City of Calgary report says blanket rezoning has required 'minimal' infrastructure upgrades

A report by the City of Calgary presented to councillors says blanket rezoning has so far required only "minimal" upgrades to infrastructure.

It contradicts what has been a common complaint about the controversial policy. Increased pressure on aging infrastructure was cited as a reason for repealing the policy in a motion filed last month.

The report examined nearly 2,000 homes approved under blanket rezoning since October 2024, and found less than one per cent of those required upgrades to public utilities. Those would include services like roads, water and wastewater. It found no upgrades were needed for mobility networks or parks.

Maggie Choi, the city's manager of growth infrastructure planning, made the presentation Wednesday to members of the infrastructure and planning committee.

She said the previous council directed the city to look at infrastructure as it relates to Residential Grade-Oriented Infill (R-CG) applications, the policy that allows for new homes, duplexes and rowhouses in established neighbourhoods.

"At a street or a block level, the change related to new R-CG development can look and feel significant," Choi told the committee. "However, from an infrastructure perspective, the impact has been minimal."

Choi said the 1,949 homes approved under blanket rezoning the city looked at are largely dispersed across pre-1970s neighbourhoods, and represent about one in every 240 homes in those areas.

The city says a third of those new builds replaced older, previously single-detached homes, rather than adding net new homes.

Ward 10 Coun. Andre Chabot, who chairs the committee, expressed his doubts to reporters following the presentation.

"[Blanket rezoning] is very concentrated in certain areas, which will trigger a need to improve or add capacity to some of that infrastructure at some point in the future," Chabot said.

He contrasted infill with greenfield developments, where typically the developer building new housing on previously untouched land will shoulder the responsibility of paying for the infrastructure.

But with blanket rezoning, he said, it won't be possible to pinpoint one particular development as the reason for upgrades needed.

"So who ends up paying for it? Property taxes," he said.

In a statement, the Calgary Inner City Builders Association praised the report, saying it provided "clear, data-driven, and evidence-based analysis that accurately reflects the realities of redevelopment in Calgary’s established communities."