Anyone live or lived in Chestermere?

[North East Goon]

Went and saw a few houses we enjoyed out there and was wondering if anyone has experience living in this community?

[VladtheImpaler]

Originally Posted by North East Goon

Went and saw a few houses we enjoyed out there and was wondering if anyone has experience living in this community?

My best friend lives there... DON'T.

[North East Goon]

Originally Posted by VladtheImpaler

My best friend lives there... DON'T.

Does he hate something about living there or do you hate something about it?

[VladtheImpaler]

Originally Posted by North East Goon

Does he hate something about living there or do you hate something about it?

It all depends on what you expect and require. What do you do? Where (geographically) do you work? What do you like to do for entertainment/recreation?

[KTown]

Originally Posted by VladtheImpaler

It all depends on what you expect and require. What do you do? Where (geographically) do you work? What do you like to do for entertainment/recreation?

Here are the facts. I live in Chestermere and I love it. I love it way more than Calgary. I like sitting on my deck at night and not hearing anything at all. It is quiet and peaceful. The preperty tax payments are alot less.

I work downtown Calgary and it takes me 25 minutes to get to work which is alot less time than it takes people from the deep NW or SE/SW.

The town has just about everything I need. It has new schools which will be great for my son when he is older. It has a grocery store that is clean and not over crowded like the city. It has a golf course along with many recreational activities.

If you like partying at the bar it might not be for you, however that being said it is only a $35 cab ride home. I plan my city shopping that I only have to make one trip, I never only go to one store, I wait till I need to go to more than one.

I personally would never live in Calgary again, living there and surrounded by various noise is not something I don't enjoy.

I've been in Chestermere since 2003 and allthough it has gotten busier than I like, it is still one of the best places to live in that is near Calgary.

PS it is closer to downtown from Chestermere than it is from Mckenzie town. So when people say its too far, i tend to just ignore them

[Bill Bumface]

Originally Posted by KTown

I work downtown Calgary and it takes me 25 minutes to get to work which is alot less time than it takes people from the deep NW or SE/SW.

What time do you go to work? 5am?

[kdoir345]

Chestermere is great. Been out here almost a year now. I work downtown and like someone said before it only takes about 25 minutes to get into the office, start at around 8 and home no later than 5:30 each evening. Its great to hear nothing at night after being downtown all day long.

[algernon]

Originally Posted by hulkrogan

What time do you go to work? 5am?

No kidding. I live in Albert Park( I know,the hood, yada,yada,etc) which is 10 minutes into downtown with normal (non-peak) daytime traffic because of the lights. It bugs me when my friends spin their yarns about 15 minutes to DT from Evergreen or wherever...
Accept it. Suburbanites have longer commutes. In exchange they get homogenous communities, brand new schools, and front garages. Don't try to claim inner-city status with your once-a-month 15 minute commutes.

/end innercity-ite rant.

[Hemi-Cuda]

Originally Posted by hulkrogan

What time do you go to work? 5am?

ya i live in Chestermere and work downtown, and doing park & ride takes me 45 minutes to get to work. still faster than my co-workers who live in the south of Calgary though

[urban1]

Lol. I have many friend/coworkers/acquaintances who claim low commute times into downtown from the burbs. I dont think people are intentionally lying but i think its a subconcious thing where you dont want to face the reality that your commute time is closer to 1 hour rather than a 1/2 hour.

I cant comment on the Chestermere commute as Ive never driven it.

All these low commute times must be on the ideal summer day where all the stars align and there are no stalls, no accidents, no lanes closed to construction, maybe its even a 1st or 3rd Friday with all the O&G workers off work.

How about the extreme opposite? A nice snowy winter day with blowing snow and icy roads.

If you could live in Chestermere and work Chestermere (or any other burb or surrounding community) that would be a better setup.

Originally Posted by algernon

No kidding. I live in Albert Park( I know,the hood, yada,yada,etc) which is 10 minutes into downtown with normal (non-peak) daytime traffic because of the lights. It bugs me when my friends spin their yarns about 15 minutes to DT from Evergreen or wherever...
Accept it. Suburbanites have longer commutes. In exchange they get homogenous communities, brand new schools, and front garages. Don't try to claim inner-city status with your once-a-month 15 minute commutes.

/end innercity-ite rant.

[Sutter_in_law]

Originally Posted by urban1

I dont think people are intentionally lying but i think its a subconcious thing where you dont want to face the reality that your commute time is closer to 1 hour rather than a 1/2 hour.

I cant comment on the Chestermere commute as Ive never driven it.

I lived in chestermere for 21 years, moved out 3 years ago as it was getting busier but it is still a 7 minute drive from east chestermere drive to 52nd street.
so 25-30 minutes downtown is pretty accurate.

[Titan]

My co-worker lives there and loves it. She gets to work at 11 ave and 8 st sw in about 30 minutes. This is how long it takes me from McK Towne on and "average" day with no unusual delays. Having said that, an accident 2 times per month is also normal on the deerfoot.

[Hemi-Cuda]

Originally Posted by Sutter_in_law

I lived in chestermere for 21 years, moved out 3 years ago as it was getting busier but it is still a 7 minute drive from east chestermere drive to 52nd street.
so 25-30 minutes downtown is pretty accurate.

on my Sunday shift with free parking downtown, i can make the trip in 30 minutes (with speeding). once the ring road construction is completed i could see that falling to 20-25 minutes. but during the week in rush hour traffic, there is no way you're driving to downtown from Chestermere and finding parking in under 40 minutes

[Bill Bumface]

I've lived in Rocky Ridge for 4 years, and yeah, in the summer I can blow down Crowchild at 120km/h and make it door to parkade entrance in 20 minutes on the nose if I'm rolling into work at 9am, but the way home is never even close to that and winter will always have a few days of taking over an hour to get to work... hence me moving one train stop out of downtown in 2 weeks.

[FanIn80]

Sort of off topic, but what the hell is wrong with everyone's priorities that it takes 20 minutes to drive to work in the AM, but almost 1.5 hours to do the opposite commute on the way home from work in the evening?! To me, this is the most maddening thing about traffic.

...and done.

[photon]

Been in Chestermere for 3.5 years.

For a family I think it's great, there's some stuff to do but the city is still very accessible. There's parks, the lake, pathways, the arena, etc.. For a childless couple who like nights out and eating out it'll always be a trip into Calgary, but it's close enough that it doesn't feel like a big deal. I lived in Airdrie as well, and a trip into Calgary always felt much further away; Chestermere feels much closer, because it is closer to the interesting stuff.

I've also lived in Calgary in the far NE, right near downtown, in the SW by Heritage and Macleod, in the SW by Canyon Meadows Drive, and in the SW by Anderson and Elbow (and a few other places), and in Airdrie. So I know how long drives to work downtown take.

I concur that as along as you don't try to do it right at the height of rush hour, you can go from Chestermere to downtown in under 30 minutes.. I used to work at the far west end of downtown and left at 8 to get there by 8:30. There's multiple ways to do it so listening to traffic and adjusting for problems is pretty easy, even going out on 16th ave sometimes (though that would add time). I find going down 17th all the way and then onto 9th Ave worked great most mornings, that was the fastest route. But I could instead go up 68th to Memorial and take that in, or I could take 17th then get off behind the Stampede grounds onto 25th and go up Elbow, or up Macleod and then over on 11th.. so many choices it was easy to modify my path depending on the needs.

Then when I started working in the SW, it went up to about 40 minutes after the Glenmore construction was done.

[Yeah_Baby]

Chestermere is also way more of its own town than it used to be. We used to have to pretty much go into the city (which isn't that big of a deal) for everything, these days not so much. It also seems to perpetually full of teenagers though. But I suppose that could be because they have nothing better to do than hang out at Safeway.

[Sutter_in_law]

Originally Posted by Hemi-Cuda

on my Sunday shift with free parking downtown, i can make the trip in 30 minutes (with speeding). once the ring road construction is completed i could see that falling to 20-25 minutes. but during the week in rush hour traffic, there is no way you're driving to downtown from Chestermere and finding parking in under 40 minutes

i think its understood "with speeding" its rare (and annoying) to come across someone on the highway doing 100 even. lots of people who work downtown have designated paid for parking spots, and as someone else said, listening to the radio can save you tons of time, yes if u get caught in bad traffic it will take longer but thats no different from any other part of the city. as i stated 7 minutes to 52nd, thats the earliest place that traffic will pile up. 30 minutes is very possible

[KTown]

Originally Posted by hulkrogan

What time do you go to work? 5am?

I leave at around 7am to 7:15am. If you leave around 7:15 to about 7:45 you can add 10 to 15 minutes to your commute.

[KTown]

Originally Posted by photon

Been in Chestermere for 3.5 years.

For a family I think it's great, there's some stuff to do but the city is still very accessible. There's parks, the lake, pathways, the arena, etc.. For a childless couple who like nights out and eating out it'll always be a trip into Calgary, but it's close enough that it doesn't feel like a big deal. I lived in Airdrie as well, and a trip into Calgary always felt much further away; Chestermere feels much closer, because it is closer to the interesting stuff.

I've also lived in Calgary in the far NE, right near downtown, in the SW by Heritage and Macleod, in the SW by Canyon Meadows Drive, and in the SW by Anderson and Elbow (and a few other places), and in Airdrie. So I know how long drives to work downtown take.

I concur that as along as you don't try to do it right at the height of rush hour, you can go from Chestermere to downtown in under 30 minutes.. I used to work at the far west end of downtown and left at 8 to get there by 8:30. There's multiple ways to do it so listening to traffic and adjusting for problems is pretty easy, even going out on 16th ave sometimes (though that would add time). I find going down 17th all the way and then onto 9th Ave worked great most mornings, that was the fastest route. But I could instead go up 68th to Memorial and take that in, or I could take 17th then get off behind the Stampede grounds onto 25th and go up Elbow, or up Macleod and then over on 11th.. so many choices it was easy to modify my path depending on the needs.

Then when I started working in the SW, it went up to about 40 minutes after the Glenmore construction was done.

I take 17th ave through inglewood by the saddledome and I only hit congestion at the deerfoot exit to blackfoot/17th which only takes a couple of minutes to get through, other than that I don't hit any problems unless I get stuck behind a train in inglewood, which then I just do the famous U-turn under the bridge.

Its a myth that people think Chestermere is so far away. Door to Door to my office is roughly 20km, this is not far at all.