Calgarians are being encouraged by the City of Calgary and advocates for the city’s parks to take one last chance to get outside this fall, and enjoy the more than 10,000 hectares of natural and outdoor spaces on offer.

Even for those Calgarians who do regularly use the parks and pathway system, there are a lot of new things to check out, say the city and Parks Foundation Calgary.

Among those new things is updated wayfinding signage, unveiled for the public at Dale Hodges Park on Nov. 1, and aims to help visitors better navigate and understand what makes that park different from many others in Calgary.

“I would say these signs are akin to the icing on the cake. They really allow folks to understand what they’re seeing,” said Kyle Ripley, Director of Parks and Open Spaces for the City of Calgary.

“Not everyone is a stormwater engineer or an artist or a landscape architect, and these signs really explain the engineering and the function behind what is really happening in the park and literally in the ground below them as they walk through the site.”

He said that those signs also serve as a way for Calgarians to begin conversations with each other, and about the natural environment.

“Through the interpretation, we get the opportunity for Calgarians to get that connection to certainly our heritage, but also to understand the natural connections as well.”

Ripley said that also means helping Calgarians find ways of using their parks outside of the summer season.

Those signs detail the park’s biology, including the plants, birds, and animal movements through the river valley throughout the year.

“Dale Hodges Park is a gem in our open space system. We have 5,700 hectares of parkland, just a massive, massive parkland, and this is just a jewel. It’s where we have nature storm water infrastructure, engineering infrastructure, and art and landscape architecture combined,” Ripley said.

“It’s a unique space for all of Calgary and all of Calgarians to come and see how stormwater can be managed in a very fascinating way.”

Take advantage of the fall season

Parks Foundation Calgary CEO Sheila Taylor echoed that message about Calgarians getting out to enjoy the remainder of the fall at parks throughout Calgary.

“Our message is that this is actually a great time to get outdoors. With daylight savings time coming this year, people will have an opportunity to get out earlier in the day,” she said.

“More and more we’re starting to see that big impact on people’s health—their mental health and wellness, that is coming from being out in nature. So, we hope that people will take this change of season to maybe get out and explore some new parks that they haven’t been to.”

Among those, she said, were some of the parks that the foundation had played a role in helping to build this year, but really any park in an effort to encourage people to get outside.

“Calgary has so much to offer, whether it’s recreational park options, or whether it’s that chance to truly escape and be part in nature. We have some of everything here right in our city. If it’s just staying in your neighbourhood, at the local playground, or maybe exploring a new nature park and trail,” Taylor said.

“We’ve got some special amenities online in the last few years that we feel like a really innovative, and we hope that Calgarians will maybe take a chance and try somewhere new.”

Chief among those was the city’s first mental health park, the Brawn Family Foundation Rotary Park, located next to The Summit but not limited to patients at that facility.

“It was specifically designed to support mental health recovery, but also lots of really cool features that are for teens like the largest climbing boulder in Calgary, that certainly is designed to challenge and be a lot of fun. That park also built in artistic elements, like the mural on the sport court and the hammocks that you’ll see nowhere else that were an award-winning design from Halifax,” Taylor said.

“It’s a very interesting and creative space, but also one that is trying to address some pretty hard-hitting problems in Calgary and supporting teen mental health.”

Another park was the West Confederation Park Pump Track, which has built on the work that the Parks Foundation has done to build other pump tracks across the city.

“The first one was probably about five years ago, that we built our first pump track project in South Glenmore Park. It continues to be the most visited pump track in Calgary. But we get massively good feedback on the West Confederation Park Pump Track,” said Taylor.

“I think one of the things that makes that one special is a real separation between the track that’s designed for young kids and another that’s designed for more experienced users. The setting itself is really beautiful and family-friendly, so it lends itself well to everyone coming out, even if you’re not on your bike or scooter.”

Taylor also said a good way to get around to all of the parks in the city was with the Rotary-Mattamy Greenway, which connects parks around the city through 138 kilometres of pathways.

“There’s a number of resources for helping people kind of get outside and be active because we have such a really well-connected trail system. I think that’s also a great way: get on your trail system, and you might be surprised to find all of the interesting things along the way,” she said.