Grande Prairie council considering garden suites to reduce urban sprawl

Grande Prairie, Alta. (Source: Province of Alberta)

The City of Grande Prairie is continuing to work on its land use bylaw (LUB) that would allow garden suites to make more housing available and reduce urban sprawl.

The LUB currently allows for garage suites where a suite is attached to a garage and has an internal parking space; garden suites will not require an internal parking space.

“All of the comparable municipalities do allow garden suites to some degree, with different regulations, as well as garage suites,” said Alison Downing, city senior planner.

The city compared backyard suite regulations to Edmonton, Calgary, Red Deer and Medicine Hat.

“Calgary and Edmonton have the most lenient regulations with no minimum parking requirements,” reads a city report.

“In contrast, Medicine Hat only allows backyard suites on lots with lanes while Red Deer limits them to corner lots or lots with lanes.”

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If Grande Prairie council accepts the amendments to the LUB, garden and garage suites will be allowed.

The proposed bylaw includes changing the required parking stall from currently one per bedroom suite to one in total, that has driveway access to the backyard; the maximum size of 75 metres or up to 80 per cent of the principal dwelling (whichever is smaller); limiting the height of garden suites to not exceed the height of the principal dwelling; and a maximum site coverage of 20- per cent for a backyard suite.

What will stay the same between garage suites and garden suites will be a maximum of two bedrooms, and to build them would be discretionary with neighbour notification required and discretion based on impacts to adjacent properties and the specifications of the proposal.

The city has been making changes to its LUB over the past year, allowing for more housing in secondary suites, including basement suites.

The city has allowed garage suites since at least 2003 and to date has only five approved garage suites; two were constructed since 2015, according to a city report.

“The limited number of these suites is likely due to the high costs associated with building them, as seen in cities like Calgary and Edmonton, where builders charge over $200,000 for a garage suite,” read the report.

The LUB changes can come with some risks.

The city said eliminating garage parking to accommodate garden suites could lead to an increase in demand for on-street parking.

Fire flow requirements need to be met based on minimum risk for fire and propagation, and the impacts infrastructure, water, sewer, roads, as the unknown numbers of future dwellings in an area makes it difficult to plan accordingly.

In April, BILD Grande Prairie spoke to the InvestGP Committee (a city council committee) requesting that secondary suite restrictions be loosened.

“Currently, there's a shortage of lower-cost homes in Grande Prairie, and at BILD, we are regularly asked to improve entry-level market access,” said Jordan Gregson, BILD chair.

“Many municipalities in Alberta are implementing increases to density and access to lower cost housing by relaxing LUBs and incentivizing secondary suites.”