City launches sales for housing parcels at site of former mobile home park

The City of Calgary put the first sites of Midfield Heights up for sale to developers Tuesday, marking another step toward its goal of creating a "vibrant," mixed-use housing village.

The nearly 10-hectare plot of land north of 16th Avenue N.E. and east of Moncton Road N.E., was the former home of the Midfield Mobile Home Park, which was bulldozed in 2018 after tenants were evicted, with the city blaming deteriorating underground water and sanitary lines.

Since then, the city says it has undertaken extensive work across the property, from utility repair to slope stabilization to tree removal, in preparation for putting it on the market.

Marcia Andreychuk, a spokesperson with the City of Calgary, said they are seeking "experienced, mixed-use, multi-family developers" for the five sites that were launched Tuesday.

A commercial site will be put up for sale in the fall, and a final, seventh site is being held for the next non-market land sale, said Andreychuk.

"In future years, we're looking forward to the vertical construction on Midfield Heights to bring up to 1,500 new homes to the area where in the past we had about 180 mobile homes," she added.

"This will be a vibrant, mixed-use village of ... new homes for Calgarians, much-needed homes."

While development parcels are sold, the rest of this year will be focused on construction across the site, including putting in roads, sidewalks, street lighting and two parks.

"And also we would not expect to see any further land-use applications," Andreychuk said.

"We expect the purchasers to build this according to the plan developed by the city. It's a master-planned community with great access and connection to Renfrew across the street."

Speaking with reporters on Tuesday, Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek said she wished the city had been able to move quicker to move the project along.

"When it comes to Midfield, there was a significant amount of work that had to be done with folks that were living there at the time and making sure that they were put into safe housing situations," said Gondek.

"So that took some time. Since then, there has been a lot of land development work that had to take place. There were approvals that had to be done. I don't believe we've moved as quickly as we could on that site. And so I'm very encouraged to see that there is action taking place now."

Andreychuk said the future timeline of the site is now in the hands of buyers.

"Once they purchase the site, they'll be looking to build as quickly as they can and we're looking to accommodate that and support whatever needs to be done for them to get in the ground as soon as possible."