More than water: Calgary infrastructure woes putting pressure on city hall

Two catastrophic pipe ruptures have put Calgary’s water system under a microscope, but Evan Spencer sees a bigger problem.

The pair of Bearspaw feeder main breaks 18 months apart has led to greater scrutiny of how Calgary manages its drinking water, especially after an independent report was released this month. Unclear oversight and years of deferred maintenance were cited as factors in the 2024 break, in a system further weakened by leaky pipes.

But it's not just in the water where Spencer, the former Ward 12 city councillor, sees red flags. He sees it in Calgary’s roads and public transit, all compounded by Calgary's population boom.

In 2024, Spencer gathered an estimate from city administration of what it would cost Calgary to simply maintain its infrastructure at its current level. He called for a vote to cover the $480 million in new spending through tax increases over the following three years — to better maintain streets and sidewalks, recreation facilities, public transit and parks.

The idea was shot down nearly unanimously by council, but Spencer now says he accomplished his goal to put more attention on Calgary's infrastructure needs, a growing issue over generations of leadership that he said sought to offer a high quality of service while maintaining a low cost of living. 

“Every year, as we add more people to this city, our service level on the aggregate is dropping for every Calgarian,” Spencer told CBC News.

“We’re selling a promise we can’t afford to keep right now.”

Calgary’s projected infrastructure gap was estimated to be more than $7.7 billion in 2020. That figure represents the value of unfunded infrastructure investment needs in the ensuing decade. Spencer expects an updated figure will be brought to council this year, and that it will be significantly larger.

A recent report on the risks the city faces found 11 per cent of Calgary’s total infrastructure is in poor or very poor condition.

But doing the work to fix existing infrastructure that is sometimes invisible and often taken for granted can be difficult to communicate, says University of Calgary political science professor Jack Lucas.

“There’s not a lot of people campaigning for mayor on a platform that’s relentlessly focused on water,” said Lucas.

"Most of the time, it’s the hard work that leads to no visible event [that's] success. There’s no pipe exploding, there’s no power outage. It’s a little hard to explain in those cases, ‘Here’s what I did for you over the course of the last four years.’”

Many of the criticisms hurled at Calgary’s drinking water management this month apply across the utility, said Angus Chu.

The University of Calgary civil engineering professor argues the city’s rapid growth has put more strain on Calgary’s water demand, and its wastewater system needs more resources for its upkeep.