very sensitive to their electorate out there, and they're not sure that community associations will accept a different form of urban development. A more sustainable community means more intensive land use, it means tighter groupings of housing, it means mixed use of housing, and it means more preservation of open space and natural ecological systems, which adds maintenance costs either to the community or to the city."

That kind of widespread resistance would doom most projects. But, says Van Vliet, "None of this is unusual. It's certainly happened in other places, in terms of having to overcome some of these barriers before things can move forward."

The first barrier Perks identifies, the housing industry, currently enjoys a booming market in Calgary. With houses selling as quickly as they can be built, developers might well see the ASC Project as an unneccessary risk. Says Greg Brown, "As a planner who is out there designing the subdivisions and developments that people are buying today, my biggest concern is, is there a market? Are there enough people willing to invest their dollars to live in this community?

"People are extremely conservative when they buy their houses. One of the real driving forces is not only 'Does it satisfy my needs' but 'Am I going to be able to sell it?' When people go buy a car they say, 'This is going to serve my needs for the next six years, it looks fun, I love the colour, so I'm going to buy it.' When people buy a house, they say, 'I'm going to leave the walls white for the rest of time, I'm not going to get too exciting or do anything really radical with this house, because I'm going to have to sell it 15 years from now if I decide to move.'"

Although they're named as Perk's second barrier, Calgary's city administrators appear ready to give the ASC Project at least some regulatory leeway. "In my mind, the City of Calgary is willing to look at anything, as long as it seems reasonable," says Owen Tobert of the City's Urban Development Division. "Our job isn't to make sure that they make a subdivision just like any other subdivision."

Tobert even sees some distinct advantages to the project. For instance, by taking responsibility for such things as waste water treatment and storm water management, ASC removes that burden from the City. "Everybody here at the City of Calgary is fully aware that we've got finite financial capabilities. If subdivision development is going to continue the way it has in the past, we're going to reach a point where we won't be able to afford new developments. We're rapidly reaching that point already.'

Perks and Van Vliet did their best to overcome the third, political barrier when they made up their initial advisory panel. The panel included a representative from the Mayor's Office, a City Alderman, and Bob Lang, Director of Federation of Calgary Communities. As a result of their involvement, none seem particularly alarmed about ASC. Says Lang, "I don't see any real problems with the project."

Even so, Van Vliet can't seem to find the kind of political help he saw in Scandinavia, where politicians eagerly embrace social experimentation. "The attitude there is to see how things work in practice as fast as possible in order to learn from it. The fundamental difference is that municipal agents see themselves as playing a role for change and having influence on the private sector."

Instead, he finds himself caught in a frustrating political cycle. "Certain people say, 'This can only come from strong political support,' and certain politicians say, 'No, this can only come from support from the planning bureaucracy,' and the planning bureaucracy says, 'The only way this can happen is if the Commissioners fully support it.'"

If they lack a strong friend at City Hall, however, Van Vliet and Perks have some determined allies in Ida Tjosvold and her colleagues. The Sustainable Community Housing Society sprang into existence after Van Vliet and Perks were interviewed on the local CBC radio, recruiting ordinary Calgarians for the design portion of the project. Over the next 36 hours, they were flooded with over a hundred interested prospects.

Of the 24 people chosen for the group, many hope to ultimately become residents of the project. A concrete development proposal may be months or even years away, yet they feel as if they are planning their own future neighbourhood.

Tim Nourse and his wife spend much of their working time at home. Until a few years ago, they lived in Edmonton's Old Strathcona area. Now that they're in Calgary, Nourse misses the intimate atmosphere of his old neighbourhood. "I like taking a break and going for a walk, going to a coffee shop or just seeing what else is going on. I could do that in Strathcona. I could get up and leave for a bit, and come back feeling refreshed. But out here, I walk down the street and see some cars going by, or go to the shopping mall, and then run for cover."

With ASC, Nourse hopes to help shape a new community to meet his own needs. "At this point, everyone's ideas are taken in," he says. "Once it gets more developed, we'll see whether or not those ideas are incorporated."

Tjosvold feels comfortable with the added responsibility inherent in a sustainable community. "I like the sense of stewardship, of 'living lightly on the earth', of being environmentally responsible."

Like Nourse, however, she also looks forward to a closer relationship with her neighbours. "I look at it in two ways. Partly I look at it as a consumer, in that I would love to live there. On the other hand, I'm also a sociologist, and it makes awfully good sociological sense, in terms of people's loneliness and the need for community. It also speaks very strongly to Ida's need for community.

Nourse and Tjosvold will get their wishes, if project engineering consultant Finn Spanggaard has his way. "We've been trying to increase the density of the housing units, so you'll find people living closer together but at the same time with more common areas. That will cut down on servicing costs," says Spanggaard. It will also create a fortunate side effect: "Sometimes if you're closer in with other people you're almost forced to talk to them. I think in today's communities people are very distant towards each other."

For the time being, Calgarians will have to find more conventional ways of bridging the distance among them. The three hectare plot at the edge of the Bow won't take its new shape for a few years, at the very least. Still, Van Vliet is convinced that his long wait will eventually be rewarded. "Some of the professionals involved say that they have never seen something being discussed for this long, and engaging this many people, without eventually proceeding. I'm confident that something will happen." Ask him when, however, and he can only chuckle ruefully: "I couldn't even venture a guess."

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