Residents and stakeholders in Bragg Creek had the chance to review the draft revitalization plan for the community at an open house Sept. 30 at the Snowbirds Chalet. The evening featured a presentation and question and answer period with planners from Rocky View County (RVC) and McElhanney Consulting, who are working together on the project.
“This draft is a collection of all of the comments we’ve received over this past year, and now we’re looking at what our priorities are,” said Johnson Kwan, planner with RVC. “We’ve had lots of discussions with various groups about what should happen first, and that’s the information we are looking to collect from the community now.”
The plan addresses a number of concerns brought forward by the community, by dividing the hamlet and surrounding area into six distinct sections.
Each area, Kwan said, will involve different stakeholders and will require a different implementation strategy.
“What we are planning to do is develop an Implementation Committee,” Kwan said. “This will be a group of Bragg Creek residents who will work together to oversee the plan and guide it forward, while making sure that it continues to address the needs of residents and stakeholders. We want this committee to be representative of the entire community, to make sure it stays on track.”
In all areas, Kwan said, the plan focuses on the key aspects of maintaining the definitive character of the community, creating community connectedness, and building a thriving and sustainable local economy.
“Some areas are more development driven, like the hamlet core,” Kwan said. “In other areas, the concerns are more related to maintenance issues, with sidewalks or trail systems. The main thing we are trying to do with this plan is to reconnect the entire hamlet, to let them rebuild after what’s happened here.”
The community was devastated by the flood in 2013 and, according to resident Shelley Shea, has been in desperate need of “new life” and a sense of direction. While she said she was excited about the vision of the plan, her concern is with the traffic congestion caused by the roundabout connecting Highway 22 to Highway 8.
“I really think one of the things that will hold us back as we move forward with this plan is the entrance to our community,” she said. “People get frustrated coming in and out. Any nice weekend, both residents and visitors end up sitting in traffic for half an hour just waiting to get through. We need to make it easy for people to come here, as well as providing them with the services they need once they get here.”
According to Kwan, once the team has had the chance to compile the newly collected input from the open house into the draft, the finalized plan will be presented to council in December or early 2016.
“This is not a statutory document, like an Area Structure Plan (ASP), but some of the next steps might be to amend some of the ASP policies,” he said. “To do that, though, here will be further public consultation and additional steps to go through, and this revitalization plan provides a focus on the actions themselves – things that are related to planning but don’t have to be included in an ASP. This identifies general directions Bragg Creek wants to go as a community.”
For more information, go to rockyview.ca and search for “Bragg Creek Revitalization Plan.”
