After several years of re-development, Eau Claire Plaza is set to reopen to Calgarians on July 2, with new features designed to become one of the most accessible park spaces in downtown Calgary.

The project, which cost $47 million, was part of an $86 million redevelopment of the Jaipur Bridge, Downtown Flood Barrier, and the Centre Street Pedestrian Ramps.

“Eau Claire Plaza is designed to be that iconic kind of postcard location in downtown Calgary. It connects the urban fabric of downtown to the natural environment of the Bow River, and we see that collision of urban in nature throughout the throughout the space,” said Dennis Hoffart, Project Manager with the City of Calgary.

The new plaza, which stretches from the north next to the Sheraton Suites hotel, to the west at what is now being called Market Street, and to the south to the Bow River pathway system.

Hoffart said that one of the largest components of the plaza was the urban podium space followed by the central green.

“That’s our large, open green space. People can relax there, day to day, grab a coffee, play bocce ball, throw Frisbee on the lunch hours or during those large events, it’s a space to expand that footprint and have a little bit more of a relaxed atmosphere off of the hard ground paving there,” he said.

Festivals already set to use Eau Claire Plaza

Hoffart said that the podium and green space have already been booked for festivals and cultural activities throughout the summer, starting with Mexifest on July 4.

To the south of that is a new terrace structure to provide shade, made with large wooden beams as a motif that connects the plaza to the original use of the space as part of the Eau Claire saw mill.

Next to the terrace is a feature which is likely to become very popular with social media users, said Hoffart.

The new fog mist feature has replaced the former wading pools, allowing anyone, bathing suit or not, to enjoy some cooling mist on hot days. The misters are also lit up at night, providing for a city-designed light show, which will see the mist replaced with clear bollards in the winter so that the show can be year-round.

Transitioning towards the pathway system and the nature of the Bow River are planters, trees, and an urban beach with permanently installed bright yellow beach umbrellas and loungers.

Bryce Miranda, Landscape Architect and Partner at Dialog, said that the redevelopment was an example of adaptive reuse of spaces that connected people to natural resources like the Bow River.

“How do you connect cities to these amenities? That’s what this is about. Bringing people back to these spaces, because we already have something that’s special,” Miranda said.

Although the site plan for the plaza was a complex one, owing to potential development of the Green Line at the former Eau Claire Mall site, along with other private land ownership in the area, Miranda said that Dialog approached the project thinking about how the space could be thought of as different rooms.

Space for many different groups to use the plaza at one time

Miranda said those rooms reflected the individual spaces within the plaza that could be programmed by different groups or used by different people.

“It wouldn’t be right if we brought a concrete hardscape environment right up to the Bow, because that’s not what it’s about. It’s really about connecting, bringing people from that urban interface gradually, and immersing them into that, that Bow atmosphere,” he said.

“The fun of all of this, is that we were had enough space for us to get that large event space in the large open space, which has a bit of a relief off of the event space, and then you get into the the fog emitting feature, and then you’re into the the the beach, which is that perfect interface with that connection with the Bow.

That the entire site is also accessible in a way that it wasn’t before came about as a result of careful design, said Miranda.

“Every piece has been looked at from an accessibility perspective, including the podium, which has a couple of stairs that go up. We’ve had to be very careful about tactile warning surface indicators to indicate drops, ao that has been looked at, and also grade level changes all throughout,” he said.

“You can imagine a site this big, with all of the grading that we had to work with and still deal with all of the stormwater management challenges it has, it was difficult to get it to that point where everything was accessible. But I think we were successful.”

The redesigned Eau Claire Plaza is set to reopen at noon on June 2, with a 30-minute formal ceremony followed by an afternoon of entertainment.