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outoftheice said:
Council has directed Administration to do two things.

1. Prepare a bylaw to repeal blanket rezoning and go back to the old zoning with a caveat that any development permit obtained prior to the repeal date will be grandfathered in.
2. Prepare a bylaw to heavily modify what is permitted as part of R-CG zoning.

Council will debate both bylaws and hear from the public on them in March. The reason why it can't occur any sooner is that bylaw modifications like the ones being proposed have strict public advertising timelines and so in order to comply with the requirements of the Municipal Government Act, March is pretty much the soonest anything can happen.

Personally I'm almost more concerned with #2 versus #1. Repealing blanket rezoning is going to add cost and delay to infill projects but there is still the opportunity for them to get built after a developer jumps through the hoops.

I've been told by people smarter than me that the modifications to R-CG that Council has directed Administration to make will essentially make it completely unfeasable to build any sort of in-fill project using R-CG ever again. The worst part is these amendments were supported by many of the pro-housing Councillors and the entire conversation has flown under the radar because everyone is so focused on the blanket rezoning repeal instead.
Click to expand...
Thank you for the insights!
 
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In the first year following blanket rezoning, Calgary moved significantly closer to its goal of a 50/50 split between greenfield and infill. This goal has been around since 2009 and is meant to deliver billions in infrastructure cost savings. So yup, makes absolute total sense to kill blanket rezoning and slide things back in the other direction...

"In 2025, growth in new communities accounted for 57 per cent of the new homes citywide while existing communities (developed areas) accounted for 43 per cent. About 13,000 new homes were issued building permits in new communities while the developed areas saw about 9,600 new homes.

For comparison, in 2024, new communities made up 73 per cent of the citywide share compared to developed areas which captured 27 per cent. Over the last five years, new communities have made up 69 per cent of the citywide share compared to developed areas which captured 31 per cent on average."

newsroom.calgary.ca

2025 marks another record year for housing delivery in Calgary

Calgary continued to lead the country in housing delivery in 2025, setting new records across the development and construction pipeline as The City of Calgary worked to meet population growth and improve housing supply, choice, and affordability for Calgarians. "Another record year of creating...
newsroom.calgary.ca newsroom.calgary.ca
 
Two things regarding rezoning coming out today...

livewirecalgary.com

CHMC letter to Calgary city council: Don't reintroduce exclusionary zoning - LiveWire Calgary

It’s the Calgary citywide rezoning / Housing Accelerator Fund (HAF) story that won’t go away. In the latest turn of events, city administration and councillors received a letter late Monday that has been interpreted by some as the strongest signal yet that the feds may withhold funding should...
livewirecalgary.com livewirecalgary.com

https://twitter.com/x/status/2021624571951190248
 
Mayor Farkas said that he’s been in contact with his federal counterparts, including reassurance from the Prime Minister, that they recognize Calgary has been a leader in housing nationwide.

“Obviously, the federal government would like to see much more density, much more zoning applied across cities, across from coast to coast to coast. But the local context really matters, and also the written words of the agreement really matter,” Farkas said.

“So, when you look at the housing accelerator fund agreement that’s been posted online at the City of Calgary website, it doesn’t speak to four units by right. It does not speak to city wide zoning approaches. What it does speak to is specific outcomes.”
Click to expand...

The written words of the agreement clearly give CMHC full discretion to withhold or reduce funding if they are not satisfied. But I'm sure they'll be swayed but some local exceptionalism argument...

The agreement is more akin to a philanthropy agreement than a typical bilateral contract. A quarter billion dollars aren't typically exchanged based on a dozen bullet points - most of which are like 6 words or less.


It will be interesting to see how it's calculated if it comes to that. The other thing here is that in arguing for the land-use reversion, councillors have bluntly claimed that the rezoning has failed to deliver. We're parsing six word phrases here, but has 'streamlining approvals by undertaking city initiated redesignations' really incentivize 2500 units? IIRC the number specifically attributed to upzoning was quite a bit lower than that, though maybe that number was just limited to R-CG (and H-GO would hit that target?). In any event, there is lots of room for interpretation here, but where the agreement is actually written like a proper contract it gives CMHC sole discretion to do such interpreting.

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