A plan to turn an old Calgary high school into 2,500 homes is underway

Existing site of Viscount Bennett (top) and an illustrative artistic rendering of the proposed development (bottom). (Google Maps | Minto Communities)

With a land use redesignation application submitted and community engagement sessions in progress, the plan to redevelop an old Calgary high school is well underway.

Whether you know it as Viscount Bennett or the Chinook Learning Services centre, you’ve likely gone past the now-vacant building driving down Crowchild Trail.

The building was most recently used as a Calgary Board of Education (CBE) high school upgrading facility, before it was shut down in 2018.

Before that, it was a junior and senior high school built in the 1950s.

You might also like:

“The site has been under-utilized for a very long time, I’ll put it that way,” Courtney Walcott, the City councillor for the area, told Daily Hive Urbanized.

“I look at a piece of land like this, and we know that we have to build more homes for people.”

An illustrative rendering of what the site could look like. (Minto Communities)

Earlier this year, developer Minto Communities bought the property, located at 2501 Richmond Road SW from the CBE.

They want to turn it into an area in the community consisting of multi-unit residential buildings and open parks, and connect that to the existing neighbourhood.

The company submitted a land use redesignation application to the City of Calgary on November 15 to do just that.

It wants to use the land currently zoned as R-C1, meaning low-density or single dwelling to: M-H1 or high-density, low-rise district; M-H2 or high-density, medium-rise district; and M-H3 or high-density, high-rise district.

A change in the zoning designation would allow the developer to go through with its proposal to build 2,500 housing units at the site.

An illustration that shows the proposed changes to the site. (Minto Communities)

Community residents, however, have raised concerns about the proposed redevelopment. A lot of worries circulate on traffic, parking, and transportation.

According to Minto, a number of improvements would be made to deal with the issue. For driving, the company identified that there would need to be a new signal and left turn lane at 25th Street and 26th Avenue SW; a new signal at 29th Street and Richmond Road SW; an all-way stop at 25th Street and Richmond Road SW; and road upgrades at 25th Street SW from 26th to 30th Avenues.

Sidewalk improvements would need to be done along site frontages, curb extensions would be needed at 25th Street and Richmond Road SW, and an upgraded pathway would be integrated through the site and tie into network improvements on 26 Avenue SW.

The company said it also identified opportunities to support the development through alternative travel modes, including transit, by moving up the BRT stop closer to the site to provide more direct connectivity.

An illustration showing proposed traffic and transit changes to the Viscount Bennett site area. (Minto Communities)

Residents have also expressed opposition regarding the size of the rebuild itself.

“There is, right now, a lot of publicly stated opposition to development at the proposed scale,” Walcott said.

“If you’re in opposition to this and you say that this is an inappropriate number, well, let’s have a conversation.”

Early conceptual plans show that Minto wants to turn this site into about a dozen buildings that range from four to six storeys in height and a high-rise tower.

“Our goal right now is to appeal to a wide range of people. So we’re looking at everything from owners to renters, and then all kinds of demographics within that,” said Nora Fraser, the vice president of development at Minto Group.

“We’re looking at all housing forms, we’re looking at different options. We know that affordability is something that’s a real challenge in the city right now.”

You might also like: