#athabaska

We were driving down the drizzly Trans-Canada from Brandon to Winnipeg, when Ruzz remarked on how he noticed the landscapes were decidedly un-Albertan.  Everything was more lush, more green, with forested areas more commonplace when compared with the North Dakota, Saskatchewan, and Southern Alberta we’d just been. 

But for me, these landscapes of Manitoba had the opposite reaction; they really reminded me of Alberta!  It was the dried out nothing-but-tiny-shrubs for miles of Suffield that felt more foreign to me than Brandon.  It was then I realized that although Ruzz and I are both born and raised Albertans, we really do come from two different Albertas.  His, the more iconic cowboys and Lake Louise variety, mine the flat parkland and Ukrainian Orthodox churches variety, which is also a common vernacular to Southern Manitoba. 

There was a time when what is now Alberta was split into two.  Back in the late 19th century, when Alberta was apart of the Northwest Territories, the area was subdivided into two districts, one called Alberta, the other Athabaska. Athabaska corresponds with Northern Alberta today, including Peace Country and the oil sands.  It doesn’t actually include Edmonton or Jasper or Wetaskiwin.  Township Road 582 is just north of what was the delineation between the two (1).  There’s also been non-serious discussion of splitting northern and southern portions of the province.  In this contemporary scenario, Edmonton would be in Athabaska, though.  I don’t recall ever seeing anyone propose an official line in the sand, but I’d probably put it somewhere between Lacombe and Blackfalds.

I’d never really considered it, though.  I mean, as far as major cities go, Edmonton and Calgary are two peas in a pod.  You can’t ask for more similar major cities, really.  Sure, there are differences, but I always found the two to be more similar than different. I still think the two are more similar than either party likes to admit to but the differences are far more apparent now.  Perhaps I’ve just been in Alberta too long.

Growing up, Calgary was always the more imposing, bustling city. Coming in on the QEII, Calgary’s geographic luck plays out through the sprawling tract hills exaggerating the city’s extent.  This same sprawl exists in Edmonton, but it’s completely flat and thus less visually apparent.  Then, bam. The skyline.  Calgary’s skyline oozes big city, even if modest 1920s bungalows await the skyscrapers directly across the river, hinting at the city’s youth.

Calgary’s skyline is simultaneously dense and expansive; its phallic gestures the tallest outside of Toronto.  Edmonton’s skyline is fairly decent for a city of over a million, but it is infinitely more modest than Calgary’s.  This disparity is largely due to the now-closed City Centre Airport in Edmonton, which was Canada’s first commercial airport, built in 1929, servicing remote northern communities with supplies and air mail.  Mere blocks from Downtown Edmonton, it imposed a height limit that dwarfed the city’s potential.  Sure, you might be thinking, “tall buildings aren’t everything.”  And you’d be right.  Amsterdam, Nice, St. John’s, Lima, and Portland aren’t particularly known for postcard perfect skyscraper canyons.  But this is Alberta.  And Alberta is all about oil and money. Companies want their vanity pieces and when they couldn’t make it happen in Edmonton, they moved to Calgary.  It is rumoured that Husky Oil toyed with the idea of building what is now the Calgary Tower in Edmonton, but were put off by the height limit.

It’s kinda funny how things turned out, because Edmonton was definitely given the initial boost. Cozier with Ottawa, it was chosen as the provincial capital in 1905, and then got the University of Alberta a few years later (technically in the now-annexed City of Strathcona across the river).  The UofA remains a “Top 5” university nationally, and only being bested by UBC in the West in such rankings.

Still, the way things played out, Calgary is winning, and has been since the late ‘80s.  Perhaps not having the leg up early on forced Calgary to be more competitive and business savvy, knowing it couldn’t rely on the government.  In the ‘80s, Calgary got the Olympics, the main Alberta media offices moved to Calgary, the Edmonton-founded businesses moved either to Calgary or Vancouver, something that continued into the ‘90s and even to this day.  TELUS started as the public AGT, before buying EdTel, moving south, then rolling out nation-wide before the turn of the millennium as a private telecom.  Famoso is based out of Vancouver now, I think. 

Where was I? Right.  Athabaska and Alberta.

When outsiders think of Alberta, what generally comes to mind?  Cowboys, ranches, oil, the Rockies, badlands, Conservativism.  All of these things are awoken in Southern Alberta, in places like Banff, Drumheller, Turner Valley, the Crowsnest Pass, and of course, Calgary.  It isn’t awoken in Edmonton or Grande Prairie or Cold Lake or Vegreville.  Maybe Jasper and of course Fort McMurray, but that’s about it. 

Calgary has taken the cowboy theme on in full, with a saddle-shaped arena, a massive outdoor rodeo, and cops that wear cowboy hats.  Couple that with the glossy veneer that Calgarians espouse, the nouveau-riche flaunting their oil money, and being nestled right between prairie and foothill, with the Rockies soaring in the distance, and it’s hard not to see why Calgary is synonymous with the Alberta brand.  Calgary is Dallas while Edmonton is Austin-sans-overhype with Houston’s stature. 

Ruzz was even surprised to find out there are a few Francophone communities in Northern Alberta. Edmonton has the only French-language university west of Winnipeg, Campus St-Jean.  While Southern Alberta was settled by Germans, Brits, and Americans, Ukrainians, Poles, and French Canadians settled Central and Northern Alberta. I mean, Edmonton is no Quebec or even New Brunswick; it’s a very Anglo city and you don’t need any French skills to live here, but there is still a sizable minority.

Truthfully, there’s nothing arbitrarily more “Alberta” to Dinosaur Provincial Park compared to Elk Island National Park, but nevertheless, one is more iconic Alberta than the other. Even me, growing up in Edmonton, aside from Jasper, Fort Mac, and here in Edmonton, the places I associate most strongly with Alberta are all south of Red Deer, all within the Calgary universe. Drumheller is hella foreign compared to somewhere like Wabamun from an Edmontonian perspective, but we are brought up to associate one more strongly with our provincial identity than the other.

Y tho?

I’d chalk it up to my earlier tangent about Calgary being forced to be more competitive vis-à-vis its northern brother.  Calgary won the interurban competition game and has been able to propel its and its hinterland’s brand across Canada and beyond.  Calgary also won economically, for the most part.  While Edmonton was suffering from the Klein era of austerity in the ‘90s, Calgary was doing relatively ok.  It embraced corporate vanity projects and used its savvy marketing to attract people to its brand and lifestyle. 

Edmonton may be on the upswing lately.  It has fared better during the downturn in oil prices, and with the billions in investment into Downtown Edmonton since the City Centre Airport closed in 2013 (now hoping to pull a Stapleton), people are starting to wake up to Edmonton’s potential and newcomers are being surprised. I’m not sure if it’s enough to reverse the brain drain anymore, but Edmonton certainly isn’t still being left in the dust.