It could be 20 years before residents on acreages in Turner Valley’s southwest see any changes to their area.
About 25 people attended an open house on Sept. 14 where the Town of Turner Valley shared plans to develop a 60-acre area, currently home to acreages in Cuffling Flats and Okalta. The area redevelopment plan will go back to council on Oct. 3 for a public hearing and final reading.
The plan calls for nine acres of recreation use and parks, 15 acres for the existing raw water reservoir and storm ponds, 11 acres of roads and 25 acres of residential development. It also includes a trail network, municipal reserve lands and a variety of housing types and lot sizes. The plan has received first and second readings from town council.
Donna Ohlson, who own 4.6 acres in Okalta, said she sees both advantages and disadvantages to the plan.
While it will bring water and sewer services to her property and her neighbours’, she said it also means development will draw more people to what is now a country-like atmosphere.
“You can’t stop progress,” she said. “Right now I’ve got the best of both worlds. It’s in town, but you feel like you’re out in the country. You don’t want that quietness to change.”
Ohlson said she’s been thinking about building a house on the property that will overlook the Sheep River, but she would have to pay for studies and analysis on the property as it would be zoned as environmental reserve, if approved for final reading.
She said she’s glad the existing plan shows that the property would be preserved in its current state.
She bought the land, which her mother lived on as a child, with plans to eventually hand it down to her niece and nephew.
She said she has memories of playing near the old hospital, which is now used for the Youth With a Mission program.
“There’s a picture of us playing in the sand when I was three years old,” she said. “There’s a lot of history there.”
Harvey Matson, who lives next to Ohlson, oversees property development for the non-profit Youth With a Mission, which has been in Okalta since 1985, and wanted to see if the plan fit with his own.
“We have a development plan we want to present to the town and want to make sure it fits with the plan,” he said, adding it appears to be a good fit. “We want to continue to develop it as a campus for Christian education.”
Youth With a Mission provides education to adults aged 18 to 30-years-old who are sent on missions around the world to spread the Christian message, teach their faith to others and provide relief for struggling communities through building projects, teaching English and other initiatives.
Matson said the Turner Valley campus has 27 staff, 15 of whom live on the 11-acres of land.
Also attending the open house was Katherine O’Flynn, who owns an acre-and-a-half of land in Okalta and is the citizen chair of the Municipal Planning Commission.
O’Flynn said the commission received two requests from homeowners interested in subdividing in the past five years, but they have to be deferred until the area redevelopment plan is approved.
“You can’t contemplate subdividing without a vision,” she said.
If approved, O’Flynn said the area redevelopment plan is a guideline and not written in stone.
“It could potentially change,” she said. “If a homeowner worked with a developer and came up with some proposal, I don’t think it would be refused if it was a reasonable development and if it was a slight variation.”
Turner Valley town planner Matthew Atkinson said most of the comments he received from residents at Wednesday night’s meeting were positive, with many questions about when the area will see the addition of sewer and water services.
Infrastructure for water and sewer in that area is not in the Town’s 10 year plan, although residents of Cuffling Flats have been making requests to expedite the process as many are struggling with insufficient water in their wells.
Atkinson said many residents in attendance were happy with the amount of environmental reserve land among the 60 acres.
Some want to see a higher housing density to allow for cheaper costs for infrastructure and others want low density housing to maintain the area’s country feel, he said.
