Edmonton’s Bold Regulatory Reform Has Flipped the Housing Crisis on its Head

An Opinion Editorial By: Riker Farmer

In cities with high population growth a highly predictable surge in housing prices occurs. Vancouver and Toronto were hit especially hard by Canada’s recent population growth. Edmonton, on the other hand, has seen larger increases in population yet housing costs remain level and have even taken a slight drop since 2024.

Healthy vacancy rates prevent rent hikes

Edmonton grew by 5.7% and 3.4% in 2024 and 2025 respectively. In Vancouver, similar growth pushed the cheapest rentals to near zero vacancy. Edmonton has managed to absorb similar growth in demand without causing strain on the housing supply. As of last October, vacancy rates in Edmonton across the cheapest 75% of rentals were hovering around a healthy 3%. At this level of vacancy, there is a balance in the leverage between landlords and tenants, making rent hikes unlikely.

Source: CMHC 2025 Rental Market Report

In other markets that have seen Edmonton’s magnitude of population growth, the vacancy rate in the premium (Q4) quartile almost always spikes first, with a gradual filtering down. This is largely because newer builds demand rent premiums well above the median rent in order for the development to pencil out, driving middle-income renters toward lower-tier units that remain affordable for them.

This structural mismatch in places like Vancouver is due in large part to zoning restrictions that permit density only in areas with natural premiums like near transit and along major commercial corridors. The only new housing supply provided are large site projects with tremendous fixed costs and risk premia. In the developer’s pro forma, the math only works out when the rentals are priced at a premium.

Negative absorption dominated by below-median rentals

Instead of the downward filtering pattern seen in Vancouver, Edmonton’s steepest increase in vacancy is actually occurring in its bottom 50%. When analyzing CMHC1 data to map the year-over-year changes in these markets, the vacancy increase in Vancouver is dominated by the top 50%. In Edmonton, the cheapest 50% of rentals having a higher increase in vacancy than the top 50% is the exact mechanism that is causing rents to drop.

Source: CMHC 2025 Rental Market Report

Zoning reform removed barriers to small-scale infill

The main driver of Edmonton’s affordability is a rise in missing-middle construction, made legal in 2024 as part of its Zoning Bylaw Renewal. 

The old zoning framework allowed single detached homes in the RF1 zone, semi-detached homes in the RF2 zone and rowhomes up to 1 unit per 150 m2 in the RF3 zone. The zoning bylaw, in conjunction with Area Redevelopment Plans, strictly dictated how and where developers can add density.

The full rewrite of Edmonton’s Zoning Bylaw, which took effect at the beginning of 2024, allowed by-right 1 unit per 75 m2 which is capped at 8 units for a midblock lot. Additionally, instead of controlling the exact type of residential use (single family/semi-detached), the city now allows any residential use. This allows developers and neighbourhood-driven demand to decide the form of housing it desires.

Removing arbitrary parking requirements cut development costs

The City also removed minimum parking requirements in 2020, switching to Open Option Parking to allow market forces to determine how much parking a property needs. A semi-detached home may demand a heated 2 car garage per unit in order to position itself, but a small 8-unit apartment building near transit will likely do well with an uncovered 3-to-4 car concrete pad off the rear lane. Instead of applying a broad stroke of “one stall per unit” across all types of residential buildings, developers pick and choose based on what adds the most value to their target demographic.

Unlocking densification through low-cost and low-risk development

Small-scale infill developments also operate within Part 9 of Alberta’s Building Code, making permitting and construction costs much lighter, thus creating a very cost effective way of delivering more units to the market. This reduces a lot of the costs associated with residential development, and these savings get passed on to renters due to a high degree of competition. New developments in Edmonton can get away with asking for far less in rent than the typical premium that large-scale infill needs in order to pencil out, which allows missing-middle housing to be priced in a mid-tier quartile instead of competing in the luxury space.

The delivery mechanism of small-scale infill also introduces a critical time advantage. Instead of the multi-year horizons required for large developments, missing-middle projects deliver finished units to the market within 12 to 15 months. This compressed cycle drastically reduces interest rate risk and carrying costs. Small-scale developers can accept a lower rate of return due to less uncertainty.

Vacancy relief for the cheapest rentals

The result of all this new missing-middle development is that the cheapest 75% of rentals are becoming highly stable. Instead of middle-income renters being pushed into the lowest quartile during a population growth surge, Edmonton’s supply is steadily keeping up with exactly what the market demands. This allows the vacancy in the cheapest 75% to hover comfortably around 3%. 

Japan’s precedent for gentle density

It is often suggested that Edmonton’s affordability is due to nearly endless cheap land nearby and that the nature of Toronto and Vancouver’s spatial constraints make them inevitably unaffordable. But Edmonton’s current affordability advantage actually comes from its ability to grow upward, not outward.

Looking internationally, Japan has a very similar regulatory framework of bottom-up, demand-driven density. In the 1970s, Japan nationalized the zoning code and consolidated their zones down to just 12 core “use categories.” Just as Edmonton is doing, bottom-up gentle density allows developers to deliver more housing where there is demand for it. Today, Japan has the most affordable rent of any developed country.

Japan largely achieves affordability by allowing space for every form of housing the market demands. Hyper-affordable micro apartments in Tokyo’s suburbs can be rented for as little as CA$300, because there is an environment for a developer to be able to easily reposition an existing building to something the market demands.

Thirty months ago Edmonton officially reformed its regulatory environment allowing cheap and cost effective density to be added and respond to demand. As a result, the most affordable units can remain affordable, slowing or preventing housing scarcity. Edmonton’s Japan-like approach shifted to the North American context is now the blueprint for municipalities that take affordability seriously.

Tracks of Time: How Edmonton’s Old Streetcars Shaped Urban Growth

An Op-Ed Written By: Alexander Brown

There is not much evidence anymore, but Edmonton used to have an extensive streetcar network that served the city’s first neighbourhoods. Operating from 1908 to 1951 the radial railway, or streetcar, network served many Edmontonians in their commuting needs, and served the City of Edmonton by helping to manage growth. While these streetcars haven’t been in operation for 75 years, their legacy of development remains. 

When looking at 2021 federal census data one can see that the areas immediately surrounding the former streetcar lines are much more dense than other areas of Edmonton, with a 30% higher population density compared to even mature areas. While this density is perhaps to be expected, as many of the streetcar lines ran through Edmonton’s Downtown, the image below shows that even outside of the Downtown core, this density exists. 

In fact, if Edmonton were built out to the same density as these streetcar areas, its population would be over 2.5 million residents, or 1.5 million within the Anthony Henday ring road.

Census data in these areas surrounding the former streetcar lines also reveals interesting demographic trends. One key trend is the age of the population, 40% of the population in these areas are between 20-39 years-old, compared to 30% elsewhere in the city. Despite this higher share of young adults, there is a much lower share of children living in these former streetcar areas. 

In fact, half of the households in these former streetcar areas have just one resident, and only 16% have more than two residents compared to 40% of households city-wide. The household sizes and lack of children can be perhaps explained by the current housing mix. Across Edmonton 50% of residents live in low-density housing, while in these former streetcar areas this number is less than 20%. Finally, and perhaps least surprising, residents of these denser areas enjoy shorter commute times, with 30% of residents having a commute of less than 15 minutes (compared to 23% citywide), and 74% having a commute of less than 30 minutes. Commutes are still typically made by car. However 30% of residents choose other commuting methods (public transit, biking, walking), compared to just 13% citywide.

It is perhaps not surprising to see such a high share of young adults in these dense areas which are closest to post-secondary institutions, employment centres, and abundant retail opportunities. However, the current housing stock in these areas seems to be limited when it comes to housing diversity, as young families are more frequently found living in the suburbs. 

By replacing aging housing stock in these former streetcar areas with stock that is more friendly to families – in both unit size, as well as amenities offered, schools that were previously at risk of closing can stay open. As well, the need to build new schools in areas outside of the Henday is reduced. The same is true for other types of infrastructure: utility lines, fire halls, etc, as mature neighbourhoods already have this existing infrastructure, that would be millions in capital dollars to build out into new, suburban neighhbourhoods. 

Please Note: Demographic data comes from 2021 federal census data at the Dissemination Area level. DAs which were partially within a given boundary (e.g., a mature area or former streetcar area) contribute proportionally to that area.

Where Did the Third Place Go?

An Op-Ed Written By: Ranon Soans

Stopgap Coffee is tucked into a converted heritage home in Wîhkwêntôwin, the kind of place you only find if someone tells you about it or you happen to walk past. On any given morning it feels like the neighbourhood's living room. You recognize faces. You strike up a conversation in line, or with the person pulling the espresso shot. You leave having talked to someone you weren't expecting to.

Most cities used to have "third places" like this on every other block. The corner pub, the neighbourhood bookstore, the café where people stay longer than they planned. Places woven into the daily texture of a neighbourhood, the kind you wander into rather than plan a trip for.

Edmonton had more of them once. Main streets lined with independent shops, accessible on foot and by streetcar, where running an errand and running into a neighbour were often the same trip. Through the latter half of the twentieth century that changed. Cities across North America were rebuilt around the car — the promise being convenience, the ability to get anywhere quickly and easily. And in many ways it delivered. But neighbourhood storefronts emptied out in the process. The corner café, the local grocer, the pub within walking distance — these became harder to sustain when the people who might have walked to them were instead driving somewhere farther away. The rhythms of daily neighbourhood life grew harder to come by. Not because people stopped wanting them, but because the city had been organized around a different set of priorities.

What is striking now is where they are coming back.

Pictured: Iconoclast Coffee, located at 12021 102 Ave NW, within the Oliver Exchange Building.

In Edmonton's densest neighbourhood, Iconoclast Coffee anchors Oliver Exchange, another converted heritage building only a few blocks from Stopgap. On 124 Street, Delavoye has built a bean-to-bar chocolate factory and street-facing café that has become a fixture of the corridor — the kind of place people find on a walk and return to deliberately.

In Strathcona, an older building on 99 Street has been reimagined as Mill Creek West — Frank's Pub and Porchlight Books at street level, with Made by Marcus in a neighbouring converted house next door.

In McQueen, Freson Brothers opened their most central Edmonton location in a reinvested commercial strip at the edge of some of the city's most active infill neighbourhoods. In Bonnie Doon, Duggan's Boundary Irish Pub has been a neighbourhood fixture for years. It seems busier now than it has ever been, as the surrounding blocks have filled in and a new generation of residents has arrived within walking distance. 

None of these places exist in isolation. Each has grown from the neighbourhood around it — people who walk past, stop in, come back, and tell someone else. The money spent at Delavoye or Porchlight Books tends to stay closer to home — in the hands of people who live here, hire here, and are invested in what happens here. The person behind the counter knows the neighbourhood because they are probably a part of it.

There is something that happens to a city when enough of this accumulates. It is difficult to describe precisely but easy to recognize — a sense that the street belongs to the people on it, that you care about your city's future, and that something worth sticking around for, is happening. The neighbourhoods in Edmonton where that feeling is strongest are not accidents. They are the product of sustained investment in the kinds of places and the kinds of density that make daily life enjoyable.

This is why infill is not only a housing argument. The businesses follow the people, the people follow the places, and somewhere in that cycle a neighbourhood stops being somewhere you live and becomes somewhere you belong.

Restrictive Covenants Did Not Kill Neighbourhood Grocery Stores

An Op-Ed Written By: Riker Farmer

For many Edmontonians, a trip to the grocery store is a weekly hassle. Planning large lists, organizing the pantry and hauling several bags into and out of the car, all to avoid returning to the store for an extra few items unforeseen a few days later. If for any reason you do need to return for a few forgotten or unplanned items, the detour is highly inconvenient and inefficient.

Some Edmontonians have access to a convenience store to grab these items, but these stores rarely have the infrastructure required to stock up on perishables like meat and produce. It is impossible to rely on a convenience store to carry what you need to sustain yourself and your family. 

A large supermarket (>30,000 sqft) and a small convenience store (<3000 sqft) sit at distant ends of the spectrum. There are no options existing in the middle that have the “one-stop-shop” selection of the supermarket, but fits the neighbourhood context like a convenience store. This “middle-tier” size of a supermarket would need to be 6000-15000 sqft and despite offering less variety per product type, it would still stock every product necessary to feed a household.

However, this is not an example of our behaviour shaping the built form, rather the built form shaping our behaviour. This missing “middle-tier” of grocery stores are ones where a convenient 10-minute trip after work is not only feasible, but comfortable too. By existing at a neighbourhood scale, these grocery stores would induce trips made car-free or car-light, making this lifestyle not only more practical, but preferable in medium density neighbourhoods.

Right now, car-free lifestyles are only practical in Edmonton’s most urban neighbourhoods like Downtown, Wîhkwêntôwin, Garneau and Strathcona. Here residents can typically walk to the grocery store, but many stores follow the same design language as those in the suburbs; but a single 30-40k sqft grocery store serves a larger radius than one one-third of that size. Those on the periphery of the grocery store catchment area are ill-served by convenient walkability.  These neighbourhoods would instead be better served by smaller stores existing more frequently.

Communities where amenities are within walking distance routinely out-value those without; people crave walkability, yet the grocery stores, the most critical retail amenities, are so rarely adapted to a walkable environment. 

The “missing middle” refers to a systemic housing problem: communities are unable to intensify to match demand due to post-war urban planning, therefore the only housing options available are a single family home, or an apartment accessed by an elevator. If the middle-tier scale of homes built is missing, then it stands to reason that the middle-tier grocery stores would never be built.

For grocery stores, standardization is a huge competitive advantage. Same basic store size and layout means predictability when it comes to stocking shelves, increasing efficiency of labour. Loblaws’ City Market tends to use smaller, non-standardized floorplates for its stores, but passes the cost of non-standardization onto the consumer, meaning the few smaller (20-30k sqft) stores that exist in urban areas are a luxury.

Existing chain grocers also rely on a standardized fleet for delivery, but large semi-trucks don’t work well in dense urban areas. A neighbourhood-scale grocer would require a different fleet of sprinter vans, necessitating more frequent deliveries.

Between the extreme overhead tied up in storage, logistics and large floorplates, the margins of grocery stores are very thin. Just to exist at all, grocery stores tend to demand over 50% rent discounts compared to the market. 

For an individual landlord, this is a non-starter: renting space to a grocer means income after taxes and debt servicing will result in a net loss, or at the very least, the opportunity cost of not renting to a retailer (or several) that will pay full market rent. A developer of a new mixed-use building will not tie up one CRU (commercial retail unit) into one use when it could be split into 5 CRU’s and better diversified.

Grocery stores are natural anchor tenants. For landlords, the added value of a grocery store is the increased rents of nearby CRU’s from increased foot traffic brought about by the grocery store. The REIT’s pro forma ends up penciling out only because the strip-mall as a whole is one entire entity.

Other nearby commercial uses are almost always necessary to spur a grocery store; it cannot exist on its own. The upfront cost of construction for such a site makes land acquisition prohibitively expensive. In walkable communities where land is already valued higher-than-average, large scale land assembly can kill these projects before they get going.

The overhead and slim margins of owning and operating a grocery store make these long-term investments, making grocery stores extremely risk averse. The return is small and must be as close to risk-free as possible. Protecting this small return becomes essential in the pro forma of a grocer. If by year 5, another grocery store opens down the road with predatory pricing, the long-term investment is ruined.

This is where restrictive covenants (RCs) come in. They play a crucial role in the financial management of grocery stores as long-term investments. RCs are a set of property controls put in place by an owner of a piece of land, limiting how it can be used. It runs with the land, meaning future owners are bound to the RC unless it is removed. In Alberta, they cannot affect an area surrounding the property unless each individual owner agrees to register the RC.

Grocery stores use RCs typically to prohibit a former site from being used as a grocery store, often for strategic reasons (inducing traffic to a nearby location). They can also register them on strategic land grabs to prevent a potential grocery store from opening there. 

Recently, Edmonton City Council has begun lobbying the provincial government to prevent restrictive covenants from being used by grocery stores, claiming them to be anti-competitive and create “food deserts,” identifying some of Edmonton’s pre-war neighbourhoods as being especially barren of grocery stores.

However, the legal protection of grocery stores is a minor culprit in creating the “food deserts.” The biggest blame is to be put on the structural, logistical and financial barriers that make starting and operating a grocery store that is compatible within a walkable urban environment especially difficult in Edmonton. 

Arguably, the most damaging legal protection isn’t the restrictive covenants, rather the non-compete clauses that grocery stores negotiate into their contracts with landlords. Non-compete clauses mean a landlord cannot rent to a different grocery store in the same site or on all sites with the same owner within a radius (note: these are separate from restrictive covenants). Because there are only a handful of retail REITs, a non-compete clause in the contract is even more powerful at controlling where the grocery stores are able to go.

REITs loss-lead their rent to grocery stores to generate traffic for other retail. In contrast to a traditional mainstreet, where there is no individual owner that can tolerate a subsidy for a grocery store. As shown earlier, REITs require complementing retail to subsidize the rent of a grocer. So in a mainstreet area with existing retail, a REIT may deem it unprofitable because there is already too much retail nearby that competes.

It is extremely clear, based on land value alone, that people want to walk to amenities, especially the grocery store. But the existing hurdles in place make it only feasible when luxury apartments exist nearby with residents that can pay for increased cost. Therefore lower income residents, who would be most positively impacted from not needing to own a car, end up poorly served.

Dictionary:

CRU: commercial retail unit.

REIT: real estate investment trust. Ex: First Capital

Pro forma: a financial model of an income producing asset.

Downtown is Turning a Page and Not Enough People are Talking About It

An op-ed about Edmonton’s newest O-Day’ min Park

Written by: Riker Farmer

“Downtown revitalization” has been a talking point echoed by media, politicians and business people in Edmonton for a long, long time.

Revitalization efforts that get the most political and media attention are the ones that may give suburban dwellers more reason to journey downtown.

Because of this, the most impactful revitalization project that has been made to this day has gotten little attention outside of the development community.

O-Day’min Park is not about generating new trips to downtown. Rather, it’s a new central park in a part of downtown that has been neglected for decades, and is capitalizing on what downtown does best: public spaces and third places.

Seen above: 102 Avenue from 109 Street (left) to 104 Street (right)

Long before O-day’min Park opened, this section of downtown housed warehouses and other light industrial uses for the CN rail yard that used to exist north of 104 Avenue. Some of these warehouses have been well preserved with their original brick facades, forming much of the 104 Street streetscape.

When the downtown railyard began to end its operations in the 1980s, the warehouses were bought by speculators and developers and converted into parking lots for interim use. By the late 1980s, a severe recession reversed almost all plans for development. Almost 40 years later, these lots remained undeveloped.

Development needed a gentle nudge and O-Day’min Park was designed to do just that.

The Parks, by Pangman Developments and Maclab Development Group, was the first on board to develop this area of downtown. This project is proposed to deliver over 1000 units across three phases, with the first being completed in early 2025.

As well, Westrich Pacific will deliver 607 units across three projects: Lilac Park (239 units), Lotus Park (152 units) and Vantage Park (201 units). As of February 2026, all three are under construction.

Another project on 108 Street will deliver 54 units and another on 106 Street is proposed to deliver 226.

Maclab has plans for a project on 102 Avenue which may become known later this year.

If you’re keeping track, that is almost 1900 units planned, proposed or underway. All with front doors less than 100 meters from O-Day'min Park.

An explosion of development surrounding the park totals 2.25 hectares, with over 4 hectares including the park. 

But it is less about the size of this development. What will be impactful for the vibrancy of downtown streetlife and the vitality of downtown business is the 2000 new units bringing between 2500-3500 new permanent residents. In comparison, the first phase of Ice District saw roughly 500 units across 7.66 hectares of development, roughly one quarter of the density of the O-Day’min area.

Density is incredibly powerful for a few reasons. Aside from the increased patronage of businesses in the area, density enforces public safety through a concept known as “eyes on the street.” With more permanent residents frequenting public spaces, the constant attention on these areas drastically reduces the likelihood of petty theft and vandalism. 

Without density it is clear why areas of downtown continue to struggle. Much of downtown has been designed with “downtown as a destination” for suburban dwellers, only to be vacated during off-hours. Much of downtown's streets tend to go unmonitored for large times of the day, contributing to a reduced feeling of safety, which perpetuates dwindling foot traffic.

Situated between three rapid transit lines, the location provides car-free access to almost every corner of the city. Furthermore, the location serves two post-secondary institutions, drawing daily foot traffic from students, faculty and staff. With the plethora of urban amenities now available, it is no wonder why such an explosion of development is occurring.

This project can serve as a framework for future development efforts. Inducing development should be first and foremost about helping an area realize its full potential. 

O-Day’min Park met the need for a community space and developers have bought into the vision.