We've all heard that Rome wasn't built in a day. Neither was Calgary, which continues to undergo an urban renaissance. Over the next five days, CREB®Now will present a series where it has sat down with five influencers who have helped develop the city as we know it today.

The lure of lasting value

He leads a Calgary-based company with assets of $3.2 billion and 1,100 employees in 12 different North American markets.

In its 57-year history, the company has developed and built in 62 Calgary neighbourhoods in all four quadrants of the city.

But while Alan Norris's Brookfield Residential Properties has been successful developing communities throughout North America, the president and CEO also leads what may be his biggest task yet: to end homelessness in Calgary.

A rapidly growing population in the Calgary area will impact surrounding communities now and in the future.

From families to businesses, decision-making around infrastructure investment, economic well-being and environmentally responsible land use is a big deal. That's why the Calgary Metropolitan Region Board (CMRB) is prioritizing public input as it plans for the area's future.

Urban planning experts offer tips on how to shop for your next neighbourhood

Is it a neighbourhood with a lake so you don't need a vacation cottage?

Or an upgraded, older neighbourhood with lots of housing choices?

Perhaps a community with a main street so "you don't have to jump in your car to get a quart of milk?"

When urban commentators weigh in on what homebuyers, first-time or otherwise, should be looking for when they chose a place to live the emphasis is on community amenities – or as Greg Morrow puts it, looking "outside the four walls" of the home, to the DNA of the neighbourhood.

From Chaparral to Sage Hill, off-leash areas are becoming more common in Calgary neighbourhoods

A few years ago, Amy Malke bought her first place: a condo downtown, just two blocks from River Park. Although she didn't have a dog at the time, she'd often wander through the off-leash area and dream of having a pup of her own.

That dream was realized much sooner than she'd expected. Six months after moving in, she adopted her beloved Schnauzer, Maximus, from a colleague whose child was allergic. After that, she frequented the park daily — and not just for Max's enjoyment.

"One of my friends calls [the dog park] his third space. There's work, there's home and there's a third space — a place you go to every day or even a few times a week, that's not work or home," she said. "Some people have a coffee shop. Others have church. But for dog people, it's the dog park."

FCC, U of C join forces to support community development

A new agreement between the Federation of Calgary Communities and University of Calgary aims to offer students real-world urban-planning experience, valuable data for community planners and some certainty for homeowners.

The agreement with the university's Faculty of Environmental Design (EVDS) formalizes ongoing efforts to get students into the field, aiding community associations in conducting research, consulting residents and coming up with planning documents to guide future growth and redevelopment.

"This partnership is really critical from the point of view of having access to experience and skills (community associations) wouldn't otherwise have access to," said FCC president Leslie Evans, whose federation has some 150 member associations.

New developments increasingly designed to minimize impact on agricultural neighbours

A suburban home with a two-car garage is hardly what most people would call a potential threat to our nation's food security.

Yet as subdivisions push evermore into rural areas — with neighbourhoods bordering on fields of wheat and other crops — their impact on agricultural land has increasingly become a hot-button topic, says Tim Dietzler, an agricultural expert with Rocky View County.

"This is not a new issue in this area or any area in Alberta with development new agricultural land," he says. "But many municipalities now pay much more attention to the potential problems that can arise."

Will mega-project CalgaryNEXT be the anchor institution that breathes new life into the local landscape?

Urban planning enthusiasts call them anchor institutions – those landmark buildings in which cities are built around.

In Calgary, they dot our landscape: from the University of Calgary and Foothills Medical Centre in the northwest to Stampede Park and the Calgary Tower in the southwest — even the up-and-coming Seton mixed-use district in the southeast.

Calgary would be a very different — even lesser — place without them, says Colin Jackson, member of the senate at the University of Calgary and also chair of several arts and culture initiatives.

"A good way to think of them as anchor institutions is that they set the tone or give a feel to a neighbourhood," said Jackson, who has spoken on the subject in the past.

Could the CalgaryNEXT mega-project be next?

Has "not in my backyard" become Calgary's unofficial slogan?

The cry "not in my backyard" has been heard in this city over many topics. From secondary suites to skateparks to special needs schools and even bottle depots, objections have arisen on projects both public and personal.

Having even spawned its own Twitter handle, Calgary's long-running history of NIMBYism has seen residents object to special needs schools on the basis that they would lower property values, social housing based on an increase in population density and skateboard parks based on the "racket" created by budding Tony Hawks.

For those tasked with moving projects forward in the face of such criticism, it can be a delicate balance.

"Obviously there is NIMBYism in Calgary, as there is in every city. Whether or not there's more, I don't know," said RESOLVE spokeswoman Amy Hurst.

We've all heard that Rome wasn't built in a day. Neither was Calgary, which continues to undergo an urban renaissance. Over the next five days, CREB®Now will present a series where it has sat down with five influencers who have helped develop the city as we know it today

The man with the plan

In Grade 12, a university professor spoke to Jeff Fielding's class about cities and how they are planned.

"I had no idea what I wanted to be at the time," said the man appointed city manager just over a year ago to lead Calgary's 15,000 municipal employees.

"He (the university professor) was so passionate about what he was doing and what the future held for cities that I thought, 'wow, I have to get into that.'"

We've all heard that Rome wasn't built in a day. Neither was Calgary, which continues to undergo an urban renaissance. Over the next five days, CREB®Now will present a series where it has sat down with five influencers who have helped develop the city as we know it today.

'Sink or swim' for housing titan

At the age of 17, Jay Westman was thrown by dad, Al, into the housing industry's version of 'sink or swim.'

The self-described "average" student had no "big idea" about what he wanted to do after high school: "I think my parents would have liked me to be a lawyer or a doctor but school was not my strong suit," said the chairman and CEO of Calgary-based Jayman Built, one of the largest homebuilders in Alberta.

So Al Westman — through his own housing company — plunged Jay into project management, and life in a motorhome on a multi-family site in Lethbridge.

"I learned a lot of life lessons. I made a lot of mistakes and cost my dad some money. But I paid him back later," he said.