Major Water Main Break in Bowness Area

[Leondros]

Super quick. I shutter to think what happens if one of the breaks happens under the river or an equally difficult place to access?

[Leondros]

Originally Posted by mrkajz44

Pretty embarrassing that we can't seem to get into the green. I know our family has cut back a ton, so looking at the dashboard everyday and seeing basically no movement is discouraging. Like all you really need to do is half your shower time and don't flush when you pee and people literally cannot do that.

I wonder how the water supply alert will affect behaviour. I mentioned it to my wife last night when I noticed it and her first instinct was to fill up a bunch of containers with water "just in case". We obviously didn't do that, but I wonder how many people had the same thought and followed through with it.

I think if an alert went out on everyone's phones or something similar people would have taken this more seriously. We were sitting down with friends 2-3 days after this and they had no idea about the restrictions.

Now, its been much longer than a couple days however I expect some people are not taking it seriously.

[Jimmy Stang]

^ The alert that was issued yesterday didn't happen on my phone and I just saw it on social media. Is there a reason it wasn't sent to everyone's phones?

Of course, over-using that system would defeat the purpose, but I would think that running out of firefighting and drinking water would qualify for the full-on buzz on everyone's phones. I do feel that would have an impact as, believe it or not, not everyone watches the news or follows local social media stuff.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by mrkajz44

Pretty embarrassing that we can't seem to get into the green. I know our family has cut back a ton, so looking at the dashboard everyday and seeing basically no movement is discouraging. Like all you really need to do is half your shower time and don't flush when you pee and people literally cannot do that.

I wonder how the water supply alert will affect behaviour. I mentioned it to my wife last night when I noticed it and her first instinct was to fill up a bunch of containers with water "just in case". We obviously didn't do that, but I wonder how many people had the same thought and followed through with it.

Officials said that everyone needs to reduce their usage by about 25 to 30 litres per day – the equivalent of one-and-a-half water cooler jugs.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/calgary/artic...rgency-notice/


A dual flush toilet typically does ~4 lpf. So all every person really needs to do is flush once per 6 uses. That's, perhaps, a stretch, but you cut your shower in half, or just be a bit more careful running the faucet, dishwasher, laundry and it should be pretty easy.


I put a sticky note over my toilet button just to prevent my automatic brain response. The first two times I pushed the sticky note out of the way so I could flush...I realize my brain runs on forced autopilot more often than I'd have guessed.

[surferguy]

Wait - there was an alert yesterday? When? I didn’t get it

[Jimmy Stang]

Originally Posted by surferguy

Wait - there was an alert yesterday? When? I didn’t get it

Yesterday at 12:37pm. Which underscores my point - the new watchers and people who follow social media may have seen it, but many wouldn't have been aware.

https://www.alberta.ca/aea/cap/2026/...C7C794E1FB.htm

Edit to add: This seems to have been an "advisory" and not "critical", so maybe another gentle wrist slap vs. dropping the hammer. But it seem that they are saving the big one for when we're on the brink.

[Torture]

Originally Posted by surferguy

Wait - there was an alert yesterday? When? I didn’t get it

Apparently only to people that have the AEA app that have notifications on - not the text message/interrupt broadcast type of emergency alert. So essentially went to the keeners that are already aware.

I have the app, but Google snoozed notifications because I don't use it. No notification for me.

[#-3]

Originally Posted by Torture

Apparently only to people that have the AEA app that have notifications on - not the text message/interrupt broadcast type of emergency alert. So essentially went to the keeners that are already aware.

I have the app, but Google snoozed notifications because I don't use it. No notification for me.

hell, I'm pretty aware and I didn't even know there was an AEA ap

(I also have no intention of downloading it, and will forget that it exists before the next emergency, and if I did download it now, I would not re-download it when I get a new phone before the next emergency).

Opt in is a pretty bad way to do emergency communication

[Torture]

Hey imagine that, sprawl contributed to the feeder main break. If only we had some sort of rezoning policy that created more efficient growth and funding/efficient use of infrastructure than endlessly sprawling out into new suburbs requiring new infrastructure that we can't afford to maintain.

I imagine council and our mayor would support that kind of policy....right?

Calgary has highest per capita water infrastructuve vs major Canadian peer cities - driven by low-density growth

In addition, it remains a low-density municipality, resulting in more kilometres of pipe per resident than any other large Canadian peer city. These factors have stretched capacity and added maintenance and asset integrity costs for the Water Utility.

https://bsky.app/profile/lrtonthegre.../3mbuhdiujgs26

[marsplasticeraser]

Originally Posted by Torture

Hey imagine that, sprawl contributed to the feeder main break. If only we had some sort of rezoning policy that created more efficient growth and funding/efficient use of infrastructure than endlessly sprawling out into new suburbs requiring new infrastructure that we can't afford to maintain.

I imagine council and our mayor would support that kind of policy....right?

Calgary has highest per capita water infrastructuve vs major Canadian peer cities - driven by low-density growth

Although I am greatly in favour of density, I don't think that the rezoning was a workable solution, and I suspect it would have created a number of unintended consequences for our water and sewage systems

Having a more developed plan about how to increase density can ensure we don't create a bunch of work while we're tryin to upgrade our system.

Some ideas that I think make sense regarding how we pay for our infrastructure and also incentivize density:

1. More of the financial burden of water infrastructure should be paid by new communities that are driving these costs.

2. Denser communities should see lower water costs. For example, perhaps we come up with a sliding scale of water costs based on density (in a community, or a project). This would incentivize redeveloping inner city and bring cost savings to those that cost the system less.

3. Distant communities that require more pipe should pay higher rates.

Anyways, these seem pretty pragmatic and workable, but I'm sure there is a reason we would never do them.

[Fuzz]

Wasn't it already concluded densifying inner city neighbourhoods wouldn't have much impact on utilities like water infrastructure costs?

EDIT:

A report by the City of Calgary presented to councillors says blanket rezoning has so far required only "minimal" upgrades to infrastructure.

It contradicts what has been a common complaint about the controversial policy. Increased pressure on aging infrastructure was cited as a reason for repealing the policy in a motion filed last month.

The report examined nearly 2,000 homes approved under blanket rezoning since October 2024, and found less than one per cent of those required upgrades to public utilities. Those would include services like roads, water and wastewater. It found no upgrades were needed for mobility networks or parks.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...date-9.7003697

[Torture]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Wasn't it already concluded densifying inner city neighbourhoods wouldn't have much impact on utilities like water infrastructure costs?

EDIT:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...date-9.7003697

Exactly. The anti-rezoning crowd argues it would 'stress' infrastructure, but it would actually allows us to use it more efficiently. Because we continually sprawl we need more infrastructure that we can't afford to maintain. This is what the report is pointing at (in addition to many many other factors structural, governance, etc)

[Bigtime]

Originally Posted by Torture

Apparently only to people that have the AEA app that have notifications on - not the text message/interrupt broadcast type of emergency alert. So essentially went to the keeners that are already aware.

I have the app, but Google snoozed notifications because I don't use it. No notification for me.

I have the app but got nothing. Just checked it and I had it set to "Critical Alerts Only".

[Slava]

That pipe is what, 50 years old? The argument we're expected to believe is that this would've held up if we had more density?

I suppose the angle is that they didn't do the inspections because the system is too large, but honestly, that seems weird after the other section caused an enormous issue a year and a half ago. You would think (as an outsider, with no expertise in the area) that checking the rest of that pipe would've been a high priority.

[Torture]

Originally Posted by Slava

That pipe is what, 50 years old? The argument we're expected to believe is that this would've held up if we had more density?

I suppose the angle is that they didn't do the inspections because the system is too large, but honestly, that seems weird after the other section caused an enormous issue a year and a half ago. You would think (as an outsider, with no expertise in the area) that checking the rest of that pipe would've been a high priority.

There's many many reasons and this is just one piece of it. This is by no means the only thing highlighted in the report, nor is it the main reason that they point to. There are many reasons that we find ourselves in this mess and the report doesn't really single an individual member of administration, council, mayor, etc. This has been a slow motion trainwreck over 10-20 years.

But for this aspect, the argument is that we have an infrastructure deficit because we have an inefficient, sprawling tax base. The report highlights that we have more kilometres of pipe per resident than any comparable city. Put simply we have more pipe, paid for by fewer people than comparable cities. The City as a whole has a 7.7B infrastructure deficit (At least, 6 years ago...it's probably mroe now https://www.calgary.ca/our-strategy/...re-report.html) As we sprawl we need more infrastructure to service an increasingly larger city (geographically). I don't think it's that convoluted of an argument.

Density isn't the only solution though - you could always raise taxes to service our sprawling infrastructure, put more burden on new communities, etc. Nenshi's Council did that to a certain extent where they asked developers to contribute more for new communities to pay for the infrastructure - you could argue they didn't go far enough but even what they did was not popular amongst developers.

Mayor Naheed Nenshi says the higher fees better reflect the cost of bringing services like roads, sewers, water and police to those communities. Right now he says new communities actually cost the city millions of dollars.

"Every single new house costs $10,000 to $15,000 more than we ever get back in the taxes on that house and we build 5,000 of them every year." he said. "So we can't do it any more. We have to come up with an agreement that is more fair so that we can pay for water and sewer and transit and roads.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...rawl-1.1098080

Here's Farkas saying roughly the same thing on Reddit the other day

Calgary’s core problem isn’t simply that taxes are “too low.” It’s that for years we approved growth without paying the full long-term cost, pushed bills into the future, and relied on unstable revenues. Calgarians are already paying more through fees, utilities, and inflation, and they rightly expect City Hall to prove every dollar is being used wisely before talking about cuts or tax hikes.

There's also a big "built form" dimension to this debate and argument for a greater range of housing types.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Calgary/com...l_meeting_for/

[Firebot]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Stang

^ The alert that was issued yesterday didn't happen on my phone and I just saw it on social media. Is there a reason it wasn't sent to everyone's phones?

Doesn't meet the threshold (human life in danger)