Calgary city councillors have voted in favour of beginning the process to amend the city’s land-use bylaw to revert to the state of pre-citywide rezoning.

They voted 13-2 in favour of moving ahead with the process during the Dec. 15 Regular Meeting of Calgary city council.

It’s the next step in the process to eliminate citywide rezoning from Calgary’s Land Use Bylaw, a push that began almost immediately after it was enacted back on Aug. 6, 2024.

Shortly after approval, talk of removing the change had already begun. It became an early campaign issue in Calgary’s 2025 municipal election for some candidates and was a big conversation driver in some Calgary wards.

Ward 10 Coun. Andre Chabot pushed forward the motion, reverting to the prior Land-Use Bylaw.

“The gist of my motion is to look at starting over and trying to get this right,” said Chabot.

“Because I do believe that the method, whilst I think the intent was laudable insofar as trying to create a more sustainable city, I think in order to do it, it should have been done in a more coordinated, strategic, planned and sequenced fashion, as is identified as recommendations through the Local Area Plans.”

Ward 7 Coun. Myke Atkinson, in his close on the motion, asked for a slide to be pulled up showing the number of applications in the past year, broken down by ward. Between seven of the wards, most with councillors who voted for the repeal, 16 of 478 applications were made under RCG. Of those 16, three were for semi-detached. Nine were for rowhouse or townhouse.

“There are certain areas within our city that have been experiencing this way heavier than other areas in the city, and there are certain areas that haven’t been experiencing this at all,” Atkinson said.

“So, yeah, sure, the boogeyman.”

Atkinson said that he hopes that these same councillors who voted to amend the Land-Use Bylaw, will be willing to correct the issues and not just brush it off. He said the issue isn’t the public hearings, it’s the built form and the location of mid-block rowhouses.

“I don’t know that there’s going to be the political appetite to actually get to solving it once everyone just wishes this away with the blanket repeal,” he said.

“It’s irresponsible. This is not how you govern properly. Proper governance is coming to the table with a solution, a solution to the actual problem that is at hand.”

Straight removal of citywide rezoning instead of tweaks

Ward 13 Coun. Dan McLean said he preferred a straight repeal of citywide rezoning, instead of making changes to the Land-Use bylaw to address some of the bylaw’s rezoning shortcomings.

Attempts were made to tweak the bylaw to deal with mid-block townhomes, reducing lot coverage to 55 per cent, eliminating zero lot lines, limiting building height to 10 metres, and the requirement of contextual setbacks. Ward 2 Coun. Jennifer Wyness also wanted to include an opt-in process that would have allowed RC and RCG property owners to have their properties redesignated within a 24-month window.

That latter part of the proposal got former Ward 1 Coun. Sonya Sharp into hot water with repeal die-hards during the recent Calgary municipal election.

Coun. McLean said that Calgarians wanted a full reversal of citywide rezoning.

“I’ve been advocating for a straight repeal from the beginning, because that’s what Calgarians want. They asked us for a full repeal at the doors, at community centers across the city,” he said.

“They want a full repeal. They don’t want something watered down.”

The watering down, however, began immediately with conversations around how changes could be made to the bylaw once it got to second reading. This motion arising was virtually identical to the proposed amendment put forward by Coun. Wyness earlier in the day.

Ward 3 Coun. Andrew Yule, who had no RCG applications in his ward in the past year, acknowledged that he didn’t have skin in the game, per se. The city did, however.

Upon his questions, councillors learned that roughly $23 million in city administration time (roughly one per cent of a property tax increase) had been saved, with ~$50,000 per application spent in prior years. The applications in the queue also represent homes for roughly 4,500 people, admin said.

“I guess, from my perspective, there’s a lot of savings in some of what was there. I know it wasn’t perfect. At the doors, I heard it’s not perfect, but there could be some changes, and it sounds like some of those changes are on the way,” Yule said, urging councillors to ensure the minor tweaks get done swiftly to avoid costly bureaucracy.

“We’ve created an entire community that doesn’t have to go on the outskirts, where I live in Ward 3, where we don’t have the infrastructure to support that population of another community out there.”

What happens next?

Now, city administration will go back to prepare an amendment to the bylaw to reintroduce the 12 divisions (land-use districts used under the prior bylaw). Concurrently, work will be done on an infrastructure assessment and on revising parking rules on private property.

There would be another public hearing in March 2026, at which time council can give three readings to the revised bylaw.

Administration said that once the bylaw amendments are approved, they will need until August 2026 to implement the changes to the bylaw.