Suddenly There’s Room at the Inn
On a recent Thursday outside the Coliseum Inn, a woman in wrinkled clothes balances a large blue sleeping bag atop her shoulder. In the parking lot a man pushes a shopping cart overflowing with [...]
Housing
Housing
Finding Home
Amber Cannon first applied for a subsidized apartment from Calgary Housing Company (CHC) in 1998, when she was 23 years old. Securing public housing would become an eight-year odyssey. Cannon [...]
By Yutaka Dirks
Secondary Suites
Like many Calgarians, Martin and Diane Tremblay live in a large suburban home that has more floor area than they need. After their two sons moved out, the walk-out basement, which backs onto [...]
By Jeff Doherty
Built to Last
On Highway 43, near the Alberta–British Columbia boundary, I turn my car down a dirt path and come upon a clearing. One left turn and I have arrived in Demmitt, a tiny hamlet an hour west of [...]
By Amy Fung
Sky-High Rents
Marni Armstrong received the shock of her life when she opened the envelope. Enclosed was a notice from her landlord explaining that the rent for her one-bedroom apartment in the Mission district [...]
By Mike Sadava
The Little Neighbourhood That Could
Frank Mcloone reaches for the ringing phone in his office at Inglewood Silver Threads, a seniors organization located in the old Inglewood Telephone Exchange. He picks up and immediately sings a [...]
MOST READ
MOST READ
The Lesson of Lougheed
For 100 years, between 1905 and 2005, Albertans changed their government only three times (1921, 1935, 1971). The last of these elections, the most portentous, happened 50 years ago this August. Alberta has now changed government twice in the past six years. The next election may see yet another new government—meaning ...
The Assault on Higher Education
The Kenney government proclaimed in fall 2019 that Alberta’s post-secondary institutions were “overly dependent” on government funding—which is an odd thing to say about a public good. Then it declared that the province’s grant to the schools should be reduced by 20 per cent by 2023. The rationale for this ...
Rediscovering a River
The Cree called it Kisiskâciwanisîpiy—the swiftly flowing river. For the Blackfoot, it was omaka-ty—the big river. It starts in the Columbia Icefield, at the toe of the Saskatchewan Glacier, and cuts the province in half as it flows through Banff and Jasper national parks, northeast to Edmonton, then east-by-southeast across the ...