BANFF – Jan and Adam Waterous’ dream for a car-free Banff was created around the family’s kitchen table in 2016.
In the intervening years, the couple has come up with a proposal for a multi-modal transportation hub on the railway lands at the west entrance to town, complete with the return of passenger rail from Calgary, an aerial gondola to Mount Norquay ski resort and intercept parking for more than 1,000 vehicles.
“We were taking turns complaining about vehicle congestion in town and how it was getting worse, not better, each year,” said Jan Waterous during a March 20 public hearing on her and her oil tycoon husband Adam's plans for redeveloping the train station lands.
“Over the years, so many good ideas have been put forth by others as to how to manage congestion, and yet the big ideas, infrastructure that would have truly moved the needle – ideas like passenger rail, intercept parking, aerial transit – had not been brought to fruition.”
Through their personal holding company Liricon Capital, which also owns Mount Norquay ski resort, the Waterous’ secured a lease from Canadian Pacific Kansas City Railway in order to put forward their area redevelopment plan (ARP) for about 17.5 hectares on the north and south side of the train tracks.
The plan calls for a woonerf-like setting on Railway Avenue, retail shops, restaurants, and an amphitheatre centred around the historic 1910 railway station – designated as a federal heritage railway station in 1991. There are also long-term plans for medium-density residential housing on the periphery.
As well as a pitch for an aerial gondola from the train station lands to Mount Norway ski area, the Waterous’ have been pushing for the return of passenger rail from Calgary to Banff National Park, which Via Rail ended in the late 1980s.
For the Waterous’, intercept parking is fundamental to the overall vision to reduce vehicle congestion, with the existing 500 stalls on the south side of the tracks and another 580 on the north side, which includes the 170 existing stalls at the Fenlands Recreation Centre.
“On a standalone basis, passenger rail and intercept parking are uneconomical,” Jan said, noting once the plan for the train station lands was mapped out, they segued to the practical question of: “How the heck are we going to pay for it?”
In order to provide free intercept parking, Jan said revenue must be generated from aerial transit.
“Aerial transit will be utilized almost entirely by the visitor, hence the visitor is paying for the parking,” she said.
To provide affordable mass transit like a passenger train, which would bring workers to the townsite that often struggles with labour shortages, Jan said premium revenue would be generated from out-of-province visitors.
“Like the airline model, premium economy and first-class fares support economy fares,” she said. “So, higher fares for visitors allows locals to travel on the train for a fraction of the cost.”
However, the issue is, some of the plan doesn’t conform to long-standing national park policy and legislation.
Proposed gondola terminus infrastructure on the north side of the tracks, which would pave the way for an eventual aerial gondola to the base of Mount Norquay, is undoubtedly the most contentious issue in the ARP.
Parks Canada has repeatedly said an aerial gondola is a no-go amid concern it could be viewed as de-facto expansion of the ski area and flies in the face of national park policy and legislation pertaining to commercial development, land use and ski area management.
The federal agency has ultimate authority over all land use and development decisions in the national park townsite as laid out in the federal-provincial-municipal agreement that incorporated Banff as an Alberta municipality in 1990.
While Parks Canada has voiced support for the overall revitalization of the train station lands within park policy, Banff National Park superintendent Sal Rasheed sent a terse letter to the Town of Banff on March 15 in advance of the March 20 public hearing to reinforce the agency’s position on the aerial gondola.
Rasheed said as noted in several letters, emails, meetings, and telephone discussions between 2019 and 2024, a gondola from the ARP site to the Mount Norquay ski area has been “found not to be feasible due to non-conformance with key park policy and legislation.”
“It is Parks Canada’s position that its policies on limits to commercial development and ski area management are fundamental to protecting the ecological integrity of Banff National Park now and in the future,” he said in a follow-up statement.
Environmental groups such as Bow Valley Naturalists (BVN), Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS), Yellowstone to Yukon (Y2Y) Conservation Initiative, and Alberta Wilderness Association (AWA) all hammered home the same message – the gondola should be off the table.
They also oppose any development on the north side of the tracks, including the addition of another 400 parking stalls, which they say would compromise an already narrow travel route for animals – the Fenlands-Indian Grounds wildlife corridor located in rare montane lands.
They worry the cumulative effects of development in the Bow Valley, which includes recent approval of a massive housing development on Three Sisters lands outside the national park in Canmore and a proposal for a gondola at Silvertip, will make it even harder for wildlife to travel through this busy region.
Shelley Mardiros, a long-term resident, was one of several locals who spoke during the public hearing in opposition to the gondola infrastructure being included in the ARP.
She believes it would only add to congestion and traffic at the west entrance to town and present a “Disney-esque introduction to the town, which is national park treasure.”
“I don’t think that is how we want to present our community to the world,” she said.
“If they wish to present something that does not include a gondola in it, then we will consider that, but the gondola is very much a part of this plan even though nothing is told to us about it.”
However, many residents and members of the business community spoke in favour of the overall area redevelopment plan for the train station lands, seeing it as a way to bring new life to the area and a solution to Banff’s congestion problem.
Banff can see up to 35,000 cars a day in the four-square-kilometre town on the busiest of summer days, with traffic jams and vehicles backed up Mountain Avenue from vehicles returning from Pursuit’s gondola and Parks Canada’s hot pools on Sulphur Mountain.
Jonathan Welsh, a resident of Banff for more than 30 years and co-owner of Banff Trail Riders and Banff Discover Tours, voiced strong support for redevelopment of the train station lands.
“I believe Banff has a car problem, not a people problem, and I believe mass transit and buses can help solve this,” he said.
Marty von Neudegg, a born and raised Banffite, welcomed revitalization of the train station lands, remembering a time when it was more in the spirit of the national park tourist town before Canadian Pacific Railway left it in a dilapidated state.
“It’s inexcusable that one of Canada’s most iconic railway stations and rail lands have been treated as no more than an industrial port by the company that first created it,” he said.
Like others in council chambers that day, van Neudegg said he was grateful the Waterous’ were putting in so much time and work to “make practical use of woefully under-utilized space.”
“This corporate citizen is doing this without cost to the taxpayers, which is always a benefit in Banff, where debate and the sad reality over rising taxes never ends,” he said.
“We have all watched Banff get busier over the past few decades and it’s time to advance a strategy that will help manage how people move efficiently and sustainably in and around the townsite and park.”
Longtime resident Connie MacDonald urged council to support the area redevelopment as a way to deal with the tourist town’s congestion woes.
“I believe this is the plan we’ve been waiting for,” she said.
MacDonald has been listening to the community’s concerns regarding the economic model for the plan, but said the aerial gondola will help pay for projects and keep intercept parking free at no cost to taxpayers.
“There has to be an element of the plan that will fund this transportation hub and this refers back to aerial transit … this is what will ensure the financial stability, meaning users, not taxpayers would be funding the projects,” she said.
The intercept parking removes countless cars from Banff’s limited roadways by providing free parking, MacDonald said, but if there was a charge to park at the train station, visitors would simply drive into the downtown to be closer to their destination.
“The intercept lot is such a huge success, but we need to do more to reduce the number of private vehicles in and around town,” she said.
“By creating this transportation hub at the train station, the ARP would enable the change we need, providing more parking.”
But conservation groups say building more parking goes against the very idea of encouraging people not to drive their private vehicles to the mountains – and it paves over an area that is used by wildlife on the north side of the tracks.
Although the ARP proposes enhancing the wildlife corridor, conservation groups don’t buy it will do what is needed, saying there is no up-to-date wildlife corridor monitoring data to justify the plan or proposed mitigations.
“Yes, that part of the corridor is too narrow, yes it’s adjacent to a lot of built infrastructure; however, it’s the least bad alternative for those animals, otherwise, they have to go through Whiskey Creek, Forty Mile Creek, and all the wetlands that are associated with that,” said longtime resident Jess Harding.
“Those animals are smart enough to move where it’s most feasible. If we bulldoze that, then we’re essentially blocking that corridor.”
Bow Valley Naturalists, a local conservation group that formed 57 years ago, says the precautionary principle should always be applied when looking at new development and effects on ecological integrity, and decisions must “err on the side of caution.”
Peter Duck, BVN’s president, said the ARP as presented poses a threat to the ecological integrity of the Bow Valley and goes against the municipality’s own environmental management plan, which speaks to protection of biodiversity, forests and wetland protection.
“We are perplexed that much of this ARP proposal seems to be in contradiction to that plan,” he said during the public hearing.
“Unless this plan goes back to the office and is discussed through the ecosystem lens of the environmental management plan, we have no way to be sure how this plan will affect ecological integrity and whether it is good for the community.”
To improve wildlife movement on lands adjacent to the Banff townsite, in the late 1990s, the bison paddock, cadet camp and airstrip were closed on the north side of the highway, while the government and community horse corrals were relocated.
Duck said the proposal to build a parking lot “threatens to take a step backwards” and compromise this already “constricted and vulnerable” wildlife movement corridor on the north side of the tracks.
“BVN’s observations of how wildlife move through the area suggest it would cause harm to the effectiveness of the corridor,” he said.
“It is a valuable but vulnerable functioning wildlife corridor. If you want to be sure you cause no harm – leave it alone,” he said.
The Banff National Park management plan does not close the door on the return of passenger rail, but it does raise challenges around wildlife mortality on the existing tracks and that a second line for passenger trains would only make that worse.
An environmental assessment would be required for such a project – which has provincial dollars dedicated to a feasibility study – but ultimately, Parks Canada has no say on land within Canadian Pacific Kansas City’s right-of-way.
At the public hearing, Alberta Wilderness Association (AWA) raised concerns about the ecological impacts of passenger trains.
AWA’s Kennedy Halvorson, a conservation specialist, pointed to a 2019 study that examined the feasibility of mass transit, including bus and passenger trains.
She said she fears additional train traffic through the park would have too much of an impact on wildlife connectivity and lead to more animals being hit and killed on the tracks.
“The report found that capital costs to implement a bus system were 34 per cent less than that of a train with less than half the annual operating costs,” she said during the public hearing.
“Projected to have similar ridership numbers, buses would use existing infrastructure working with, instead of expanding, human footprint in the region. … A future passenger rail services poses significant ecological concerns to the region.”
Town of Banff officials say the intent of the ARP – which passed first reading by council in December – is a statutory plan that guides land use and development decisions on the railway lands over the next 10 to 20 years.
“An ARP does not authorize or approve individual or specific projects for development,” said Randall McKay, manager of strategic initiatives and special projects for the Town of Banff. “A valid development permit must be obtained for any development prior to the commencement of construction.”
As part of the 4.5-hour public hearing on March 20, about 25 people spoke in favour or opposition to the plan and there were approximately 90 letters on the public agenda. Council’s consideration of second and third reading of the ARP has been scheduled for April 22.
“What I want to make really clear is that if there’s any amendments made at second reading, we would pause there and take a break to a further date before we were to go to third reading,” said Mayor Corrie DiManno.
