Looking Beyond the Park Boundary

Environmental design student Elyse Barchard’s work seeks to ensure the Harvie
family’s land maintains its value for future generations.  

By Joe Obad

Master of Environmental Design student Elyse Barchard’s thesis project offers regional planners alternatives to allow for development near Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park that maintain the park’s connection to the wider eco-region.

Standing beside a stretch of the Bow River on the eastern fringe of Cochrane, Elyse Barchard can see two very different futures for one of Alberta’s newest protected areas, the Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park.

For now, this riverside habitat is in good shape. Thanks to the philanthropic Harvie family, 3,246 acres along the north side of the Bow River between Cochrane and Calgary will be protected as a provincial park. 

There is much here worth protecting. The coulees drain from the prairie down into aspen-filled groves that host a rich web of wildlife such as coyotes, foxes, Richardson ground squirrels and deer. Some are migrants; others live in the area all year round. When the park was announced in the spring of 2007, it was warmly received across the province as way to safeguard the area from Alberta’s hunger for riverfront development.

But Barchard’s work as a student in the U of C’s Faculty of Environmental Design tells her this story is still unfolding—there are choices beyond the park designation to be made that will affect the area’s future.

“We’re blessed to have a family like the Harvies make this contribution, but the development pressures that spurred Neil Harvie’s idea for this area still exist outside of the proposed park,” says Barchard. “Without strong land-use planning on the lands bordering the park, those pressures could turn the park into an island in a sea of development, diminishing the Harvie family’s gift.”

Barchard’s concerns are well founded. For now, large ranches and a few acreages occupy the adjacent lands just north of the new park. However, this area is predicted to experience strong growth pressures in the near future, due to a number of factors such as the westward extension of the C-train in Calgary; the construction of the Calgary ring road; and a growing population in the Municipal District of Rocky View. If traditional development practices are used in the area, it may lead to the ecological isolation of Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park, much like Nose Hill Park in Calgary.

Residents of the MD of Rocky View share these concerns. Summaries of public open houses on the matter identified concerns for water resources, the environment, preservation of wildlife habitat and the disappearance of the family farm.

Fortunately, Barchard can see beyond the simplified options of “development” or “no development.” Her master’s degree project identifies ways that municipal planners in both Calgary and Rocky View can still develop the areas adjacent to the park while minimizing the impact on the ecology of the park and the wildlife corridors that connect the park area to the wider region.

Using principles of landscape ecology and ecological design, Barchard modelled two potential development outcomes for the region bordering the park. In the first scenario using typical development patterns, Barchard shows how the ecological connectivity between the park and surrounding region significantly diminishes, creating ecological isolation. In the second scenario, she demonstrates that if development is clustered in certain patterns, vibrant communities can be built that are functional for residents, profitable to developers yet still maintain connections from the park to the wider eco-region by maintaining critical habitat patches.

In fact, under Barchard’s alternate scenario, future residents would enjoy the open space between the development clusters as recreational corridors that could link Calgary to Cochrane.

Barchard’s work is making a real difference to planning. The Calgary Regional Partnership (CRP) is a new approach to proactively solving regional issues through cooperation between the City of Calgary and surrounding municipalities. As part of a partnership between the University of Calgary and the CRP, student work like Barchard’s is informing everyday planning in the region.

Bob Miller from the City of Calgary’s strategic planning department is on secondment to the CRP. Miller says work like Barchard’s is a huge resource to municipal planners across the region.

“Planning with constrained resources can limit us to historical practices that we need to move past,” says Miller. “But working with student partners like Elyse brings more resources to bear on specific challenges where we don’t have the time or resources to test various scenarios. Elyse and others also bring fresh eyes to projects where we might be inclined to go with established practices.”

Miller is careful to note that there is no direct or automatic leap from research projects to actual municipal planning. However, he underlines the importance of nudging busy planners out of traditional grooves through collaborations such as Barchard’s work.

For Barchard’s part, the opportunity to influence planning even from her graduate studies is encouraging and affirms her choice in graduate programs. “I chose the Faculty of Environmental Design because of its emphasis on interdisciplinary,” she says. “Coming from an undergrad degree in biology, EVDS exposed me to enough other disciplines that I could work on a project like this confidently—even though some planning aspects of the project are pretty far from my undergrad studies.”

After convocation, Barchard will be volunteering this summer at a National Wildlife Park in South Africa. She shrugs off the suggestion that she’s returning to pure biology work.

“I really value parks and protected areas, but there’s so much work to be done where developed areas and protected areas meet. I hope I can make some more contributions on that front in the future.”