Letters to the editor: City can do better on housing crisis

Posted on September 22, 2023

Mary Moran’s letter in the Herald makes many excellent points. 

It’s mind boggling to me that two good friends of mine in Capitol Hill — a stone’s-throw from the university — applied for a building permit with the city of Calgary to build a laneway house two years ago. After a lot of time and money, they’ve just now received the OK to start building.

In the meantime, two university kids could have been going to school and living blocks from the U of C in a comfortable and safe laneway house.

Now there is a housing crisis in Calgary. University students can’t find housing, newly arrived immigrants are homeless, and students and grandparents are moving back into the family home, not to mention the worsening homeless situation.

Now the city is trying to do a blanket rezone of the entire city, allowing R1 and R1/ R2 areas to be developed by any builder without any consideration or input from Calgary homeowners or communities. Restrictive covenants be damned.

Will these developers have to wait 24 months to have their building permits approved?

Come on Calgary city council, we can do better.

Pedestrians share responsibility for safety

Re: Pedestrian in life-threatening condition after being struck; Letters, Sept. 15

Pedestrian accidents are often blamed on the driver. However, it is the responsibility of both pedestrians and drivers to avoid these collisions.

After reading much of the pedestrian safety research and publishing a book chapter on the subject, I realize that pedestrians and drivers are about equally at fault in these accidents. In about 42 per cent, each are at fault according to one study done several years ago. In the remainder, both share the responsibility.

In a recent accident that killed a pedestrian on 24th Avenue N.W., there is no crosswalk there and no intersection in which to cross. I am familiar with the location, as I live one block from it.

However, there is a marked crosswalk with flashing beacons about 50 metres east of the location.

Robert Dewar, Calgary

The federal Liberal government recently threatened grocers with tax measures if prices don’t stabilize.

How are higher taxes for grocers going to translate into lower prices that “we” pay for at the grocery store? How is that going to affect price inflation?

The taxes go into government coffers, not people’s pockets. Underlying price inflation won’t change, it will just be taxed at a higher level. It won’t make any difference to the people, including themselves.

This policy has not been very well thought out. But, hey, they are rich, so what if and so what?

Is this another one of Chrystia Freeland’s fantastical delusions as announced by “King Justin” and the fawning sycophants of the Liberal Party of Canada?

Brian Leslie Engler, B.C.