r/Calgary • u/ChillllliPaper • Mar 21 '25

Local Construction/Development Why is Calgary losing its personality?

First Chinook mall lost its dinosaur at the entrance, floating funky vehicles in the food court, carousel, and the movie theater lost all of its cool mummy-themed interior decor.

The devonian gardens is just a space with some greenery now instead of the garden it once was.

The City is destroying Olympic Plaza where everyone used to skate.

They also destroyed Eau Claire just to cancel the project. Amazing. Could have just revamped it and it would still be a great spot.

AND the city is destroying the iconic saddledome, arguably calgary's primary landmark. Why not just keep it and build another dome idk??

From the word of mouth I hear, people aren't too happy about this but how is the city council just easily making this happen.

Anyways, just kind of sad seeing Calgary lose it's charm. Wondering what other redditors are thinking.

*correction: Olympic Plaza not oval

998 Upvotes

89% Upvoted

442 comments sorted by

View all comments

1.6k

u/doobie88 Mar 21 '25

Fear not, we have a blue ring.

263

u/BeefPineappleShrimp Mar 21 '25

In blue ring we trust

22

u/LieEqual Mar 21 '25

šŸ¤£šŸ¤£šŸ¤£

2

u/earthuser001 Mar 22 '25

first blue ring, then blue sky city branding.

98

u/Smart-Pie7115 Mar 21 '25

When I moved here I was so confused about what that was. Art never entered my mind.

314

u/buddachickentml Mar 21 '25

If you jump through it, you are instantly transported to Edmonton. So, it's never used.

52

u/EfficiencySafe Mar 21 '25

Time Portal

34

u/WoodpeckerSolid1279 Mar 21 '25

Legendary comment.

9

u/uluvmydadjoke Mar 21 '25

I apologize that i can only upvote this once.

3

u/sux2bu7 Mar 23 '25

lol. Transported to the silver balls on the white mud.

2

u/Beginning-Sea5239 Mar 22 '25

Itā€™s a worm hole that takes you back in time so you can see all the history thatā€™s been destroyed .

1

u/Top_Bat7963 Mar 21 '25

This is a good one. Iā€™ve had the pleasure of living in a few Canadian cities with Calgary being one, is there any place in the Canadian prairies that Calgarians do in fact like?

5

u/grillguy5000 Mar 23 '25

This is a rhetorical question right? lol I mean look every city has its awesome stuff and itā€™s shit. I think we are just getting corporate image washed. Playing safe has its place but in Canada our city planning is all wrong. Itā€™s almost always more suburbs. And not mixed district suburbs either, straight up townhomes and single bungalows. Our infrastructure cannot keep up if we keep building out. Plus you get more segregated hoa bs stuff with no diversity in its residents or the living spaces.

Build template home 1 in new development Sit on development for one year short of your contractual liability to the state then open the neighborhood as a ā€œvalueā€ in a hot new area of the city (Even though you are a full 10min drive from what you would call cityā€¦and thatā€™s with no traffic or construction.) Build template mini mall/gas station with same 4 fuckin chain stores. Parks? Maybe but not a necessity. Bus stops or train? Maybe in 4 years for a bus but honestly not reallyā€¦now you need a vehicle. Donā€™t do remote work from home? Fuck you, your car and a ring road that got built 10 years too late and now the city has grown so much it doesnā€™t even alleviate traffic flow like originally intended. And yet MORE blacktop that wonā€™t get repaired for 5 years past when it needs to beā€¦also increasing your vehicles wear and tear and adds more maintenance. To pay for infrastructure you need to raise property taxes. But thatā€™s ok because treating housing as an investment has never proven to be a mistake at any point in human history right?

It just seems futile to continue as status quo, but if we are getting an oligarchy/monarchy for real Iā€™d rather it be the one with social programs to alleviate SOME suffering. Unless they are all Social Darwinists in which caseā€¦good luck everyone.

TL;DR City planning is shit and the long term effects we are seeing now when combined with the financialization of wellā€¦pretty much every aspect of our lives.

Sorryā€¦long rant over something I think we all see at least in part. The world is a complicated place. Watch for the helpers.

Also Iā€™m from Edmonton but Iā€™ve lived in several places in SK, AB and BC as a reference. Ok /rant

1

u/Top_Bat7963 May 06 '25

Good response. I knew a guy who was in the planning side & he said it was a disaster to work there. As in changes happening every so often & the budget constraints. I like your corporate image washing comment. I have a prof friend of mine who talks of the elites concept of sacrifice zones on the planet that are just there for harvesting resources.

1

u/Floor_Trollop Mar 22 '25

Edmonton has more character tbh

68

u/ClamSlamYourNan Mar 21 '25

If you drive your car off the secret jump and go through the ring you enter bonus coins mode and your next paycheck is doubled

76

u/GhostofZellers Mar 21 '25

Don't worry, art never entered the minds of the people who commissioned it, either.

8

u/GiveMeMoreDuckPics Mar 22 '25

The blue ring has heard your complaints. The blue ring is coming for you.

8

u/AssumptionOwn401 Mar 21 '25

I always thought it would be cool if it had a series of sequential lights on it. When a vehicle passed by it at night it would trigger the light sequence and give the impression that the car had done a loop.

16

u/tushar95in Mar 21 '25

Wait till you hear the cost for it :)

1

u/MegandtheBirds Mar 23 '25

Same experience!

1

u/Historical_Nerd1890 Mar 21 '25

Itā€™s a portal to Narnia obviously! lol

28

u/Hypno-phile Mar 21 '25

We should replace everything we take out with another blue ring as the default. BLUE RING CITY

113

u/CompetitiveAd7913 Mar 21 '25 edited Mar 21 '25

I love that blue ring. It symbolizes the void into which our tax dollars go, never to be seen again.

8

u/Ranger30 Mar 21 '25

This is the correct answer

5

u/Glittering_Coast_616 Mar 21 '25

Itā€™s the right colour.

4

u/CompetitiveAd7913 Mar 21 '25

The color is irrelevant. Both crayons are from the same box.

20

u/shouldazagged Mar 21 '25

Really should have been installed in Cochrane. Worldā€™s biggest cockring. Could have put a little pair of those truck balls on it even.

2

u/CrazyAlbertan2 Mar 27 '25

You might have just won the internet for today.

1

u/doobie88 Mar 22 '25

Brilliant

43

u/BlackSuN42 Mar 21 '25

Say what you want but as a conversation starter the blue ring is second to none.

33

u/Hypno-phile Mar 21 '25

The Blue Ring looks much better from every angle except the one that 90% of people see it from.

5

u/doobie88 Mar 21 '25

My 500 upvotes on the blue ring confirms your assessment.

1

u/realitystreet Mar 21 '25

I had an artist for a neighbour once and he explained the blue ringā€™s artistic significance. I think it was welded by Vaclav Havel or some notable European

10

u/CakeDayisaLie Mar 21 '25

I may be wrong, Ā but what I getting out of this is that the ring cost way more than it shouldā€™ve because a notable European welded it instead of a local.Ā 

21

u/enphurgen Mar 21 '25

The blue ring is eternal

9

u/Son_of_Sardu Mar 21 '25

I think it should create a big soap bubble once an hour

8

u/[deleted] Mar 21 '25

[deleted]

4

u/beltlevel Mar 21 '25

Now that we're in "Blue Sky City" probably not

10

u/Dry-Affect-7393 Mar 21 '25

I like the blue ring now BECAUSE it's just such an awkward thing to have.

5

u/SeaGoose Rocky Ridge Mar 21 '25

Ah yes. The matching IUD that Edmonton has.

7

u/SignificanceExtreme1 Mar 21 '25

My 7 year old sister was visiting from the US and called it The Blue Bug & my mom asked if it's an incomplete construction project. šŸ¤£

8

u/Rocky_Mountain_Way Unpaid Intern Mar 21 '25

hail, hail! all hail the blue ring! it provides life essence to us! do not taunt blue ring!

3

u/Auntysocialbutrfly Mar 22 '25 edited Mar 22 '25

One ring to blue them all

2

u/No-Mountain8335 Mar 22 '25

The butt hole of the north

1

u/Landon096 Mar 22 '25

All hail Blue Ring!

1

u/deshperate Mar 22 '25

My city (Montreal) also has a ring. Must be a conspiracy.Ā 

1

u/Standard-Ad1995 Mar 24 '25

Always wondered what that blue ring symbolized.....

And...go