A Calgary Summer

After many posts from the diverse, cultured centres of urbanity on the European continent, the travel bug is not quite out of my system. As I have used up all my vacation time -and then some - for the remainder of 2014 and I should probably attempt to stay employed for a while, my options for travelling abroad are limited.

Lucky for me I live in the most diverse, engaging and fast-changing city this side of the Rockies and before Montreal: Calgary!

I hope this will give a taste to some of my new friends around the world of what my city is like. Perhaps even a few locals might learn a thing or two as well. Let us begin!

Mural on 4th Avenue Bridge pier into Downtown Calgary, near the East Village District

Calgary is the largest city in the province of Alberta, and 4th largest in the country - behind Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver. Founded in the late 19th century, the city has grown quickly into a modern cosmopolitan city over the past 120 years. As of 2014, the city is  home to 1.2 million people, with several smaller satellite cities immediately surrounding the city, bringing the metropolitan area to nearly 1.5 million. It wasn't always this way: Calgary has doubled in size since 1980. An oil-fuelled economic boom is responsible for making Calgary the largest city within 700 kilometres.

Condominium towers in East Village, a redeveloped area of parking lots and empty fields a few blocks from the major business district of Calgary. Over 1,000 condos/apartments are being constructed here, with some 8,000 under construction elsewhere in the city centre in the next few years.

Calgary's Downtown is dominated by office towers; most of these built in the last 30 years as the economic boom continued. Calgary has more office space in the city centre than many larger cities: nearly twice as much as Vancouver, a city of more than 2 million people.

The Calgary skyline is below. The Calgary Tower no longer dominates the skyline, the office buildings around it reach up to 60 storeys and top out at 230 metres high, the tallest in the Canada outside Toronto. The towers in the foreground are residential towers in the Beltline district, the urban hub of Calgary where thousands of apartments, hipsters, bars and restaurants serve as the beating heart of the city:

The skyline from Ramsay, a inner city neighbourhood in south-east Calgary. The Saddledome was built of the 1988 Winter Olympic Games, an now hosts the professional hockey team the Calgary Flames. Noted for it's curved roof, the design was meant to reflect the western / cowboy history of the city (saddle) and save energy heating the arena in winter - yes it gets that cold here that we need to heat our hockey rinks in the winter.

An criticism that is often levied on urban Calgary is that as a business-only town everyone goes home after-working hours and the city centre is quiet in the evenings. While there may have been some truth to this statement in the 1980s or early 1990s, it could not be farther from the truth in 2014. The city centre has many lively and diverse districts, with bars and restaurants teeming with thousands of people to the early morning hours in areas like the Beltline, Mission, Stephen Ave and Chinatown amongst others.

Stephen Avenue during Sled Island, a indie-music festival of 200+ bands spread over 30 venues in the beginning of the summer. Sled Island celebrates urban life, music, bicycles and the arts; a true gem on Calgary's diverse and busy festival scene. Check out my daily play-by-play during Sled Island 2014 for more details.

Immediately surrounding the business core is where all the action is. In addition to the Beltline, popular districts include Mission, Sunnyside, Bridgeland and Inglewood. All are within a few minute walk of the largest office buildings that dominate the skyline and are home to thousands of Calgarians.

Mission neighbourhood, 15 minute walk south of the city centre on 4th Street SW. The Mission Diner is a popular breakfast place, one of several local favourites. Cafes, shops, bars and restaurants line this neighbourhood strip. 4th Street connects to the infamous 17th Avenue in the Beltline. 17th Avenue is long known as Calgary's prime night spot and is home to dozens of bars and restaurants.

My old apartment in the Cliff Bungalow-Mission area - looks like a house, but is restructure inside as 6 apartment units. The house was built in 1911 by the Canadian Pacific Railway for railway workers as the area was first being settled. Long before the oil industry, railways dominated the western Canadian prairie provinces. Calgary was a railway town much like places such as Brooks, Red Deer and Medicine Hat. Unlike places like Brooks, Red Deer and Medicine Hat, Calgary out-competed similar railways towns and became the predominate urban centre of the the prairies.

Only 3 minute walk from 17th Avenue, 15 minutes from the main office core. Most other houses like this have long since been replaced by apartment or condominium towers. Notice that the new tenants are not as cool as we were with the lack of vintage yard-sales and front-yard neighbourhood barbecue parties in this picture.

surrounding the city centre are two rivers: the Bow and Elbow. They are popular destinations for joggers, cyclists, walkers and general recreation activities. Unlike many cities, Calgary never had a large industrial base that polluted and channelled the local rivers into concrete canals. The result of minimal industrial usage, the length of the river valleys are filled with a series of pedestrian and bicycle pathways connecting many kilometres of parks and public spaces. Most parks place priority on preserving the natural look and environment of the riverbank. Natural enough that birds, muskrats, deer and beavers are common sights all along the river park system. Every once in a while even a moose makes it into the urban core of the city!

The East Village Plaza, connects to a new pedestrian bridge - opening Fall 2014 - to St. Georges Island, home of the Calgary Zoo. The Plaza hosts events year-round, currently the Calgary Opera in the large white tent in the centre is doing a summer series. This picture is only a few metres from the large condo projects in the earlier East Village picture.

Prince's Island is Calgary's "central park" and is one of the most loved public spaces in the city. Today it was hosting Carifest - a celebration to Caribbean-Canadian culture. Unfortunately it was a cloudy and cold day so it was otherwise quite quiet. On sunny days you will see thousands of people slack-lining, unicycling, sun-tanning, frisbee-ing and generally loving the outdoors in this pristine park at the heart of the city:

A new addition, but quickly becoming the place to see in Calgary is the Peace Bridge, a designer pedestrian bridge spanning the Bow River between the Sunnyside neighbourhood and Downtown. Wedding parties, buskers and photo-takers are always out in number here. It actually doesn't function well as a bridge because too many people stand in the way trying to get the perfect picture in the middle of the bicycle lane. I can't argue with them though it is an amazing bridge:

Inner-city Calgarians are typically a fashionable bunch but not this fashionable: this is definitely a prom/graduation photo-shoot. Picture from June 2014.

The view from the north bank of the Bow River. The Peace Bridge is a single span, gracefully crossing to the south bank with no support columns. A new landmark of the inner city:

One thing that these pictures cannot describe is the attitude of the city. While Calgary lacks the history and some of the human-scale elements I noted during my European urban posts, it makes up for it in the way that citizens deem their city. Unlike some of other places I have visited, Calgary is a place where people believe that they can change their city for the better. There is no stagnation here only relentless progress; the city changes faster and more extensively in a few years than many cities will change in a lifetime. Everything is renewed, questioned and challenged in the name of improving the city that so many here love. There are many challenges that come with the speed that Calgary changes, but many opportunities too.

Sunset at Olympic Plaza, during a concert for Sled Island. In the winter the Plaza hosts a skating rink.

Calgary made the transition from being a shabby fort of a few dozen settlers in the frontier of western Canada to a modern, diverse metropolis of a million people in 120 years. There are entire quadrants in Vienna, Amsterdam and countless other European cities that do not have a single building that was built after the first European settler stumbled across the intersection of the Bow and Elbow Rivers.

At this pace, imagine where Calgary will be in another 120 years?

This is only the summer: there is another whole season here called winter. That post might be a little bit longer :)

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BONUS PICTURE: Hello friends from Munich! Guess what I found on the Bow River today?? Turns out the 2013 floods were not all bad when they diverted the river in unexpected ways. Bring your boards and come for a visit!

This is along the Bow River pathway system, looking across to Sunnyside from Downtown near the Louise Bridge.

Innsbruck, Austria - Sophistication in the Alps

After Vienna, I travelled three hours by train to the smaller city of Innsbruck in the Austrian Alps. I enjoyed two melanges on the train, the traditional Viennese coffee that is the regular cup of expresso with a milk foam of sorts poured on top. I had been warned that this was a specifically Viennese drink and would be cut off from it in most other places even within Austria. I went for the second cup and arrived in Innsbruck a bit more jittery and sweaty than normal.

Train-travel sophistication. A cup of melange at 240km/h:

A city of some 120,000 people, Innsbruck is the smallest city since Arras, France I have stayed in - a pleasant change from the big cities of the past few weeks.

The city sits in a very low valley at an altitude of some 500m. The mountain ranges on all sides aren't particularly tall by Canadian Rocky standards, however they have almost twice the prominence (look bigger) than the mountains around Canmore, Alberta because the valley is so much lower. They are quite striking - but often shrouded by cloud.

Think of Innsbruck as much like Canmore, but with no pick-up trucks, no million dollar McMansions and a public transit system that rivals Vancouver:

A problem soon emerges: due to the size of the city, I vastly underestimated the ease of finding a hostel without a reservation. A few tries at ones near the central station were greeted with laughter, not a good sign for the wayward  traveller. I walked nearly 30 minutes to the edge of the city to find a hostel that was full as well. I met two Spainards in the same situation and between the the three of us we convinced the staff to allow us to convert the luggage room into a temporary dorm for a paltry (or expensive depending on how you look at it) 12€ / night. Problem solved!

The view from the hostel makes it all worth it:

After a good nights rest - a debatable fact due to being forced to eat dinner with my new Spanish friends at the "regular" 11pm followed by a lengthy argument about which type of bears are the best with some Koreans (hint stop what you are doing and google Korean Bears, they are the best) - I was ready to tackle the mountains the following morning.

This being the Alps, most of my choices allowed easy cable car access to aid my decent. Again, Europe doesn't know how to do anything without sophistication.

I chose to tackle the Hafelekarspitze, a 2,300m mountain to the north highly visible from Innbruck.

Here it is from the bottom. You may just be able to make out a small white chalet three-quarters of the way up the mountain, that is a cable car stop:

Access to the base of the climb is granted from the centre of the city by an underground funicular railway - specially designed to handle steep slopes - that is an impressive work of engineering and architecture for a city the size of Red Deer. Red Deer barely knows what a bike-lane is, let alone a tram and funicular- filled rapid transit utopia like Innsbruck. Perhaps I'll finish slamming Red Deer in a future post.

A brisk four hour walk led me to the top just as the clouds and mists parted:

Innsbruck:

To the north:

An excellent coffee at the summit cafe (see sophistication) and I was down by a very expensive cable car ride of 19€. No discount for the 1,400m I climbed to get here unfortunately:

Innsbruck is quite sleepy as one would expect. I used the tram to get around, a brilliant idea in every city. I have seen few that are better setup than Innsbruck's due to it's simplicity.

Take the stations for starters. Simple, effective and cheap. Nothing more than a next stop time display, seats and a ticket machine. The design shares the stop with buses and is the only part of the network that prohibits cars from driving on the tracks:

It's the small details that set it apart. One thing is the off-board ticket machines. 1.60€ for a 90-minute ticket while 2€ if you buy from the driver on-board. It encourages efficiency and makes all but the most clueless tourists buy from the machine instead of the driver, allowing her to continue driving, speeding the journey up dramatically. Think how much faster taking the bus in Calgary would be if everyone could board at any door, and the ticket prices encourage you to buy off the vehicle allowing the driver to proceed to the next stop very quickly instead of hand out transfers. Currently there is no discount of buying off vehicle in Calgary, nor is all door boarding allowed, creating unnecessary long queues to jam into the single door on front and each pay the driver individually. 

The trams are about half the size of a three-car LRT in Calgary, but hold substantially more people than even an articulated bus. The have next stop information displays, live maps and notifications on which side the tram's doors will open at the next station. A view inside the tram:

The 30 minute walk from the central station to the hostel takes 7 minutes on the tram - and the vehicle never exceeds 30 - 40 km/h. It is able to achieve this by using these low cost, efficiency improvements everywhere it can, rather than the traditional and expensive way of separating the transit line from everything else. It is also quiet enough that it runs down narrow residential streets and navigates tight turns of the inner city as easy as any bus, giving it much better access to where people actually live than a station built in a freeway median like many in Calgary.

The tram arrived every 5-10 minutes throughout the day and evening, providing rapid transit to this tiny city. As if that wasn't enough night service is provided. Here is a excerpt from the transit company's website:

"Round-the-clock operations for you:

For all those who are on the move through the night or who have late work shifts, there is an IVB night service. The Nightliner, the ASTI telephone group taxi and the Women’s Nighttime Taxi bring you home quickly, safely and inexpensively, no matter what the hour."

Imagine any transit organization that puts that much effort and focus on individuals of all demographics and needs; not just the regular 9-5 crowd.

Sophistication. In a city the size of Red Deer. Amazing.

Now I won't have to slam Red Deer in a future post. 

Vienna - A City that Wants You

Vienna - Wien if you're In the German-speaking part of the world - is a spectacular city. It has more monuments, marble and more landmarks than most new countries have combined. Until the Berlin reunification, Vienna was the largest German speaking city in the world of nearly 2 million inhabitants. While it currently has nowhere near the level geo-political prominence in world affairs the city enjoyed in the 17th to 19th centuries, Vienna still impresses with an attitude of greatness; both past and present.

Coming from Munich is around three and a half hours by train, reaching up to 240km/h. Austrian trains are some of the best I have seen so far: clear English and German announcements, a digital map that shows where you are travelling in real-time, and a live speedometer (which is why I can provide the extra tid-bit of information). Smooth and spectacular all the way into Wien Westbahnhof, followed by a 20 minute walk to the old city.

10€ ($15 CAD) and five minutes after walking off the train I had 10GBs of data for my phone. The irony really hits that I am currently paying $75 CAD this past month for 1 GB of data in Canada that I have no way of using. The day of reckoning will come for the Canadian telecom companies and I would love to be there to see it through. Alas, I will not be leading the charge on that fight; I have urban planning and design to rant about.

Back on point: Vienna is spectacular. Here are a few sights you will see in a matter of  minutes from one of the many central plazas and public spaces:

~900 year old St. Stephens Cathedral in central Wien:

Inside:

Hofburg Palace and the adjoining complex of incredible halls and government buildings:

Another:

This 10-metre tall Maria Theresia Statue:

Streets that look like this in every direction:

The kooky, mid-1980s designed Hundertwasser Haus:

The list goes on and on. Connecting all of this the Vienna U-Bahn, the subway system. Trains come all day and 24 hours on weekend nights at a frequency of every five or eight minutes on five lines. Nowhere in the city is more than five minute walk from a metro station and no place is really more than 20 - 30 minutes apart in total travel time using the metro. Signage is perfect, there are system maps on every conceivable surface in the trains, and lines are colour-coded and numbered to avoid any chance of confusion. I could not think of anything that would make the system easier to use. Believe me, I tried!

The train system was also unique in that it attempted to run schedules around what people actually do, as opposed to what would be easier for the transit operator to provide. For example, every Friday and Saturday night is 24-hour rapid transit service because it is the night that most people go out to the thousands of restaurants, clubs and venues crowding the streets of the inner city. There is no nightly transit service in most Canadian cities and many actually reduce the level of service of their transit system on the weekend, even though the demand from revellers and employees of the "night-economy" is at it's highest.

This same approach is used on public holidays where Vienna runs more trains not less. Again the assumption here is that lots of people are going out on the town to celebrate with family and friends and therefore they need a ride home. Vienna is happy to oblige. 

This is indicative of a broader trend in many European cities compared to Canada. There is an assumption that public services like transit and infrastructure are for everyone, not just some idealized version of what people are "supposed" to do. Back in Calgary, Calgary Transit has been successful at catering to the downtown workforce, but have been less successful at catering to the wider community that is not always business hours focused. Quality of transit service is also allowed to be worse for the general public in areas like reliability, wait-times and frequency. Vienna there is no such assumption. The idea is that everyone, in any part of the city, has the right to efficient mobility on public transit. It is not treated as a second-class service to car traffic. 

One more thing on transit: an express train from the airport is billed at taking 16 minutes from there to a central U-Bahn stop. 16 minutes. Ridiculous.

My favourite part of Vienna:

Museum Quarter is a spectacular chain of plazas and walkways that link between a few dozen - I know, only a few dozen? It's like they aren't even trying - museums and cultural institutions from art to dance to music to architecture and more.

A view of in the daytime looking at MUMOK, Vienna's grey, ultra-modern shrine to contemporary art:

The Museum Quarter is billed as one of the largest cultural facilities in the world. It is tied together with thousand of open seats and irregular blue-block street furniture - in the foreground of the picture above. Unlike Calgary, Amsterdam, Berlin and many others places, there is an incredible focus on creating public seating. It is everywhere you look and Wieners use it at all times of the day. Imagine seats lining the CPR underpasses between downtown Calgary and the Beltline neighbourhood. There are countless seats lining every park and path as well as on nearly all sidewalks and side streets. If there is ever a city that wants to encourage people to slow down and linger in it's public spaces, Vienna is it.

Calgary is certainly emulating designing public spaces in this way. The much-beloved Prince's Island Park is covered in benches and picnic sites, grassy knolls for Shakespeare in the Park performances, and rocks to sit and contemplate with the babble of the Bow in your ears. The newest edition to the city centre pathway network, the East Village River Walk builds on these ideas that Vienna does so well, offering benches and lookouts frequently with the high-quality level of design any great city deserves.

Most amazingly about Vienna's Museum Quarter is the shift in the atmosphere at night-time. It becomes one of the strangest and most interesting public spaces places I have ever seen. Starting around sunset, young and old Wieners come to the plazas to hang out. Many bring 24-packs (!) of beer and lounge all over the square. The lounging takes the form of  a lean on the wall, benches, street furniture, on the ground. Thousands of more people are hanging out in the cafés and bars of the museums even though the museums actually closed hours before.

The view of a reflecting pool in front of one of the museum-cafés:

MUMOK has free contemporary art films playing on a giant screen in one corner of the plaza. They give out wireless headphones to listen over the noise of the crowd: 

The most amazing thing about the Museum Quarter's night-life is this is for nothing. There are no festivals or youthful party bars nearby. People literally come here just to sit, chat, drink and have a good time. You'll never see the fences of beer gardens or patios, everyone simply walks around with their drink and their 24-pack (!) of beer and sit anywhere they want. You'll also see no alcohol-related problems and no police presence. It doesn't clear out until the early morning, approaching 3AM. 

Vienna is exemplary of how cities should build their public spaces. It might be one of the best in the world. Policies are put in place to encourage personal freedom and choice, not limiting freedom to use public space as if sitting in a plaza is a bad thing. No pouring out your drink if a policeman walks up, no anger or hostility of any kind. It is perfect.

I have more to show, but that's all for now - I haven't even described the public showing of famous Viennese opera films in front of the city hall; complete with food of all types and beer in the glass. An actual pint glass you can walk anywhere with in an enormous plaza of architectural marvels and thousands of people.

No plastic utensils here and high-priced food nonsense. Real food like the Kalbsbutter Schnitzel mit Erdäpfelpüree below (loosely translated as veal meatballs with a mashed potato purée):

Rathausplatz, where the films, food and beer is consumed:

In some parts of the world even indoor nightclubs and bars will refuse to give out glass-ware and utensils out of fear of violence, damage and broken glass.

Treat people like animals and they will act like them!

Vienna will do no such thing. It goes above and beyond other cities to prove that you are welcome here. Come and see it. Vienna is waiting for you.

Rennes & Mont St. Michel - A First Taste of France

I flew direct from Dublin to Rennes, the capital of Brittany in France. A quick two-hour flight by turbo-prop again highlighted the vastness of distance that Canadians are so accustomed to but is much less common here. Ireland May as well be across the Atlantic, it seems so much farther away than the rest of Europe and is so small it seems like it doesn't get much attention from citizen on the main continent.

Departing from sunny Ireland over Dublin. Travellers Note: this is not the preferred seat on turbo-prop aircraft. Very loud and rumbly, with a constant morbid suspicion that if the propeller failed you would be the first to notice as pieces of it flew through the window. I'm not the best at flying:

Rennes is a smaller city of around 200,000 with a tiny airport and one EU passport control officer for the entire crew. Ireland is outside border-less zone so you must enter customs when arriving.

Despite being a smaller city, Rennes was incredible. A full metro system, bike share and bus rapid transit from the airport. If that wasn't enough all buses come equipped with "time to next stop" and "time to departure" clocks. Every bus stop has live next bus times and all necessary information for fares and other routes.

Time to departure screen:

It is clear that every aspect of society is designed for regular people in mind. Transport is cheap, pedestrians are protected at every intersection with "islands" between the two-direction traffic, bus lanes and bike lanes have priority at every road throughout the city. Most spectacularly - and a theme of Europe overall - the entire inner city is permanently or mostly permanently restricted to pedestrian and bicycle traffic. This allows enormously successful and welcoming public spaces and squares that attract everyone in the city.

The main square. Think Tompkins Park on 17th Ave in Calgary, but only in a city of 200,000 and add about 20 times the activity of a regular night. Why can't we emulate this in Calgary?:

Bars, cafés and restaurants pack the streets in the squares. Children play in the middle of the square until well past sunset, even on a Friday night. Safely designed streets isn't even a question; it is so obviously engrained that no one would expect otherwise. There is no conflict here between cars, transit, bicycles and pedestrians. People come first. Always.

Rennes Opera House:

Now the touristy stuff . Mont St. Michel!

Who doesn't love a mideval abbey/castle built on a lone rock outcropping in the sea hundreds of years ago?

Beautiful view from the top:

And they even had something for the urban planning / transit nerds out there. Double-sided buses(!!!):

The driver simple switches to the other end and starts driving. France is shaping up fantastically so far: with history, ridiculous buses and incredible pedestrian infrastructure what could go wrong?

Lessons from Dublin - Chaotic Harmony

I landed in Dublin at 5am July 3rd after the 6-hour red-eye from Toronto. As my flight helped the earth spin a little faster beneath my feet my 11pm was Dublin's 5am. A long day awaits.

Dublin's airport is located to the north of the city and is a quick 20 or 30 minute double-deck bus ride into the heart of the city situated around St Charles Street and the River Liffy.

After some bleary-eyed wandering in the dead-quiet early morning I stumbled upon the hostel. As is common in old cities, hardly a road sign or length of road exists that doesn't change names, curve or dead-end within a block or two; creating the perfect hostel-hiding environment.

Once found it offered a nice view of a typical Dublin street, a few blocks north of the River:

For a Calgarian - or a citizen of much of the world - driving on the left in Dublin creates mental chaos as your brain comes to terms with a new reality. Even more problematic is the complete inconsistency with roads and intersections, a myriad of one-way alleys and streets intersecting at weird and random angles. Yet it works:

I am unsure if pedestrians are an afterthought or completely in charge of what happens. Many streets have pedestrian signals; while on no street does anyone (including police officers) obey them if there is even a slight gap in traffic. People are expected to cross as soon as possible, not based on the signalling. Throw in a surprisingly abundant cycling population and bike share program - Dublin has many bike lanes squeezed into everywhere of varying lengths, widths and consistencies - and driving, walking or cycling is a shockingly chaotic experience.

Dublin also has several modes of public transport. Most obviously is the public bus, consisting of obvious bright-yellow double decker vehicles. It's a great view from the second level, but good luck navigating the chaotic system and the Gaelic-language stops and instructions.

Several distinct advantages that are low cost and obvious improvements that Calgary Transit should emulate immediately: Off-vehicle ticket purchases at key stops preventing confusion and wasted time, automatic transfer/receipt printing on the bus vs. Calgary's archaic small-town paper transfer system, real-time bus stop screens at all stops and -most significantly - bus lanes. Essentially every street has them and they are obviously marked and not infringed on by other traffic. Even a city like Dublin with no reputation for transit service in Europe blows Calgary away with these steps. Buses and the people that ride them are treated as second class citizens in every way in Calgary by comparison. So far it appears Calgary Transit has little appetite, enthusiasm or mandate to mimic easy-win improvements which is mind-boggling considering how readily available examples are of them in a similar sized city like Dublin.

Dublin also has a new train that stands in stark contrast to the millenia-old city:

The tram runs through the heart of the city a block or two north of the River Liffy connecting the north side of the River to Heuston Station , the main intercity and commuter rail hub on the edge of the inner city. Several other lines exist but they don't connect; one stops a few blocks south of the River from this picture.

My favourite thing about it: simplicity. Minimal station infrastructure - essentially just a slightly sloped sidewalk and a few ticket machines - and a dedicated right-of-way through the most congested place in the city. No barriers impede pedestrians from walking along and across the track, the low-profile trains are quiet and efficient while never fast enough to pose a safety risk to pedestrians crossing all along the track everywhere. 

In all the chaos and all the energy of central Dublin there still seems to be a sense of calm. It works. Cars, buses, pedestrians, bicycles and trams crowd everywhere with almost no effort applied to containing or controlling any of them in any consistent way. 

It seems that this chaos is precisely why it works: no one mode of transport dominates the other; cars must watch for pedestrian constantly behaving erratically and even suicidally; pedestrians must watch for cars flying around blind corners; double-decker buses must whip randomly around curves far tighter that were designed without buses in mind.  Cyclists squeeze every possible space being passed within a few centimetres by cars, trucks and buses.

The River Liffy:

In all this, no anger and no horns in three days of Dublin life. The city learned many generations ago that space is shared and that this is the way it is. No one honks if someone behaves out of line or crosses the street when they shouldn't. Drivers, buses, cyclists and trams simply slow down to wait for the careless individual to pass. They are never going of a speed where this is a difficult task.

Perhaps all cities have an adolescent phase of whining and anxiety that is shown every day in downtown Calgary. For all our signage, rules, controls and limits in Calgary - many, many times over more prevalent in our city than Dublin - our streets are far more dangerous and far more aggressive than chaotic Dublin's.

Perhaps the adolescent should learn from the elder. It saves a few steps that Calgary would have to fumble through on its own to achieve a similar level of efficiency, safety and attractiveness of our streets as Dublin.

The reality is we will find these solutions eventually anyways  as we are forced to adapt and be more efficient as Calgary grows. 

It would just be nice to using solutions that are blindingly obvious and proven effective rather than having to wait our own 1,000 years to come to this chaotic harmony.

Urban Lessons from Ottawa to Calgary

The first part of my journey to Ireland and the green-fields beyond was a 6 day stretch in Ottawa for weddings, relatives and Canada Day festivities.

A few thoughts on my impression of Ottawa and what a city like Calgary can learn from it:

Parliament Hill preparations for Canada Day

One of the first feelings I have when arriving in Ottawa from Calgary is the change of pace. Calgary has progressively gotten busier, faster and louder. Ottawa doesn't share this rush. Everything from traffic, to construction projects, to the way that people move around in the city seems to be paced a notch or two below Calgary. Even though the two cities are of similar size, Calgary is noticeably more focused on change where Ottawa's change appears to happen gradually and almost imperceptibly.

That is not to say Ottawa is sleepy; it still after-all is the seat of the federal government, and centres a urban region of a dozen or so fringe cities equalling well over 1 million inhabitants. It is clear that the population and economic growth factors that are so often the principle factor influencing changes to the built form and urban environment are significantly less boom-and-bust than Calgary.

View of new downtown condo projects from the popular high-street, Elgin Street

Like many cities in Canada, the renewed focus and interest in living in the urban centre of Ottawa is very present. New condominiums, restaurants and shops are sprouting throughout the core and other increasingly popular urban strips such as Westboro.

Much more present than in Calgary is bicycle infrastructure and subsequently cyclists. There is clear support for cycling in Ottawa and it does not consist of just the beautiful Ottawa River pathways and Rideau Canal. Lanes, signals and spaces are designated throughout the city, on major arterial roadways and downtown roads. It is clear that the idea of cycling for transportation is considered on far wider swaths of the city than Calgary. Simple, cheap - and most importantly - present infrastructure is key to win public support for cycling initiatives. It is impossible to drive in Ottawa without seeing multiple pieces of cycling infrastructure. It legitimizes cycling in a way that Calgary is only just starting to with its own cycle-track network.



Segregated bicycle lanes on Laurier Ave in Downtown Ottawa. The simplicity and lack of frills is present throughout the cycle network; meaning more lanes and more kilometres of infrastructure; albeit less fancy than Calgary.

Patios are built for the summer along the Rideau Canal, immediately offering life and energy into the park setting. I passed this one on a rented bicycle at 9:00am, hence the lack of "life or energy" in this picture below.

Calgary should absolutely emulate this on every available space in summer months along the Bow River:

Summer patio setup on the banks of the Rideau Canal. The direct Calgary analogy would be temporary patios and beer gardens lining the Bow River Pathway from Kensington to Montgomery. A great idea to better utilize green space in sunny months that sit empty.

 As the capital, it is not surprising that Ottawa has clearly invested in parks and other institutions that are second-to-none in the country:

 

The Rideau Canal is one of the most beautiful waterways in Canada. A web of locks, parks and multi-use pathways stretch from the outskirts to Central Ottawa, a block from Parliament Hill.

 All of the focus on beauty and architecture gives Ottawa a much more romantic and personal side than the average Calgary experience. A lock-bridge has formed spontaneously over the Rideau Canal. The symbolism of connection that a bridge provides is combined with the symbolism of a lock's permanence. The key is traditionally thrown in the canal. Note the plethora of combination locks, suggesting that not all Ottawaians are convinced in the romantic side of the city:

A lock bridge forming over the Rideau Canal near University of Ottawa. A great way to add interest to an urban space.

Ottawa offers many vantage points to reaffirm it's commitment to being beautiful:

The view from behind the Parliament Buildings on Parliament Hill. The structure ahead is the National Gallery of Canada along Sussex Drive, also home to the trendy Byward Market area as well as numerous embassies and the Prime Minister's residence. 

Calgary and Ottawa offer a significant contrast for two cities relatively close together in size. Ottawa's offerings of architecture, bicycle infrastructure and park space is something that should be envied and emulated by any city that wants to attract people to it. It has a quiet confidence that hums along in the background, slowly changing the city and reaffirming it's own identity. As Calgary has grown so fast, it will need to come to terms with a new and ever-changing identity that has grown along with it.

Ottawa offers many ideas of how urban identity and our built environment are connected. I hope that Calgary can use some of the lessons Ottawa provides to strengthen it's own image, ideas and offerings as we continue to develop. There is much here that would be incredible to have in Calgary.

Also Ottawa has formal military marching bands all over the place, which never hurts a city's charm: