Calgary's commercial market is expected to continue at its brisk pace through 2012 according to a special report by TD Economics.

Commercial vacancy rates in the city currently sit at about 7.5 per cent, a number that is forecast to decrease to seven per cent in 2012. The current vacancy rate is a significant drop from 2010's posted 11.8 per cent vacancy. Industrial vacancy rates are even lower with a forecasted three per cent vacancy in 2012 compared to 3.1 in 2011.

There's a new office tower coming to Calgary and it's slated to be ready for tenant occupancy by 2016.

Cadillac Fairview Corporation Limited announced the commencement of construction of the Calgary City Centre Phase 1 on April 4. The first phase will include a 36 storey, LEED Gold Core and Shell, premium AA tower totaling 853,032 sq. ft. including a retail podium and five levels of underground parking withover 600 stalls.

Report tags Uptown 17th Avenue with highest retail rents in Calgary

Colliers International has dubbed Calgary's Uptown 17th Avenue the city's most expensive street to rent on.

The commercial real estate company took a look at top retail corridors around the world including New York's Fifth Avenue, Hong Kong's Queen's Road Central, London's Old Bond Street and the Champs-Elysées in Paris in a Global Retail Streets survey.

Heading west on Highway 1A, travellers descending into Cochrane down the 'Big Hill' are greeted with a stunning mountain vista slightly marred by a very large gravel lot right in the middle of town.

Between 1964 and 1988, the area was home to Domtar, a wood treatment facility who, according to the Cochrane Eagle newspaper, used a tar/creosote mixture consisting of semi-volatile polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and pentachlorophenol to treat to railway ties leading to the contamination of the soil.