Really, it's OK to like Calgary

[feepa]

Really, it's OK to like Calgary
Boosterism eases in city exploring its potential

Todd Babiak, The Edmonton Journal
Published: Tuesday, June 12, 2007

A young man in a white muscle shirt, giant sunglasses and a baseball cap floats silently down the Elbow River. He has a burning cigarette in one hand and a can of Kokanee in the other.

His baby blue dinghy is of the cheap Canadian Tire blow-up variety, with cartoon dolphins. He passes under the bridge and another dinghy appears upriver, this one carrying two young men. One is talking excitedly on a cellular phone, about dinner.

Elbow Drive is already crowded with convertibles, driven by the lucky ones who sneaked away early.
In lovely old neighbourhoods such as Kensington, above, Calgary feels remarkably similar to Edmonton.

Twenty blocks north, in the shiny office towers, the day's last few theoretical millions are being sucked out of Alberta's crust. On the banks of the river, not far from a cluster of hungry geese, three destitute men lie in the grass with their eyes closed, their two overflowing shopping carts parked in the shade of an elm tree.

This must mean something.

For more than 100 years, Edmontonians and Calgarians have become experts in making superficial observations and ridiculous judgments about each other. The rivalry between the cities, as fun as it can be in its sporting incarnation, has become tired and pathetic.

Calgarians see what they want to see in Edmonton, and vice-versa. Usually it's something doleful, which makes everyone feel better about their own hometowns and ultimately prevents them from engaging in a healthy dialogue about the possibility of urban renewal in Alberta. It also prevents them from travelling to each other's cities, just for fun.

For an Edmontonian to admit that Calgary's downtown is more attractive, its restaurants more elegant, that its zoo is amazing and its view of the Rockies enviable, would be an admission of failure.

Why?

The truth is, Edmonton and Calgary are both extraordinary and frustrating boomtowns of one million people, both ugly and pretty, both rich and poor, both redneck and sophisticated, separated by 275 kilometres.

An Edmontonian in Calgary can't help noticing that once you're in the core, in the lovely historic neighbourhoods north and south of downtown, the cities even feel remarkably similar.

Of course, there are fundamental cultural differences. Irony, neurosis and even self-loathing are stitched into the great bosom of Edmonton. Calgary, by contrast, has a marketable cowboy theme and a spanky slogan in Heart of the New West.

Without passing any city ordinances or doping the water supply, it has become perfectly acceptable to claim that Calgary has the best theatre scene, the best wine merchants, the best opera, the best restaurants, the best blue jeans, the best buskers, the best cupcakes and the best-looking people on Earth.

Calgarians point out the new German imports on their streets with a tone of astonished pride, as though every new millionaire were a shared success. It's not possible to get through a day without hearing that building cranes are "the official bird of Calgary."

Bad traffic, horrible service and wacky real estate prices have become folk tales, proof that Calgary is a big city now, even when it all doesn't seem nearly so extreme when you're actually on Memorial Drive or looking at a house in Kensington.

But something new and exciting and distinct is happening in Calgary today.

Aggressive boosterism is on the wane, along with the city's automatic tendency to vote against its interests in a block with rural Alberta. Real Calgarians, the ones who aim to stay after the boom, sense an opportunity that reaches beyond personal wealth. They're testing what they mean by "world class."

Since November, a retired oil executive named David Matthews has been holding informal lunch-hour think-tanks at La Chaumiere, a classic French restaurant on 17th Avenue.

Matthews goes through the newspaper and the phone book, and invites smart and influential people -- politicians and writers and business leaders, academics and architects and planners.

"I do sometimes think: what am I doing in this city?" he says, with a hint of a British accent, during one of his pleasant mini-salons. "Especially after having been to Europe on vacation, say.

"But the place grows on me. The city has so much potential, enormous potential, but we keep screwing it up. We need to get beyond roads and interchanges and potholes and garbage."

Matthews hopes the think-tank will transform into action at the end of June, to help elect a "few visionaries" to city council in October. He says people sometimes accuse him of being insane, as he always pays the bill at the end of the meal. "Calgary's been very good to me, and I'd like to give something back," he says. "I think we can make a very special town of this."

One of Matthew's regular guests is Bob van Wegen, a soft-spoken community activist and board member of the Calgary Heritage Initiative. He laments Calgary's No. 1 challenge, that too many people come to the city hoping to make a pile of dough and leave.

"They aren't necessarily coming here for an urban experience," he says. "They'll arrive from rural places in Saskatchewan or the Maritimes, or from similar cities like Dallas or Houston, and they're happy to buy a ranch house in the 'burbs. And a lot of people, even lifelong Calgarians, are attracted to the natural but not the physical environment.

"Why do you live in Calgary? To be close to the mountains."

This is vexing to a growing number of Calgarians focused on planning and sustainability and architecture and the arts. The constantly expanding fringes of the city suck money and energy from the city, as a reality and as a concept, and prevent Calgarians from engaging in a meaningful way with Calgary.

"Summer weekends in Kensington are the worst time of the year for the locals," says Marcello di Cintio, an award-winning travel writer who grew up in Calgary and remains here. "The tourists from the suburbs are in to see what a real neighbourhood looks like."

Di Cintio is part of a bright new generation of writers and thinkers desperate to rethink and remake Calgary, to discover what they love best about the city -- neighbourhood funk, puppet theatre, a spirit of experimentation, sandstone -- and explode it.

Not that there isn't momentum to go along with the constructive criticism. One of the greatest urban developments in recent Canadian history, Garrison Woods, transformed an abandoned army barracks into a central village of condominiums, brownstone-style townhomes, duplexes and houses.

On June 1, the city unfurled its plans for a brave and transformative 14-block downtown cultural district.

Kensington, Inglewood, Bridgeland and other inner-city neighbourhoods provide dense, colourful, authentic and tree-lined alternatives to freeways, manicured lawns and vinyl siding.

The Bow, a spectacular office tower to be built by EnCana, has sparked a renewed interest in downtown and the ways in which an architectural project can represent the hopes and dreams and shifting identity of a city and its people.

On their dinghys, the young men float through Calgary-Elbow, Ralph Klein's former riding, adjacent to the Mercedes convertibles and the men who live out of shopping carts. Today's byelection in the riding could be a political catalyst in the city's social, cultural and physical transformation. Or not.

Either way, for the first time in a generation, Calgary is fully awake to its potential. Edmontonians must stop skipping the city on their way to Kananaskis and Banff.

Really, it's OK to love Calgary.

tbabiak@thejournal.canwest.com

- - -

Get More

Go to www.edmontonjournal.com for Todd's audio slideshow of Calgary, Calgary Herald columnist Val Fortney's column on Edmonton, and a reader poll.


© The Edmonton Journal 2007

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[feepa]

If Calgary's a victim of anything, it's a victim of its own success
Bronconnier's whine about Stelmach convincing as Paris Hilton's rehab

Gary Lamphier, The Edmonton Journal
Published: Tuesday, June 12, 2007

I've never resented Calgary's oil and gas riches. In fact, I've long admired the city's swagger and entrepreneurial smarts.

When it comes to civic boosterism and urban myth-making, there's much that Edmonton -- and its myopic municipal neighbours -- could learn from their supremely confident cousin to the south.

But Calgary Mayor Dave Bronconnier's self-serving campaign to portray Alberta's wealthiest city as a poor, downtrodden victim of the unfeeling, uncaring Stelmach government is something straight out of a Monty Python flick.

I mean, c'mon. Calgary as victim? You're kidding, right? Are we talking about the same Calgary that effectively ran the premier's office in this province for 28 of the past 36 years, and 13 of the past 14?

Now that's rich. Only a flak for (boo hoo) Paris Hilton could come up with spin like that. Or a southern Alberta Liberal mayor in a province run by a northern Alberta Tory premier on the eve of two provincial by-elections.

Last time I checked, Alberta's biggest city had more newly minted millionaires than any city in Canada. More than a quarter of Canada's 100 best-paid CEOs live in Calgary, home to just three per cent of the nation's population.

Suncor CEO Rick George alone pocketed $15.5 million in 2006, topping the combined incomes of Edmonton's eight best-paid corporate bosses.

As the breathless national press has told us time and again, Calgary is a city where Ferraris, Lamborghinis and Maseratis adorn the driveways of million-dollar homes, and where every self-respecting, thirtysomething oilpatch VP owns a half-million-dollar ski pad in Canmore.

A Calgary analyst I know told me last year there were 10,000-plus brokerage house accounts in his city with assets of $1 million or more. That's roughly one for every 100 Calgarians.

Sales of Calgary homes worth $1 million or more soared nearly 40 per cent over the past year, according to a city realtor. Average prices for single-detached homes are now approaching half a million bucks.

Median household incomes and economic growth rates in Calgary have ranked at or among the highest in Canada for years. Unemployment levels are usually the lowest for any major city.

Sales of high-end condos are so hot that one new project located near Calgary Tower -- with units priced from $840,000 to $3.5 million -- recently sold out in a single day.

Calgary's LRT system puts Edmonton's to shame. The city's roadways are a pleasure to drive compared to Edmonton's, which look as if they've been riddled with artillery fire by the U.S. Air Force.

Calgary sprouts shiny new office towers the way Edmonton sprouts ugly graffiti. EnCana vows that its new monument to itself will rank as the tallest, most grandiose office tower in Western Canada.

Edmonton hasn't had a new downtown office tower in, what, 17 years. That's three years before (former Calgary mayor) Ralph Klein became premier.

(Of course, Calgary's favourite son can't be blamed for any of the city's current problems, even if his laissez-faire approach to oilsands development and his hands-off approach to royalties are the two biggest reasons why Calgary is suffering the strains of growth.

Why, Bronconnier even named a city park after King Ralph.)

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah. Calgary, if this is what pain looks like, feel free to spread it around, especially among your neighbours to the north. We could use some of that.

As my colleague Sheila Pratt has noted, despite all evidence to the contrary, Calgarians now seem convinced that dad really does like Edmonton best. As the spin goes, E-town now gets more of everything from Stelmach's Tories, including more dough for city projects.

Forget that the proposed $200-million remake of Edmonton's Royal Alberta Museum has been delayed, or that NAIT's expansion plans got the snub, or that plans for a redesign of Edmonton's legislature precinct were ditched.

And forget the fact that Calgary actually has more cabinet ministers (three) than Edmonton, which has just one. No matter.

Calgary is now a victim. That's the new mantra. The proof? Seems that uncaring, unfeeling Stelmach and his (largely rural, unsophisticated) cronies attached unwanted strings to the $1.4 billion in annual infrastructure funding for Alberta's towns and cities, including Calgary.

It's so wrong. So insensitive to Calgary's special needs. This has to end.

Well, you get the picture. The Calgary tribe, my friends, has spoken. It's clear how this episode of Survivor will end. Ed, your days on this island are numbered.

Todd Hirsch has a new gig. The erudite former chief economist at Canada West Foundation is now a senior economist with Edmonton-based ATB Financial, the province's largest homegrown bank.

In his new role, Hirsch will speak for ATB on provincial and national economic issues. He'll continue to be based in Calgary.

glamphier@thejournal.canwest.com
© The Edmonton Journal 2007

[feepa]

Edmonton and Calgary: Alberta's two solitudes
After decades of bitter rivalry, more unites than divides the two urban centres

Todd Babiak, The Edmonton Journal
Published: Tuesday, June 12, 2007

The rivalry between Edmonton and Calgary is dead. We're a corridor now, an economic zone -- the second-richest in the world, after Luxembourg, apparently.

Hockey will always be hockey, but old stereotypes have faded: Edmonton has grown in financial power while Calgary has become more of a cultural centre.

Yet we don't know each other. As urban explorers, Edmontonians and Calgarians are bound by a preference for Vancouver, New York or Paris. It's easier to rely on old-fashioned biases than to arrive at an accurate representation of our sister city. As Vladimir Lenin, never a philosophical icon in these parts, said, "A lie told often enough becomes the truth."

The relationship between Edmonton and Calgary, during the post-Lougheed era, was a mess of true lies. Crawling out of a recession into our current state of overheated madness came with plenty of civic character assassination.

Now that we're in a post-post-Lougheed era, with desperate growth issues leading the two cities and their citizens into a political, economic and cultural bloc, a place called Urban Alberta, it's time to peer between the truths and the lies.

"There's a real desire in this community to demonstrate a new look," says Bob McPhee, general director and CEO of the nationally acclaimed Calgary Opera, and a former Edmontonian. "It's more than just cowboys."

After all, the Stampede lasts for only 10 days. The core of Calgary, like the core of Edmonton, is a beautiful and diverse and increasingly cosmopolitan place -- especially in the summertime. And Calgary is moving out of its time of triumphalism into a much more thoughtful, and realistic, phase of physical and cultural growth.

tbabiak@thejournal.canwest.com

A TALE OF TWO CITIES

Today, we start a six-part series with the Calgary Herald as writers from both newspapers swap cities for a day.

Edmonton and Calgary have grown in size and sophistication, especially in the past couple of years, and in this joint project we'll give our readers a fresh look at the biggest centres in our booming province.

Today: Columnist Todd Babiak

July 10: City columnist Scott McKeen

Aug. 14: Food writer Judy Schultz

Sept. 11: Sports columnist Dan Barnes

Oct. 9: Culture writer Liz Nicholls

Nov. 13: Business columnist Gary Lamphier


© The Edmonton Journal 2007

--30--

[feepa]

Our town as seen by their town
Lesson No. 1: humble Edmontonians shrink from 'world class' status

Val Fortney, Calgary Herald
Published: Tuesday, June 12, 2007

It is a city in the midst of an economic boom, with all the good and bad that entails.

Its population, with a footprint bigger than Toronto or Chicago, has hit the million mark. Jobs are everywhere and people are flocking from all over the country to capitalize on the prosperity. Housing prices are in the stratosphere, homelessness and urban crime are growing problems and a shortage of service workers means you can't get a decent cup of coffee to save your life.

Oh, and everybody's ticked off about all the potholes.

Calgary, you say? Try Edmonton, just 275 kilometres up the QEII.

Ask a random sampling of Calgarians, and they'll variously describe Edmonton as the capital of our province, the city with North America's largest shopping mall and cold winters without the respite of chinooks.

It's a government town, a blue-collar town, a cultural, festival-rich town; and it's a place that some of us in Cowtown love to loathe.

Other than these famed characteristics and a few outmoded stereotypes, how well do we know our urban neighbours to the north? This writer, for one, confesses to a woeful ignorance of the place that once served as a major stopping point on the way to the Klondike Gold Rush.

So I welcomed the opportunity to spend a few days exploring the city's nooks and crannies -- watching a play in the famed Old Strathcona theatre district, enjoying a stroll through the verdant North Saskatchewan River valley, and dining in a handful of its more popular restaurants.

To get to the heart of the Edmontonian character, though, such short-term casual observance must be guided by those who know and love it best, leaders in the community whose work has helped to shape and inform the city's distinct -- albeit hard to uncover -- true character.

So, what's the first lesson you learn when talking to an Edmontonian about what makes the city a great place to live?

Don't dare utter such Calgary-style terms as "world class." Unless, of course, you want to be greeted with a raised eyebrow or a sarcastic chuckle.

"People here aren't really big on boasting," says Holger Peterson as he cuts into a salmon filet at Il Portico, a downtown dining spot that not long ago received a rave review in the New York Times.

"The longtime Edmontonians I know like to keep the city, and its great qualities, a secret."

© The Edmonton Journal 2007

--30--

[240glt]

Today, we start a six-part series with the Calgary Herald as writers from both newspapers swap cities for a day.

Edmonton and Calgary have grown in size and sophistication, especially in the past couple of years, and in this joint project we'll give our readers a fresh look at the biggest centres in our booming province

This aught'a generate some interesting comments....

Thank god it's not the Sun papers doing this

[codeman9669]

/\ Here is the full article from the Herald:

Perfect strangers
Val Fortney, Calgary Herald
Published: Monday, June 11, 2007
Edmonton -

It is a city in the midst of an economic boom, with all the good and bad that entails.

Its population, with a footprint bigger than Toronto or Chicago, has now hit the million mark. Jobs are everywhere and people are flocking from all over the country to capitalize on the prosperity. Housing prices are in the stratosphere, homelessness and urban crime is a growing problem and a shortage of service workers means you can't get a decent cup of coffee to save your life. Oh, and everybody's ticked off about all the potholes.

Ask a random sampling of Calgarians, and they'll variously describe Edmonton as the capital of our province, the city with North America's largest shopping mall and cold winters without the respite of Chinooks. It's a government town, a blue-collar town, a cultural, festival-rich town; and it's a place a few folks in Cowtown love to loathe.

Other than these famed characteristics and a few outmoded stereotypes, how well do we know our urban neighbours to the north? This writer, for one, confesses to a woeful ignorance of the place that once served as a major stopping point on the way to the Klondike Gold Rush.

So I welcomed the opportunity to spend a few days exploring the city's nooks and crannies - watching a play in the famed Old Strathcona theatre district, enjoying a stroll through the verdant North Saskatchewan River valley that bisects the city and dining in a handful of its more popular restaurants.

To get to the heart of the Edmontonian character, though, such short-term casual observance must be aided by those who know and love it best, leaders in the community whose work has helped to shape and inform the city's distinct, albeit hard-to-undercover, true character.

So, what's the first lesson you learn when talking to an Edmontonian about what makes his or her city a great place to live?

Don't dare utter such Calgary-style terms as "world-class." Unless, of course, you want to be greeted with a raised eyebrow or a sarcastic chuckle.

"People here aren't really big on boasting," says Holger Peterson as he cuts into a salmon filet at Il Portico, a downtown dining spot that not long ago received a rave review in the New York Times. Yes, that New York Times.

"The longtime Edmontonians I know like to keep the city, and its great qualities, a secret."

Peterson has lived here since 1958, when he arrived at age eight with his German immigrant parents. He's worked with the radio station CKUA since the 1960s and in 1976 launched his own very successful roots music record label, Stony Plains Records.

The well-travelled Peterson could have based his business anywhere. But he chose Edmonton.

"I just never felt motivated to leave," he says with a shrug of his shoulders.

When prodded, he does eventually begin to articulate what's so special about his city.

"The size works for me, and the river valley is beautiful," says the man who became a Member of the Order of Canada in 2003 for his groundbreaking work on the country's music scene.

"We have cuisine, culture, touring artists - we're not lacking in anything."

Peterson's reticence about waxing euphoric over his city's virtues, I soon discover, is a trait common amongst even the proudest citizens.

Knowing this made interviewing Stewart Lemoine about why he loves this town a much less painful experience than it could have been.

The prolific playwright/director/producer and mainstay of the city's theatre scene sits in a coffee shop looking out on to Whyte Avenue, the funky inner-city strip filled with boutique hotels, chic restaurants and eclectic shops.

"We've been labelled a cultural capital, by someone," says the longtime Edmontonian with a quiet sigh as he refers to his home's designation as Festival City.

"It's nice to have that acknowledged, but no one really knows what that means."

Lemoine, though, is the first to say there's no better place for an artist to live and ply his craft. "It's all about the freedom; I live here because I want to produce plays for myself," he says.

"This city has a great talent pool, and our audience here is incredible."

Lemoine readily admits that Edmonton lacks a clear identity that you can wrap up in a tidy promotional package, but dismisses that as a non-issue.

"People come here and say we're unpretentious because the place is unremarkable," says Lemoine, who in a rare moment of hyperbole likens the river valley to New York's Central Park.

"But we don't worry about our status - we're too busy thinking about other things."

When an Edmontonian does lapse into a brief moment of boastfulness, it's usually about the river valley and the winding North Saskatchewan that weaves its way through the city and its environs.

For Vivian Manasc, it's more than an asset: it's the key symbol of the city's very essence.

"The river valley makes this city so livable," says one of the principals of Manasc-Isaac Architects, a company renowned for its work in sustainable design.

"You can live in the most affluent or the most modest neighbourhood, and still be close to the river valley."

Manasc, a native of Montreal, came to Edmonton in the 1970s and was quickly hooked. "It was boom time, then and now, and so much of what we do is driven by growth," she says.

This isn't to say she doesn't see room for improvement in her city. Like Calgary, she says, Edmonton has an unfortunate history of not respecting its historical buildings; its downtown, she adds, has too many vacant lots and not enough "walkability"; attention to good public architecture hasn't been a priority; and urban sprawl is just as big an issue here as it is in Calgary.

But things are improving. "Urban design in Edmonton has finally got some political backing," she says, noting Mayor Stephen Mandel has put a much-needed focus on this and other urban issues.

Mandel is indeed thinking about a lot of things besides Edmonton's lack of a clear brand. "Throw on a cowboy hat, and that's Calgary," says the city's mayor of three years.

"Edmonton has struggled for years, but we're getting more confident with our identity."

Mandel sees Calgary and Edmonton as being two very different, but complementary, cities. "One of the real dilemmas of this province is that both Calgary and Edmonton have inferiority complexes," he says as he relaxes in his palatial city hall office.

"We're competitive with one another, and that's unhealthy. What we need to do is work together now, to build a great province."

He acknowledges that the two cities share many of the same boom time challenges - public transportation is one of his big concerns - but there are some that are unique to Edmonton. For instance, the population of one million is derived from what's known as the Alberta Capital Region, which consists of Edmonton proper along with 23 surrounding, sometimes warring, municipalities.

"You'll be having the same challenges we're having in this now, in about 10 years, with places like Airdrie and Okotoks," he says of the often-frustrating experience of trying to build consensus.

He's quick to point to Edmonton assets like its wealth of educational institutions in the city's core, its cultural offerings and its leadership in the life sciences field.

"We're a city of the future, with a great cultural scene," says Mandel, in this columnist's first encounter with anything remotely resembling Edmonton-style boosterism.

Rachel Notley is another typical understated Edmontonian, but admits she's been an ambassador for her hometown while living in other major Canadian cities.

"There are low expectations from people outside of Edmonton about our city," says the politician set to replace Raj Pannu as the New Democrat standard-bearer for Edmonton-Strathcona.

"Edmonton is the pleasant surprise."

Along with her city's more diverse political landscape - "if Edmonton were a city state, we would have had three different governments in the last 20 years" - the native Edmontonian loves its down-to-earth collective character.

"I think it's because so many here still have strong rural roots," says the lawyer daughter of the late ND politician Grant Notley over lunch at Caf Select, an Edmonton dining institution. "That brings with it a lack of pretense."

Lack of pretense, indeed. We Calgarians have a lot in common with this other urban Alberta centre. We share many of the same challenges, and, for the most part, we fiercely love our cities.

Just don't expect our northerly neighbours to shout their love from the rooftops.

It's just not the Edmonton way.

vfortney@theherald.canwest.com




© Calgary Herald 2007

[Coldrsx]

great articles that are some of the best ive read from visiting authors.

[Bigtime]

Great articles, well except for that second one that just smacks of more whining. I like how fair and open all the others are approaching the subject of our two cities and how we traditionally interacted with each other, versus how that is changing(for the better!).

[Calgarian]

It's about time Calgary and Edmonton start working together. :tup:

[Coldrsx]

^no friggen kidding, well to some extent.

Edmonton and Calgary are so similar it is funny.

[manny]

It's about time Calgary and Edmonton start working together. :tup:


I totally agree. I was born and raised a Calgarian and am very proud of this city. I also enjoy going up to Edmonton and enjoying all that great city has too offer - and trust me folks it has lots to offer. I always have a good time in Edmonton. Its about time Edmonton starting enjoying in all the benefits of Alberta's boom.

I recently made the mistake of moving to BC for three years, the Okanagan Valley, thinking that was the place to be. Well I'm back in Alberta where I plan to stay. Aside from the weather, Alberta has BC beat hands down. The big open prairie sky, the free entrepreneurial spirit, the self reliant attitude, small government that's not in your face every two steps, a more humble attitute - unlike BC where they honestly believe they are Canada's answer to California with the attitude to go with it. You may think the cost of living is high in Alberta, you should try BC on for size - hmmmm - BC - "Bring Cash" - as I fondly refer to it as.

Calgary and Edmonton have a lot in common, and a lot of differences that compliment each other. I hope the old days of rivalry are gone (to the point, at least, where we stop 'literally' disliking one another).

Maybe - hee, hee - we can actually start to dislike Vancouver. They actually believe they are better than us - major attitude there!! Aside from the weather, Calgary and Edmonton have just as much to offer, if not more. I'll take Calgary's skyline over Vancouver's anyday. Vancouver, in my opinion, has some of the ugliest architecture. It's city planning and road system pale in comparison to Calgary or Edmonton. Maybe its time we started putting those folks, in Vancouver, in there place - hee, hee.

[Daver]

^no friggen kidding, well to some extent.

Edmonton and Calgary are so similar it is funny.

Hardly! though politically they are merging

[feepa]

Hardly! though politically they are merging

I disagree with you, and agree with cold

(look ma, whitenoise)

[Wooster]

Tale of Two Cities: Never a dull moment in Edmonton

Festivals are the lifeblood of this leafy, artsy city

Stephen Hunt, Calgary Herald
Published: Tuesday, July 10, 2007

The first thing you notice about Edmonton is the trees. There are lots of them, in fact more than almost any other city in North America -- beautiful, healthy elm trees that make Edmonton streets that much more walkable.

The second thing you notice is the action.

When we -- me, my wife Melanee and four-year-old son Gus -- arrive in Edmonton, in the middle of a Wednesday afternoon in late June, Whyte Avenue is buzzing. There are lots of people out walking, hanging out in cafes and bars, or shopping at one of the vintage clothes shops or boutiques that are everywhere around Whyte Avenue these days.

Pulling over to ask directions to our hotel, we discover a burly, short guy wearing khaki shorts, with a live iguana draped around his neck like a living boa.

"The Met Hotel is one block back, next to the Mexican restaurant," he says cheerfully, without waking his drowsy reptile.

"Is there something going on today?" asks Melanee, who grew up in Baltimore and has lived in Washington, D.C., and New York and loves crowded streets full of people.

Actually, on any given day from June through September in Edmonton, there is.

There's the Fringe, the granddaddy of the North American fringe theatre circuit, the Folk Music Festival (Aug. 9-12), one of the biggest and best in the country, an international jazz festival (June 22-July 1), the Works Art and Design Festival, the International Street Performers Festival (July 6-15), A Taste of Edmonton (July 19-28) and the River City Shakespeare Festival (June 26-July 22), which started out 19 years ago when a bunch of acting grads from the University of Alberta decided to perform some Shakespeare and split the proceeds as a way of creating summer jobs for themselves. From those humble beginnings, it has grown into a full-blown four-week long event performed at the Heritage Amphitheatre in Hawrelak Park, presenting theatre that doesn't concern itself with our short attention span issues.

This summer, they're doing a breezy musical adaptation of Shakespeare's comedy Two Gentlemen of Verona (it won the 1972 Tony for Best Musical), and the drama A Winter's Tale.

"I don't want to dumb it down," says River City's artistic director John Kirkpatrick, who, as it turns out, actually spent as much of the past year acting in Calgary (he appeared in Of Mice and Men at Theatre Calgary and The Age of Arousal and The Drowning Bird at ATP's Playrites). "I just want to do the plays, and have the people come out and see this incredible group of actors who have matured as a company, many of them for much of those 19 years." One of River City's biggest fans, it turns out, is Julian Mayne, the new executive director of the Edmonton Fringe Festival, which last year presented 141 different productions that were attended by 77,000 Fringegoers.

"The Shakespeare Fest is now coming up really strong," Mayne says. "I've seen the Two Gentlemen of Verona. It's very cool. It is like Godspell . . . my wife (who's on the River City board) was telling me that there was a fellow who had come in from New York and had just, on the off-chance, gone down to see this (A Winter's Tale) and he was just ranting and raving and saying, 'I don't mean to be pompous or anything, but this rivals the Shakespeare they're doing in New York.' So he was coming back the next night to see Two Gents." As for the Fringe, Mayne, who has spent close to 30 years working with almost every major cultural group and institution in Edmonton, faces the opposite problem of most festival directors: too much festival and, thanks to the revitalization of the Whyte Avenue district, nowhere to grow it.

Instead, the Fringe has created Bring-Your-Own-Venue, where the performer creates the theatre as well as the production. This year, the Fringe has centralized ticket distribution. Rather than paying cash at the venue on the day of the show, Fringers will now be able to go online and buy tickets two weeks in advance, then pick up their tickets at one of 16 outlets set up to distribute them during the festival. BYOV performers, who are liable to be anywhere in the city, are still able to link into the ticket distribution network.

No walls, no lights, no proscenium arch? No problem.

Speaking of Bring Your Own Venue, try hanging art in one. That was pretty much the setup for The Works Art and Design Festival, which was located downtown, in Churchill Square and at a variety of nearby venues, including the library, the Sutton Place Hotel and even in the middle of the park, where a series of 3.6-metre high aluminum foil statues were created by artist Edmund Haakonson.

The one constant for The Works and many other summer festivals is Churchill Square, which plays host to at least four of them (The Works, Street Performers, Taste of Edmonton and CariWest) during the summer.

"People are finally understanding that they can come to Churchill Square and be a part of the Works Festival," says Michelle Gass, a Works spokesperson. "This space (Churchill Square) gets lots and lots of use." Across from Churchill Square is the Maclab Theatre inside the Citadel, a gorgeous bowl that's one of the premier venues for the Edmonton Jazz Festival, which ended July 1. On this night, Jazz Festival director Kent Sangster's Juno-nominated Octet plays some mean tango music and are followed onstage by Montreal's Oliver Jones, a seventysomething contemporary of Oscar Peterson who dazzles the crowd of about 500 who attend the show.

I've been driving all day and feel tired, but hanging out in the atrium-like lobby of the Citadel -- which features a wall of water, lots of skylights opening the hall out into the dusky summer night, and even more trees -- washes away those Highway 2 Blues.

The next morning, I stumble out onto Whyte Avenue, and set off for a jog. Ten minutes later, I'm running through the campus of the University of Alberta. Even cooler, the neighbourhood I'm running through is Garneau, now a literary landmark thanks to Journal Culture columnist Todd Babiak's Giller Prize-nominated novel The Garneau Block, a novel that was partly about the search for the mythic identity Edmonton allegedly lacks.

How about this? Edmonton's festivals are its identity.

"All of these festivals came out of that Summerfest back in the late '70s when the Alberta government and Lougheed -- we actually had Alberta Culture, a department that was by itself that focused on promoting the arts in Alberta," says Mayne. "There was a ton of money that was going in and it all started then. All of these festivals started out of that money. We feel a real kinship to that, and there's a good respect between all of the major festivals in Edmonton." The next thing I know, I've discovered a long set of wooden stairs that lead down into a forest. When I come to the bottom, it turns out to be part of the river valley, which is the biggest single green space of any city park anywhere -- the river valley is like having 22 interconnected Central Parks right in the middle of your city. There are a few runners and cyclists down here, but the overall feeling is that here is a city where you can, if you want, get completely away from everyone. Then, in 10 minutes, find yourself right back in the middle of the action, without so much as having to park a car. The river valley is the city equivalent of having a secret identity. Of course, the secret is there, for everyone to see. You just have to be able to see the city for the trees.


calgaryherald.com

[Wooster]

Hard not to bow down to Cowtown

Scott McKeen, Edmonton Journal
Published: Tuesday, July 10, 2007

It's hot as a pistol in Calgary. Cowboy hats and string ties are everywhere, this being the start of Stampede. I'm in a T-shirt, jacket and dapper driving cap. A sore-thumb Edmontonian in Cowtown.

My day starts like this: Wait for a cab; wait some more for a cab; finally ride in cab; leave cellphone in cab; spend next hour trying to retrieve cellphone. Calgarians who hear of my plight are sympathetic, helpful.

I was raised with a grudge -- a childish dislike for Calgary and stereotypes about its arrogance, pretence and Yankee sensibility. Yet what do I discover here but a crisp, yet soulful beauty in its urban geography.

There is a man fishing from the rocks in the late afternoon heat.

His flyline arcs elegantly back and forth, then lands in this, one of the world's famed trout rivers.

It's a weekday afternoon, so the man has the place to himself. The river is absent other anglers or a parade of rafters floating by with bellies saluting the sun.

People enjoying Prince's Island Park with the River Cafe in the background.
Leah Hennel, Calgary Herald

In the immediate background are glass-and-steel, pastel-coloured towers. Just to the west is a funky urban village. A short walk to the east gets you to a manicured, postcard-perfect island park, home to a world-class restaurant.

And I'm an envious Edmontonian in Calgary. Edmonton likes to think its river valley is a jewel - and it is. But there are jewels and there are gems, just as there are apples and oranges.

You first take note of the river itself. The Bow River is emerald green, not murky brown. It flows out of Bow Glacier, through Banff, to Canmore and then Calgary, on its route to the South Saskatchewan River.

In 1875, Fort Calgary was established by the Northwest Mounted Police at the confluence of the Bow and Elbow rivers. The story goes that in 1925 a truck broke down. The truck was carrying 45,000 brown trout fingerlings. To save the fish, they were set free in the Bow River.

Happy accident, it turns out, as nowadays something like 40 companies guide visiting anglers on these "blue ribbon" trout waters. The Bow River fishery contributes $30 million to the local economy. As if Calgary needs the money.

I start my day in Kensington Village, a stone's throw to the north from the Bow River. Edmontonians might imagine Whyte Avenue, if it were plunked down in the river valley.

Kensington is all cafes, tea houses, boutiques, restaurants and galleries. It's a haunt of Calgary's counterculture, judging by the mohawks and neon hair. However, it is not - on this day at least - a mecca for street people.

I see one man sleeping on a sidewalk. But in an hour of walking, not once am I panhandled. Are they being bused north?

It is a short walk back to the Bow. I cross under the LRT line. Footbridges here are smaller, closer to the water.

At the south bank I head east towards this Eau Claire Market that I've heard much about. I reach it, walk around it and ... am completely unimpressed. I find out later that much of the market is inside. An inside mall, downtown? Sorry, but that's just wrong. I've seen a bit too much of such places in my life.

Back towards the Bow I go, in search of more soulful environs. Not that the Bow is all birdsong and beauty. There is debate and danger here, too. More than a few rafters have died in the water vortex created by a weir near the zoo.

The Bow itself is in peril, according to scientists. Careless development upstream and the galloping demands and discharges of booming Calgary threaten the Bow's long-term viability.

It needs careful stewardship. That much is obvious to a visitor's eye. Calgary must not take its gem for granted.

From Eau Claire I head over another quaint footbridge and head into Prince's Island Park. It is only one of a number of parks and amenities on the river - including the Calgary Zoo - most of them connected by the Bow River Pathway.

Prince's Island Park is like walking through an expansive English garden, with its flower baskets, vintage lighting and manicured lawns. This, just a short walk from the honk and hustle of Calgary's downtown.

My destination is the River Cafe, nestled next to a lagoon on the downtown side of the island. The River Cafe occupies a building that was once a park concession, like the one in Edmonton's Hawrelak Park.

I can almost hear Edmonton's river-valley protectionists turning up their noses at the idea of a private restaurant in a city park.

My nose, at the moment, is engaged in sniffing a nice glass of Pinot Noir. That is, when it's not poised over a menu describing such culinary delights as wild prairie pickerel with spinach ravioli, tomato green bean salad and cucumber crme frache.

The pickerel makes a sumptuous meal, especially when it's followed by a closer of maple wild-rice pudding with saskatoon-berry compote and homemade fruit jellies.

The food and wine list are award-winning at the River Cafe. But it is the locale that will stick in the memory. I am seated on a rustic patio, under a darkening sky, looking beyond a curtain of aspen at geese on the lagoon.

At one point, a server carries a wicker basket of bug spray to each table on the patio, as if offering aperitifs. The River Cafe is at once elegant and pragmatic.

It is dark now and I wander south. I am soon in the canyons between towers of glass. The short walk from the river to downtown is appreciated by an Edmontonian. No huff-and-puff inclines to endure in order to reach a watering hole or sidewalk cafe.

Calgary is blessed in part by the geography of a flat valley, as well as a clear, freestone river full of silvery trout. But Calgary also made the decision to allow shops, bars and boutiques to nestle next to the Bow.

Edmonton is always comparing itself to Calgary. And vice versa. Is Calgary's river and developed river valley better than Edmonton's?

I suppose that is a matter of taste. Let's say that Calgary's river and river valley are different.

No, that's not fair. Calgary's river and river valley are truly fabulous. No use denying it.

smckeen@thejournal.canwest.com

[Surrealplaces]

Both good articles Josh. too bad these articles didn't show up in newspapers of other cities around Canada. I don't think enough people realize the good points of the cities.

[Calgarian]

Thanks Josh, good articles. How long is this series going on for?

[ExcaliburKid]

I think this goes on for 5 months, starting in June. One trade-off per month between both papers

[Riise]

"I do sometimes think: what am I doing in this city?" he says, with a hint of a British accent, during one of his pleasant mini-salons. "Especially after having been to Europe on vacation, say.

"But the place grows on me. The city has so much potential, enormous potential, but we keep screwing it up. We need to get beyond roads and interchanges and potholes and garbage."

Wow, it's like they interviewed me!

[tkoe]

Maybe I am trying to paddle upstream on this one, but I thought Stephen Hunt's article missed the whole point. His article read like a 'What's On' for summer in Edmonton and I don't think the fact that we have festivals is a huge revelation for the people of Calgary. I suppose it would be like Scott McKeen writing about a little known event called the Stampede. Playing off stereotypes is shorthand for lazy journalism.

I don't think that 'Edmonton's festivals are its identity' -- that is a glib interpretation. My feeling is that Edmonton's festivals are product of our communities, which ARE something worth writing about. Edmonton's community spirit is the reason why events, large and small, are viable and well supported in our city -- it isn't provincial money, hoards of international tourists or because we just love festivals so damn much. One just has to look to our network community leagues, our innovative public school system and or cutting-edge health authority to truly see how our communities support the unique nature of our city and make us who we are.

Whatever, I suppose 'discovering' Prince's Island isn't much different...

[Caesar555]

Both very good articles. New to Calgary, I am impressed by Prince's Island and Stephen Avenue. Great places to hang out and get away from the bustle of downtown Calgary. I do miss the river valley in Edmonton, the green, and the festivals though.
Both cities have a lot to offer. The same in many ways, but still different...

[IntotheWest]

^I don't agree necessarily with the "green" and tree comments though...not saying Edmonton isn't quite green - it is. But, Calgary is too - you just need to know where to look. Where Edmonton's River Valley is front and center, as a tourist (or new to the city) you'd have to go out of your way for a trip down some of the older streets - or Elbow Dr even - to see how plentiful trees can be in Calgary.

As well, though the bald Nose Hill sticks out like a sore thumb, there are relatively thick forests rolling through Fish Creek Prov Park - which cuts through the southern portion of the city...

And of course, Prince's Island to the Zoo is quite "green" as well.

River Cafe is still one of my favourite restaurants, period (if not my favourite). The setting just makes it that much better.

[bendecido]

^I don't agree necessarily with the "green" and tree comments though...not saying Edmonton isn't quite green - it is. But, Calgary is too - you just need to know where to look. Where Edmonton's River Valley is front and center, as a tourist (or new to the city) you'd have to go out of your way for a trip down some of the older streets - or Elbow Dr even - to see how plentiful trees can be in Calgary.

As well, though the bald Nose Hill sticks out like a sore thumb, there are relatively thick forests rolling through Fish Creek Prov Park - which cuts through the southern portion of the city...

And of course, Prince's Island to the Zoo is quite "green" as well.
Got to disagree with you on this one. After a million and one visits up to Edmonton, it dawned on me one day driving around just how many trees they had. The difference between Edmonton and Calgary is that many of Edmonton's roadways cut through actual forest, whereas all of Calgary's roadways have trees planted along them. To me there's no comparison.

[IntotheWest]

^Read my post again. Get off the roads and into something like Fish Creek - which spans across the entire width of the city in the south - is all natural.

I'm not trying to take away from Edm's stunning valley, or based on "tree count" who has more...my comment is Calgary's trees you have to look off the beaten-track for - not Deerfoot Tr.

[chuber]

When my Grandfather was alive, he used to tell us how when then came from Germany in the 60's they looked at Calgary but he said he hated all the 'elephant asses' in Calgary (bare brown hills) but loved all the forests around Edmonton and the river valley. Reminded him more of Germany which is why then ended up in Edmonton.

[Stephen Ave]

^It always amazes me when I see older pictures of Calgary. I haven't been here that long, but to me it's quite a green city. In fact Calgary seems to be much greener today than it was in 1998 when I moved here.

[Stephen Ave]

Got to disagree with you on this one. After a million and one visits up to Edmonton, it dawned on me one day driving around just how many trees they had. The difference between Edmonton and Calgary is that many of Edmonton's roadways cut through actual forest, whereas all of Calgary's roadways have trees planted along them. To me there's no comparison.

In established city areas the greenery isn't that much different between the two cities, and that's usually the case with all cities. In outer areas of the cities, Edmonton has more trees, but it also depends on where you are. If you're around some outer areas south and northwest it isn't much different. The river Valley is the areas that has the 'forests'.

To me Ottawa is greener than either city, when I first moved here I actually didn't notice any difference in greenery between Calgary and Edmonton until I took a closer look.

[Jay in Cowtown]

Trees?!? They'd just get in the way of our glorious view of the mountains , or our spectacular view of the soon to be 20 towers over 150 meters downtown. lol!

sorry Chuck, I still wouldn't mind your Stadium & Mall though!!!

[bendecido]

I'll take their stadium too, but you can have their tired old mall.
Back to trees... I agree with what you are saying Stephen Ave, but my only point was that there seems to be more density of forest (and roads going through them) in Ed. than Calgary. I'm Calgarian, so I'm not trying to be an Edmonton booster. I know we have Fish Creek and even south Glenmore park but overall, within the core of Edmonton, there are more trees. Seeing a lot of the Calgary threads I'm also amazed at how mature Calgary's trees have gotten and how green the city is looking. I miss Alberta in general.

[Surrealplaces]

I'll take their stadium too, but you can have their tired old mall.
Back to trees... I agree with what you are saying Stephen Ave, but my only point was that there seems to be more density of forest (and roads going through them) in Ed. than Calgary. I'm Calgarian, so I'm not trying to be an Edmonton booster. I know we have Fish Creek and even south Glenmore park but overall, within the core of Edmonton, there are more trees. Seeing a lot of the Calgary threads I'm also amazed at how mature Calgary's trees have gotten and how green the city is looking. I miss Alberta in general.

In general there are more trees in Edmonton, but in the cores of each city I don't actually see a big difference. With the exception of the river valley they aren't that different. Where you see less trees in Calgary is in the newer outlying areas, and the area where Calgary suffers the most from lack of trees is in the north central area where the Deerfoot comes into Calgary.

you would have seen a huge diffence between Calgary and Edmonton 50 years ago, when Calgary had almost no trees at all. Thankfully, the city has been getting greener over the last couple of decades.