The project
Our Snowpark Society is working towards the creation of Calgary’s first urban snowsport facility that will be central, admission free and accessible by public transit. Currently, many Calgarians are excluded from participating in snowsports due to financial, locational and cultural barriers. With rising lift ticket prices, remote destinations and an exclusive lifestyle, snowsports participation is currently limited to a minority of Calgary’s population.
By removing present barriers to local snowsports participation, OURS hopes to increase access to snowsports to improve the health and wellbeing of Calgarians and their communities. The establishment of an urban snowpark facility following a proven hikepark model would not only improve the social, mental and physical health of Calgarians, but the facility will also become a community gathering space that fosters unique connections and partnerships.
Hikeparks are understood as the winter compliment to skateparks, offering users a variety of terrain park features on a snow-covered slope to be hiked. Considering Calgary’s Olympic legacy in wintersport and the City’s significant investment in skatepark amenities for summer use, all Calgarians should have access to snowsport facilities for winter recreation. In fact, Calgary’s sprawling hills and vast river valleys already create the perfect landscape for an inner-city snowsport facility that would offer Calgarians unstructured and spontaneous active recreation.
Snotech Hike Parks in Quebec Learn more
Montreal is already home to over a dozen snowsparks of this nature, and since both Canadian cities share similar weather and geographical conditions, winter recreation projects happening there can be used as an accurate example of what can be achieved here.
NEXT STEPS
3- get it built.
2- Fund the project.
1- secure the site.
Site secured
Deerfoot Athletic Park
Currently in the second stage of the site approval process with the City of Calgary
Located at the intersection of Deerfoot Trail (Highway 2) and 16th Street (Highway 1), this
location is highly visible and accessible by popular traffic routes. The park is already recognized as a summer recreation hub with its four baseball diamonds, three tennis courts, large sportsfield and a hillside that extends the entire length of the park. During the winter months, this hillside is a City designated tobogganing hill that has been attracting thrillseekers for generations. Undoubtedly, the hillside has also been used informally over the years for other types of sliding, such as skiing and snowboarding.
Nestled between the neighborhoods of Mayland Heights, Belfast and Vista Heights, this space belongs to the Crossroads Community Association that describes the local community as being underserved and overlooked in terms of publicly funded amenities in the City. The Community Association has already confirmed its full support of the project and believes a novel snowsport facility of the nature outlined in this proposal would positively impact their community members. Although still central, this location is found slightly NorthEast of the City Centre and would therefore offer increased access to the many deserving communities of the entire NE Quadrant.
LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Our Snowpark Society would like to acknowledge that our work and play takes place on the ancestral land of Treaty 7 region of Southern Alberta. This includes the Blackfoot Confederacy which comprises the Siksika, Kainai and Piikani First Nations; Tsuut’ina First Nations as well as Îethka Nakoda Wîcastabi which includes the Good Stoney, Chiniki and Bearspaw First Nations. It is important to know the traditional name of Calgary is Moh-kins-tsis and is home to the Métis Nation of Alberta, Region III. It is an essential step towards reconciliation to understand and honor these lands as a tribute to the original stewardship of the First Nations, upon whose ancestral homelands we learn, share and promote the joys of snowsports.