[policyenthusiast]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I am not an idiot. I am just offering an opinion that differs from yours. I know that a lot of people on this Board hate suburbia, and given the title of the thread, that speaks volumes given that it is so offensive. Imagine if the Capital Line Thread was labeled “North South Crime and Homeless Highway”?

It does appear that “Pierre Poilievre of the left” on City Council loves to pit neighbourhood against neighbourhood. Cool, as he is catering to his base. However the inconvenient truth is that no residential development has historically paid for themselves. When the post WWII neighbourhoods, with their massively inefficient street network and huge predominantly single family lots, were built, their taxes were subsidized by industrial and commercial taxes, just like now.

I would argue that the tax situation that we are in now isn’t caused by suburban development, and instead it is a result of the City not doing enough to attract industry. The City has made residential development a priority on much of the lands beyond the Henday, whereas I would contend that much of this land should have been dedicated to industrial development.

Around twenty years ago one Alberta municipality undertook a comprehensive cost of community services study. It found that it spent $1.81 in servicing every $1 in residential collected; $0.74 in servicing every $1 in commercial taxes collected; and $0.09 in servicing every $1 in industrial tax collected. Hence the municipality focused its economic development efforts on attracting and retaining commercial and industrial businesses and requiring residential development to densify.

Fast forward to Edmonton today. Commercial is in trouble due to on line shopping. I would argue that Amazon, while they may have one? warehouse in Edmonton, is a net drain on the City due to infrastructure costs as a result of their trucks and vans using our streets, and their packaging entering our waste stream. Services have replaced some commercial, but to think that every six storey building should have the main floor dedicated to commercial is a fantasy. Where Edmonton has always been weak, is attracting industrial development. Calgary has done a far better job of this, as witnessed by the massive number of new light industrial warehousing and distribution builds that have gone up over the past several years. Before everyone jumps on me to say that the surrounding rural municipalities have lower taxes, there are tools in the Municipal Government Act that allow municipalities to provide incentives. Edmonton could heavily incent the first 10 to 15 years on taxes to match surrounding rurals, given that the ROI is so great.

You are correct (mostly), but walkability and corporate attraction are not two sides of a scale. If anything, businesses are more attracted to density.

 

[ADob]

I'm curious why you'd call the term "sprawl" offensive if you didn't dislike the concept itself. I find the term merely descriptive.

 

[thommyjo]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I am not an idiot. I am just offering an opinion that differs from yours. I know that a lot of people on this Board hate suburbia, and given the title of the thread, that speaks volumes given that it is so offensive. Imagine if the Capital Line Thread was labeled “North South Crime and Homeless Highway”?

It does appear that “Pierre Poilievre of the left” on City Council loves to pit neighbourhood against neighbourhood. Cool, as he is catering to his base. However the inconvenient truth is that no residential development has historically paid for themselves. When the post WWII neighbourhoods, with their massively inefficient street network and huge predominantly single family lots, were built, their taxes were subsidized by industrial and commercial taxes, just like now.

I would argue that the tax situation that we are in now isn’t caused by suburban development, and instead it is a result of the City not doing enough to attract industry. The City has made residential development a priority on much of the lands beyond the Henday, whereas I would contend that much of this land should have been dedicated to industrial development.

Around twenty years ago one Alberta municipality undertook a comprehensive cost of community services study. It found that it spent $1.81 in servicing every $1 in residential collected; $0.74 in servicing every $1 in commercial taxes collected; and $0.09 in servicing every $1 in industrial tax collected. Hence the municipality focused its economic development efforts on attracting and retaining commercial and industrial businesses and requiring residential development to densify.

Fast forward to Edmonton today. Commercial is in trouble due to on line shopping. I would argue that Amazon, while they may have one? warehouse in Edmonton, is a net drain on the City due to infrastructure costs as a result of their trucks and vans using our streets, and their packaging entering our waste stream. Services have replaced some commercial, but to think that every six storey building should have the main floor dedicated to commercial is a fantasy. Where Edmonton has always been weak, is attracting industrial development. Calgary has done a far better job of this, as witnessed by the massive number of new light industrial warehousing and distribution builds that have gone up over the past several years. Before everyone jumps on me to say that the surrounding rural municipalities have lower taxes, there are tools in the Municipal Government Act that allow municipalities to provide incentives. Edmonton could heavily incent the first 10 to 15 years on taxes to match surrounding rurals, given that the ROI is so great.

Your concern and comparison on this thread title and the idea of the LRT one shows you’re being driven by ideology over facts. While sprawl can be used with negative connotations, it’s also just a commonly used term to describe the outward growth of cities.

My comments about your claims on walkability are simply to name a spade a spade. Let’s not pretend this development is better than it is. Let’s not use anecdotes of people being able to walk to it to cloud the reality that 95%+ will drive to it.

Is this the reality we currently have for development, retail, commercial financing, etc in suburban areas?. Sure. But we can name the problems it continues to bring and call for better.

The “neighborhoods don’t pay for themselves” argument is also such a logical fallacy. We can all acknowledge that while being net positive isn’t possible for most, a 85% recapture vs a 55% recapture is a big deal. If industrial, downtown, and Garneau need to subsidize the city, let’s help as many neighborhoods have as small of tax burden as we can vs simply throwing our arms up and acting like there’s no point because all neighborhoods will just lose money.