Off the rails: Residents and business owners paying the price for Green Line drama
CBC
While the Green Line LRT project feels like a train that may never leave the station, Calgarians who have been forced to make sacrifices for this project are feeling ripped off.
Jane Lindsay, a former Eau Claire resident whose property was expropriated for the project, says the whole experience has left a sour taste in her mouth.
"We were told: May 31, 2024, at 11:59 p.m., we have to be gone. And today's Dec. 17, 2024, the houses are still there," said Lindsay.
"You work so hard to buy a home.… To be treated this way, it's pretty disgusting."
All of this comes after the province announced a new proposal on Friday, which was a revision of the City of Calgary's previous plan after multiple disagreements between levels of government about how the multibillion-dollar project would take shape.
The new iteration of the Green Line would feature no tunneling through Calgary's downtown, which was a key criticism from the province in the last alignment.
The revised plan has the LRT running through the core along 10th Avenue on elevated tracks, then curving north to Seventh Avenue, enabling riders to connect with the Blue Line and Red Line in the city core.
It would also span just over 17 kilometres and have 12 stations instead of the previous plan's seven; however, this plan features no Eau Claire station.
Jane's husband, Patrick Lindsay, says the recent drama about the Green Line feels like there wasn't really a reason for them to move. He believes the entire experience has been an "enormous waste of time."
"It's never been clear that they actually had a genuine need for our property," he said.
Harvard Developments owns the land, and it had plans to redevelop the Eau Claire Market land into a mixed-use project with the Green Line LRT in mind.
When asked about its plans to develop the area in light of a new Green Line alignment, a company spokesperson declined to comment.
It's not just residents who have had to make sacrifices for the project, which, for now, remains in purgatory.
Geoff Allan, owner of Bottlescrew Bill's Pub on the corner of 10th Avenue and First Street, says his business has already suffered.
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