Heading south into Ramsay from Inglewood on 11th St. S.E., it’s hard to imagine the community being home to one of the city’s most pedestrian-friendly mixed-use developments. The street is frighteningly unwalkable, with few crosswalks and a sidewalk running alongside only one side of the road. Those who work in the area — myself included —regularly face death when we sprint across four lanes of traffic during rush hour.
It’s surprising, then, to travel a little further southwest and discover Ramsay Exchange (formerly the Saddleview Industrial Park). Currently it appears as an unremarkable patch of land on the community’s southern boundary. Bordered by a barbed wire-topped fence labelled with threatening “no trespassing” signs, the space looks like nothing more than a big industrial construction site. However, Torode Commercial Ltd. plans on transforming the 8.5-hectare site — which in recent years has been used for industrial businesses, offices and artist studios — into a high-density sustainable development that will be specifically built to encourage pedestrian and bicycle traffic. Conversely, one-passenger car trips will be discouraged.
“A successful mixed-use project relies heavily on pedestrian-oriented development, so that’s a no-brainer as far as we’re concerned,” says Eileen Stan, development manager for Torode. If all goes according to plan, the development will have a hotel, office space, retail space, high-rise condos, townhouses, restaurants and food markets. (Torode is currently awaiting the city’s approval to rezone the land for the new development.)
Conceptual drawings show attractive storefronts and lots of public space. Currently, Ramsay Exchange has a single lone tenant, a modern Italian coffee shop called Caffe Rosso. The shop, which is in an old cafeteria building, is dwarfed by the Dominion Bridge Building, an old iron and steel foundry built in the 1920s. Instead of knocking the structure down — as many developers in this city are wont to do with historical buildings — Torode is renovating the building and integrating it with the new development. (Dominion Bridge’s Calgary operation shut down in 1987.) “There will be, I think, a real sense of place created by that building,” says Stan. “We want to highlight the history that’s on the site and what Dominion Bridge meant for that community.”
A visual entertainment company will move into the Dominion Bridge building sometime this year. The building’s high ceilings and spacious rooms make it prime office space. Another large industrial building on the site, a shop with a bright blue metal exterior, will also be incorporated into the new development. “[The buildings] provide some unique space that isn’t easily attainable in the city,” says Stan. “They’re not buildings that you can easily attempt to reconstruct these days.”
Ramsay, one of Calgary’s first communities (established in 1914), is full of picturesque pre-1950 homes. In addition to this low-density residential, the community is also home to businesses as varied as a foul-smelling chicken plant, the Shamrock Hotel and Fast Forward. Just over 2,000 people live in the neighbourhood, which is located just east of the Stampede grounds across the Elbow River. (Many Calgarians invade the community in July to watch Stampede fireworks from Scotsman Hill.) “It’s a very close-knit community,” says David Crosby, Caffe Rosso’s owner. “A lot of people come down on Saturdays and Sundays and everyone will know everyone else. Three groups will arrive, and everyone will know each other on a first-name basis.”
Crosby says about half of the Ramsay residents he talks to aren’t aware of what’s planned for the Ramsay Exchange site. “A lot of time I’m explaining exactly what’s going to go in Ramsay Exchange,” he says. “There’s concern from the community regarding what’s going in…. They don’t want big chains. They don’t want big boxes. They want boutique [shops].”
Stan says local residents don’t have to worry about whether or not big-box stores will go on the site. “We’re not seeing the site as being a regional retail destination,” she says. “It doesn’t have that kind of exposure. The retailers I think that’ll be interested in being there will be more specialty type of retailers…. We don’t expect to get a Safeway-type of grocery store that wants 50,000 square feet.” She says the site would be better suited to a grocer like Mercato, an Italian store and restaurant in the Mission neighbourhood directly west of Ramsay.