Latest news with #MichaelJanz
CBC
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- CBC
Edmonton's Hawrelak Park set to reopen this winter
Hawrelak Park is on track to open this fall after extensive repair work caused the park to close in 2023. Construction is anticipated to be completed in fall 2025, the city said in a statement to CBC. "Before reopening the park, the city will spend time preparing the park and staff for reopening," said Courtney Gillis with the City of Edmonton's Integrated Infrastructure Services. "The city is planning to reopen the park in winter 2025/2026. More information will be shared as details are confirmed." The project is on schedule and within its $134.5 million budget, Gillis said. "It'll be open this fall and I don't have a date, but I do know the hard guarantee is that it'll be open by the Silver Skate Festival," said Ward papastew Coun. Michael Janz in an interview with CBC. Current work includes paving of the roadways and shared pathways as rehabilitation work continues across the park. The city said a full closure of the park was needed to work on utilities, facilities and open spaces at the same time, and to account for safety concerns as repairs began.. Deep underground utility infrastructure, including the storm, sanitary, water distribution, power and irrigation systems, was all replaced. "There's been an enormous amount of work that's happened below the surface we've seen and had the opportunity to observe. It's really quite impressive what's been done and I just can't wait for it to be open again," Janz said. "With the closure, more people were discovering other parks and other spaces, be it Borden Park, Emily Murphy Park, or Rundle Park or other other spots in our river valley that offer incredible opportunities as well," Janz said. "As our city has grown, over the last four years, we've grown over 150,000 people, we're going to need more park spaces like this." 5 parks to check out while you wait for Hawrelak to reopen (in 2026) 2 years ago Hawrelak Park has been home to many events in Edmonton including the Silver Skate Festival, the Freewill Shakespeare Festival and Edmonton Heritage Festival. Heritage Festival executive Director Rob Rohatyn told CBC moving the festival to Borden park during Hawrelak's construction was an adjustment. "It's been a really great three years we've had it. It's had its challenges," Rohatyn said in an interview during Heritage Festival this past weekend. "However, it's been a really great learning opportunity, and we're excited to get back to Hawrelak and to see the upgrades that are available to us and and share our festival in the green space." The city said the remaining rehabilitation work includes electrical and mechanical work in the facilities, as well as paving the remaining roadways and pathways. This is anticipated to be completed throughout this summer and fall. The remaining landscaping work, including sod placement, tree planting, is also planned to be completed during that time. Landscaping will need time to establish before the park can reopen to the public.
Global News
7 days ago
- General
- Global News
Hawrelak Park to reopen in late 2025 after years-long rehabilitation closure
One of Edmonton's largest and most beloved parks will reopen later this year after being closed since 2023 for an extensive above and underground overhaul. An extensive three-year rehabilitation has been taking place at Hawrelak Park in the North Saskatchewan River Valley, and the city says construction continues on time and on budget, with many of the 'finishing touches' being added this summer. 'Over the last few months, there was substantial progress on the picnic shelters, main pavilion and the operations yard, including the Heritage Festival storage area,' said a statement this weekend from Jesse Banford, the director of facility infrastructure delivery with the City of Edmonton's integrated infrastructure services department. View image in full screen An aerial view from Aug. 1, 2025, shows nearly complete construction at Hawrelak Park in Edmonton's river valley. Global 1 helicopter The rehabilitation work includes updates to the main pavilion structure and plaza's finishes, fixtures, skate flooring, commercial kitchen, mechanical and electrical systems and adding gender-neutral washrooms. Story continues below advertisement 'Work has continued within the facilities, with most buildings now dry-walled. Earlier this spring, remaining site work resumed, including electrical, landscaping and paving.' The city said it's working on details for reopening the park this winter, as planned. 'The guarantee that we have is that it will be open for the Silver Skate Festival, which, as you know, is one of Edmonton's best winter festivals,' said city Coun. Michael Janz. Most of the infrastructure in Hawrelak was original to the park since its opening in 1967 and had exceeded its lifespan. View image in full screen An aerial view from Aug. 1, 2025, shows nearly complete construction at Hawrelak Park in Edmonton's river valley. Global 1 helicopter Before finalizing the plan, there was extensive debate over which route to take: take down portions of the park and complete the work over a decade while maintaining limited access, or undertake a complete three-year closure to get it all done at once. Story continues below advertisement The city elected for the latter, despite an outcry from some community groups. Get daily National news Get the day's top news, political, economic, and current affairs headlines, delivered to your inbox once a day. Sign up for daily National newsletter Sign Up By providing your email address, you have read and agree to Global News' Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy 'The only silver lining I can think of in the park closure has been that many Edmontonians have discovered other parks in the city, other river valley amenities, other ways to get outside and enjoy their community,' Janz said. 'I've seen so many families this year out at different spaces, different picnic tables — whether it's Emily Murphy, whether it's Borden, other places they may not usually go because Hawrelak Park was the go-to spot. 'Edmonton has so many wonderful parks, wonderful amenity spaces. Visitors are blown away how you can be in the middle of the river valley in a city of 1.25 million people and experience solitude. It's beautiful.' Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "Edmonton has so many wonderful parks, wonderful amenity spaces. Visitors are blown away how you can be in the middle of the river valley in a city of 1.25 million people and experience solitude. It's beautiful." View image in full screen Hawrelak Park has been closed from 2023 to 2025 for rehabilitation in Edmonton's river valley. Credit: City of Edmonton The Hawrelak Park project addressed outdated utilities, transportation, open spaces and facility infrastructure throughout the entire park. Story continues below advertisement A large part of the work involved digging up and replacing underground lines and pipes. The city has replaced the entire storm sewer, irrigation and water systems and upgraded power, gas and telecommunications. It also expanded water service to provide firefighting coverage in several areas of the park. View image in full screen An aerial view from Aug. 1, 2025, shows nearly completed updates at Hawrelak Park in Edmonton's river valley. Global 1 helicopter That underground work is now complete, the city said. 'Throughout this summer, we expect to see the remaining sod placed, plantings installed, pathways paved, and Hawrelak Park Lake refilled,' Banford said. 'Landscaping (trees, shrubs, grass, etc.) will need time to establish and develop a strong root system before the park can reopen to the public.' Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "Landscaping (trees, shrubs, grass, etc.) will need time to establish and develop a strong root system before the park can reopen to the public." The Heritage Amphitheatre will also see several changes: new outdoor seating and finishes as well as lighting, structural, mechanical and electrical upgrades, along with the addition of family/gender-neutral washrooms and increased storage. The green room and back-of-house access will also be reconfigured. Story continues below advertisement In the park's open spaces, the playground and paddle boat dock will be replaced. Banford said the playground equipment was also recently installed. View image in full screen An aerial view from Aug. 1, 2025, shows some of the updates at Hawrelak Park in Edmonton's river valley. Global 1 helicopter The city is adding more lighting, bicycle parking and shared-use paths, connecting amenities, and repaving all roads. Sediment from the bottom of the lake has also been dredged. The work should leave the massive river valley park updated for decades to come. 1:44 220 trees to be cut down in Hawrelak Park as part of rehabilitation project The city said the target for construction completion is early fall, but other work will have to take place before Hawrelak can reopen for visitors. Story continues below advertisement 'Before resuming park operations, the project team will also install site furniture (including picnic tables and benches), equipment, signage, garbage/recycling receptacles and information boards. Staff preparation will also occur,' Banford said. 'Hawrelak Park is an active construction site with the project team working diligently to complete seasonal work.' Events like the Heritage Festival, taking place this weekend in Border Park, will be able to return home next summer. Heritage organizers said part of the agreement to move the food and culture festival included a memorandum of understanding with the City of Edmonton guaranteeing a right to return to Hawrelak Park, an agreement about incremental cost coverage and improvements to the site's egress. The city said there will be a media tour of the site later this year when the park landscaping and pathways are established and ready for increased foot traffic.
CTV News
16-07-2025
- Politics
- CTV News
Edmonton councillor talks infill debate, increasing housing options across the city
Edmonton city coun. Michael Janz speaks with Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins about the city's infill debate. This interview has been edited for clarity and length Michael Higgins: Why is infill suddenly such a contentious issue? What drove the considerable degree of tension we saw heading into the summer break? Michael Janz: This issue is a big issue in many, many municipalities across Canada when you talk about how we grow and how we rebuild our cities. Our cities are changing. There's more and more people moving here. Premier Smith's Alberta Is Calling campaign has been wildly successful. We've added 150,000 people in the last three years and where they live and what housing choices are provided, these are big questions that not just Edmonton but Calgary, Toronto, Winnipeg, even Fort Saskatchewan and Sherwood Park are trying to wrestle with. MH: Blanket rezoning. Your Calgary counterparts, their decision on that, it is considered by some to be their most contentious of last year. Were there lessons that you took from what Calgary went through on the infill issue? MJ: There's always challenges with how you deal with growth. I think generally, Edmontonians know that we need to build in, not out. That we can't keep doing more and more suburban sprawl. It's financially ruinous. It's environmentally ruinous. Everybody kind of agrees that more density should be concentrated around more LRT stations, but that's challenging when you live on those blocks and there's a building going up next door, that's where we really get the rub. MH: You proposed a policy change that would have cut the number of units from eight to six at the end of your sitting, though council voted six to five against that. Why did that fail? Why did that not go through? MJ: It's funny when we talk about these numbers, because even in Edmonton, a lot is not a lot. Many of our lots are very different, and the point I was trying to make is that there is no universal lot size. We should be talking more about what is the appropriate amount of housing on a lot. That's a conversation we should be having when we say eight units anywhere. That's not actually true. The vast majority of lots, they're not big enough to even fit the requirements for eight units. There's a number of important changes we made. We made the architecture of the infills better. We made them make sure they're facing the street, not facing the neighbours. There's many of them that already exist in our communities. You go to Bonnie Doon or Richie or others, there's many infills that are unrecognizable. They just look like new homes and that's sort of what I'm trying to get towards. So the eight to six was more of a communication saying this is what you could fit anywhere, especially when we constrained the size of the box, we shrank it to half the lot. MH: Surprised it didn't pass though? Six to five was the vote. MJ: I think part of it was a recognition that in some cases where you may be able to do eight closer to an LRT, closer to another location, my colleagues still wanted to preserve that opportunity, knowing that at the end of the day, when you get out your tape measure, in most cases, you may not be able to do more than six. MH: Where do you weigh in on the issue of members of council dropping off the radar before the voting is finished? Before you're done debate on issues as big as this one? MJ: I can tell you, we knew this was a hot one. I had told my colleagues back in the June 3 Urban Planning Committee and before. I've been door knocking a lot and I can tell you, Edmontonians are very sour at a couple of councillors who were not present for the vote, in particular one who's running for mayor. I think I wouldn't be surprised if skipping that vote caused irreparable damage to their campaign. MH: Water under the bridge where council is concerned, or do you see more coming of this? Might this even be something where the province kind of leans into the conversation? MJ: The province, in the past, has said that they want to see more housing. Minister Nixon has said to me that he's very impressed with how Edmonton has been trying to welcome more housing and build more homes, especially around transit. That Edmonton City Council is very focused on affordability, that we want to see more homes with more transit choices and more housing choices where you can live, maybe with one car, maybe not required to have two or three cars. Having options for families that are more affordable and in better locations where people want to live. The province has been very favourable to this. Pierre Poilievre and Prime Minister Mark Carney have both said they want to see more housing across Canada. The two biggest issues in poll after poll, it's not infill, it's housing and affordability. Those are the big issues. We're taking action in that at the city level where we can. Edmonton has been on an infill journey for almost 20 years. We will continue to be. There's always going to be refinements, there's always going to be changes working on it. MH: Where does that leave the conversation then on Edmonton growth? Calgary as well? The need for housing supply, housing affordability, when you know that when you come back, there's an election coming? MJ: I was talking to the other city councillors, and for me, I have 20 neighbourhoods that have infill under construction, but almost seven or eight councillors don't have any infill in their wards. This is a very hot topic for three or four councillors in the city, but citywide and province wide, the main topic is still the housing crisis, where we're going to build homes, how we're going to build a more affordable city and more affordable province. This is what this is about. It's about more affordability and more housing choices for more people and no matter who the mayor is of Calgary, Edmonton, we know that we need to keep building homes, and we need to keep building them in places where people want to live. It's figuring out how to do that better, and that's what we're trying to do.
CTV News
12-07-2025
- Politics
- CTV News
Support for mayor front-runner slumps as absence for infill decision casts bad spell
Edmonton mayoral candidate Tim Cartmell is under fire after a motion to make changes to Edmonton's infill bylaw was defeated by one vote in his absence. The leadup to council's summer break put a spotlight on city hall with more than 100 Edmontonians showing up for a public hearing on infill housing. Troy Pavlek, the host of political podcast Municipally Speaking, believes the crowd was motivated by a pledge from mayoral candidate Tim Cartmell to pause mid-block infill projects. But when it came time to vote on July 8 – two days after council's summer break started – Cartmell's seat in council chambers was empty. 'This was a rare opportunity for this reduction on infill to occur, and it needs the conservative block to pass,' Pavel told CTV News Edmonton. 'Two members of the conservative block – Sarah Hamilton and Cartmell – opted not to show up.' Coun. Erin Rutherford's seat was also empty, but she attended the meeting virtually while on vacation in Kelowna. Rutherford voted in favour of mayor Amarjeet Sohi's motion to leave the decision on infill reduction to a later date after consultations are completed in 2027. The motion was narrowly passed 6-5. Coun. Michael Janz made the motion to cut the mid-block infill maximum from eight units to six. He said he's been hearing about the motion's failure on the campaign trail. 'I was at a house that had a 'Neighbourhoods United' sign, and they were really mad that Cartmell didn't show up,' said Janz Friday. Some candidates running under Cartmell's 'Better Edmonton' banner, also wanted to see the unit reduction approved. 'I saw it as a necessary step to build trust with residents while ensuring that infill continues in a way that respects neighbourhood character, 'said a statement from Nicholas Rheubottom, who is running for a council seat in Ward Ipiihkoohkanipiaohtsi. 'This week was an opportunity to bring clarity and closure to the infill conversation,' Rheubottom continued. 'While engagement has value, the decision to defer resolution for an additional 18 months creates further uncertainty for both residents and the housing sector at a time when clarity is needed most.' Cartmell's campaign manager Alex Hryciw confirmed that he was not available for comment. 'Municipal parties were not designed to have whipped votes or 'party lines,'' said Hryciw in a statement Friday. Edmonton's municipal election will be on Oct. 20.
CBC
09-07-2025
- Politics
- CBC
Council votes to maintain existing infill requirements after several intense meetings
Social Sharing After several days of contentious debate, Edmonton's city council has voted to maintain infill units to the original maximum of eight. The motion, introduced by Mayor Amarjeet Sohi, passed in a narrow win, with councillors voting 6-5. Councillors Michael Janz, Ashley Salvador, Andrew Knack, Karen Principe and Jennifer Rice voted against. Councillors Tim Cartmell, who is planning to run for mayor, and Sarah Hamilton were absent from the Tuesday meeting. Both were away on vacation. The decision comes after a motion to reduce the number of allowable units in new mid-block, multi-family buildings from eight to six was brought to city council. Instead, councillors opted for a public consultation process on the merits of unit reduction, which would include more community engagement and expert research. That motion passed with a unanimous vote. The zoning bylaw, which came into effect last year and streamlined the city's zoning regulations to allow for more infill development and density across the city, has been divisive. Sohi, who is not running for re-election next term, said the proposal for unit reduction to infill developments would set a concerning precedent if passed. "My worry is that as we try to build consensus, that you go to six, then the push comes. Now we are down to six, now we're going to push down to four. Where is that bottom line?" he said during the meeting Tuesday. "There might be people who would not be happy with reducing from eight to six, and some people may not be happy with settling with six when they want to go to four or three." He concluded that council did not have enough information to make a decision, despite having heard from hundreds of Edmontonians in public hearings last week. WATCH | Design changes could address infill conflict: Could design changes calm infill conflict in Edmonton? 6 days ago Duration 2:09 Rob Smyth, co-chair of the Glenora Community League's civics committee, was in attendance, and acknowledged that the reduction would be a major step forward, particularly in more mature neighbourhoods. He said many of the residents in his neighbourhood have been complaining that large infill developments created problems around traffic flow and parking. "Going to six would be very much supported by, in my estimation, the vast majority of community people. I think this would tell a story that council is listening to the community," he said. Last Friday, council members had to vote on a motion to extend meetings on the zoning bylaw into the summer break. On June 30, Cartmell called for a moratorium that would pause approvals for mid-block infill developments, until the city re-examines its district plans. Councillors learned later that the move would go against the Municipal Government Act. Ward Dene Coun. Aaron Paquette said the heated debates around the infill proposal have become a distraction. "To be blunt, this issue desperately needed to be depoliticized. Politicizing land use is an incredibly poor way to run a city, incredibly poor," Paquette said during the meeting. "Everyone can just take a step back and take this out of the silliness of an election season and put it where it belongs, into a place where community voice is heard, clearly recorded." Results from the public consultation process will return to city council in the first quarter of 2027.
