This week’s notes are a bit shorter, not as many things to announce as just after everyone returned from holidays.
- EEDC’s CEO Brad Ferguson was quoted being quite bullish on downtown population growth, expecting to double its population in 7-10 years. While that is great news for downtown, we haven’t seen any forecasts quite that optimistic. If it was true, think of it like this: a 23 story condo with 150 units and with an average of 1.5 residents per unit is 225 people per building. At 13,000 new residents, that is almost 58 new condo towers!
- Several board members of DECL and Oliver CL, and representatives from the Edmonton Bicycle Commuters’ Society, meet tonight to briefly discuss moving forward with planning and advocating for new, dedicated bike lanes in our communities. These will be in line with what is already approved for the Downtown LRT Connector and other plans. Connecting our communities through bike lanes make this mode of transportation all the more relevant. Follow #yegbike on twitter as planning progresses!
- Our friends at the Oliver Community League are hosting their second board games night next week. We encourage everyone to it check out, it was loads of fun at December’s inaugural event!
- Live Local Alberta’s Fork Fest Winter 2013 starts this Saturday. Check out the participating downtown restaurants, including Blue Plate Diner, Sabor Divino, and Lazia.
- Reminder – Deadline for submissions to IllumiNITE light sculpture competition is this Friday, January 18.
- There are many events coming up celebrating our new WinterCity Strategy and winter in Edmonton. DECL and Oliver are working on a joint tobogganing afternoon, and Latitude 53 will unveil the return of last year’s successful winter patio party sometime in March. Stay warm and stay tuned!
- The City of Edmonton has released a new waste collection schedule. Downtown’s designated day is Wednesday, and will be the same day year ’round.
- Nomad Mobile tweeted a photo of their new raw space in the McLeod Building. We’re excited to see this take shape!
- Speaking of Rice Howard Way – The Journal did a piece on the new ‘Cathedral of Beer‘, aka Craft Beer Market, opening on RHW, and a nice feature on Undergroud Tap‘s selection as well. All these new businesses will help provide residents and tourists at the hotels with some more options in that area of downtown.
- I picked up a flyer for a possible new art gallery in the Earnest Brown Block on Jasper Avenue, east of 97 Street, at an art market at the Deep Freeze Festival this past weekend. Could this building finally be renovated soon and new influx of businesses help revitalize that section of Jasper?