The_Cat
Senior Member
I hope that the gondola can be revisited. In the meantime, I hope the city (and possibly other levels of government) can review the historical status of the Rossdale area as a whole.
There's been a ton of work done trying to recover residential school burials, and it's frequently not successful. We just don't have the technology yet. I think you're absolutely right.I think the issue is there isn't a clear, defined location for the burial grounds. The monument you cite is deliberately incomplete; they knew there were other graves under the road. That lack of clear definition got spun into the 'All of the Power Plant site is a graveyard' thinking that we are seeing now. I don't have enough of the history to know if any graves were where the current plant is, (although there's absolutely no way there's anything under or around that building now though; the foundations are very deep, there is a huge amount of underground services running to and from the plant, and there were other buildings there before the current structure was built, all of which would have irreparably disturbed the soils at the site) but the lack of definitions surrounding what was there, and where precisely it was, created this ambiguity that i think a lot of people latched onto to pull down the project.
I've come off really callous here. I do think the site needs to be respected, but respect means figuring out what was/is there, through archeological means, surveys, better research, etc. having the site sit empty, decaying, behind chainlink, with no intiatives to change or resolve that state happening, is not an answer. and I do think there needs to be better, more commonly known background to the history of Rossdale. There very well may be more to the story, but the monument there is commemorating a post-contact burial ground of Fort Edmonton residents, both Indigenous and European, that wound down as Edmonton (the City) grew up around the fort. That's a much smaller site to commemorate than a lot of the commentary happening around the gondola would imply. there's been a power plant on the site since the 1890s. in 1924 it was a coal dump for the plant.
Not a bad idea, but I think the uncertain future of RE/MAX Field could be an issue amongst other things. There are amazing plans for West Rossdale if all the pieces fall in place, but so far it seems none have and I wonder if they ever will.If Prairie Sky wants to revise their plans, relocate that stop from the Rossdale Power Plant to RE/MAX Field. The gondola stop can be SW or NW of the baseball diamond. From that stop, the gondola can sail above the power plant and across the river. The power plant is just a 1 or 2 minute walk from RE/MAX Field. The effects on the Rossdale Transportation project would be minimal at best. And it should be reasonably far enough from the indigenous sacred lands and burial site.
I am guessing they might be waiting to see how Blatchford goes and gain knowledge from that experience. Arguably, it might have been better to start with something smaller. as the City seems to really struggle with larger projects, but it is too late to go back in a time machine and change that now. I'm also not sure if the City is very eager to be a developer/developer of last resort, although it may come to that eventually for such hard to develop central areas.Question for those who have knowledge of this specific concept: why has the city not established a real estate trust company with the sole purpose to develop the Rossdale lands? Or for that matter, why has the city not established a real estate trust company to develop Rossdale, Blatchford, The Quarters, Northlands?
The U of A has established its U of A Properties Trust to develop and re-develop several properties, Calgary has the Calgary Municipal Land Corp that developed the East Village. Why is the city intent on either 1. doing it themselves ala Blatchford or 2. sitting on more central undeveloped land potential (Rossdale, The Quarters, Northlands) when we could be advancing central communities that could tie into things like the Gondola?
Edit: I believe one of the council members ran on a platform to spur development in Rossdale and I havent heard a single thing on that...perhaps an indicative sign that the city has no vision in this area and will sit status quo for the next decade
emphasis added...I am guessing they might be waiting to see how Blatchford goes and gain knowledge from that experience. Arguably, it might have been better to start with something smaller. as the City seems to really struggle with larger projects, but it is too late to go back in a time machine and change that now. I'm also not sure if the City is very eager to be a developer/developer of last resort, although it may come to that eventually for such hard to develop central areas.
My guess: There is zero political will to touch anything to do with this site going forward. Way too contentious and there isn't a cohesive enough vision (or any demonstrated vision really) on Council to move forward with anything Admin proposes.So I wonder what plan B the city has for accessing the power station that they are so keen to develop? I may have to write to Anne Stevenson to find out. What ever solution they come up with they are going to have to do the leg with consultations.