The Calgary Municipal Land Corporation announced a major step towards the completion of north east portion of the East Village on November 30.
Parcels Q3 and Q4, which make up the remainder of the village’s Q block along 6 Street SE and 7 Avenue SE, are set to be developed by ONE Properties.
The firm is planning on transforming the plots into two mixed-use residential towers with homes for approximately 750 people. The street level of the towers will also be home to retail, food and beverage services.
“We’ve seen Calgary’s East Village thrive in recent years as more Calgarians look to live, work and play in the heart of downtown,” said Thomas Burr, Vice President of mixed-use developments for ONE Properties.
“Alongside CMLC, ONE looks forward to introducing even more options for Calgarians to be a part of this exciting, growing neighbourhood.”
Kate Thompson, President and CEO of CMLC said that she and CMLC were confident that ONE’s project would be a successful addition to the East Village.
“Having seen the success of ONE Properties’ other developments, including their BLVD Beltline project in The Culture and Entertainment District, we are confident that they will bring the same commitment to building well-designed, amenities-rich spaces in East Village,” Thompson said.
Clare LePan, CMLC Vice President for marketing and communications, said that the ONE Properties partnership, along with those of other developers that have been recently announced, signals the continued confidence in the development of the East Village.
“With this announcement, the announcement we made a few weeks ago with Minto Communities—and we expect that in 2023, there’s a couple of privately held parcels that we think are going to move forward as well—it really speaks to a confidence that developers are having in East Village to bring these projects forward,” she said.
“I think from our perspective, we’re keeping our foot on the gas so that we can continue to see these projects brought forward and surface parking lots turned into mixed use buildings, but we’re really proud of where the community is going and what’s been done today.”
Site an interesting one due to access to East Village amenities
Among the benefits for future residents living in the two towers will be the close proximity to many of the East Village's amenities, including the community garden, dog park, and RiverWalk.
LePan said that this was part of the way that the East Village was planned around giving different parts of the village different characteristics.
"When we first developed the master plan, there were character areas within the master plan which guided the different type of development that we would expect to see as you move through the community," she said.
"What was interesting about that, and the reason for the character areas, was because the East Village has these very distinct edges to it."
She said that the character for the new developments would be a sort of centre point between the northern portions surrounding the Simmon's Building and Bow River, and then the east edge amenities and Fort Calgary.
"It provides an interesting context for a mixed use project, and it changes the density sometimes a little bit because of its proximity to the river and Fort Calgary—it makes it a little bit more dynamic," LePan said.
Completion of Q and K blocks will connect The Riff from RiverWalk to 4 Street SE
Already partially complete, The Riff byway is a planned connector that cuts diagonally across the East Village from the top north east corner to the far south west along 4 Street SE.
The byway is part of CMLC's master plan to create dynamic ways of connecting pedestrians to different parts of the community.
"The Riff is a big part of it, in terms of the master plan vision, and so the Q block properties when they're complete, and that piece of The Riff is in place, it allows you to experience each different typology of the community as you walk down those diagonal corridors rather than traditional city blocks," said LePan.
"This will pull that together into what that original design intention was, when the master plan was created in 2009."
She said that the eventual goal for the entire length, once complete, is to create a space that can be used for pedestrian oriented events.
"Our neighbourhood association has hosted a couple of events in The Riff already, just to introduce the opportunity of that space a little bit, so it'll be great to see it when it's all fully built out into its completion."
