St. Albert may soon be home to a tiny pseudo-farm, plans for the next phase of Founders' Walk suggest. Less than five people showed up to an open house on Phase 2 of Founders' Walk last June 11 at the Little White School.
St. Albert may soon be home to a tiny pseudo-farm, plans for the next phase of Founders' Walk suggest.
Less than five people showed up to an open house on Phase 2 of Founders' Walk last June 11 at the Little White School. The small turnout was in no doubt due in part by the torrential thunderstorm that struck the city at the time.
Founders' Walk is a historic trail that runs through downtown St. Albert. Phase 1 of the walk wrapped up in 2011 and saw the Mission Hill and Perron Street portions of Founders' Walk revamped with new signs, trails and trees.
Phase 2 is meant to extend the trail from Mission Hill to the grain elevators along St. Vital Avenue, said Kelly Jerrott, cultural services director for the City of St. Albert.
This portion of the trail will consist of three interpretive nodes: one at the top of Seven Hills, one at the corner of Mill Drive and St. Vital Avenue, and one by the railroad crossing near Grain Elevator Park.
The most unusual feature of this part of Founders' Walk is the mini-farm near the grain elevators.
The plan proposes a 20-by-40-metre garden of perennials laid out to resemble crops you'd find on a river lot farm back in the day. A gravel path resembling the Sturgeon winds its way through the farm around benches and interpretive signs and past a cut-away version of an old-style barn.
This garden is meant to teach people about the history of agriculture in St. Albert and to give residents a rest spot at this high-traffic location, says Shari Strachan, director of the Musée Héritage Museum. Actual river lot farms were much bigger than this garden, with some reaching all the way from the Sturgeon to today's Villeneuve Road.
Mayor Nolan Crouse approved of the idea, but said he wanted to see some public art there to give people something to look at during the winter. He half-jokingly suggested a sheaf of wheat, a dandelion or tumbleweed as possible structures.
The Seven Hills node includes a curved bench, tables, and a trail around the parking lot across the street from the St. Albert Catholic Parish.
Displays at this node will talk about St. Albert's first high school – now the Northern Alberta Business Incubator building at the base of Mission Hill – the heritage trees along Madonna Drive, and St. Albert Place, which is clearly visible from the top of the hill, Strachan said.
The plans also include a planter that can be replaced with a fire pit in the winter – an idea that resident Jennifer Jones liked.
“You get kids going down the hill but you get the parents shivering at the top of the hill,” she said. This node would give those parents a place to sit and learn as their kids played.
The Mill Drive node will be much smaller than the other two as it more or less fits on a street corner.
Strachan said this node would focus on St. Vital Avenue's formal role as the main commercial corridor in St. Albert – the primary road for dogsleds and Red River carts headed to and from Lac Ste Anne, and home to many businesses, including the city's original Hudson's Bay trading post.
The Mill Drive node would also talk about the grist mill that was this road's namesake, said Ann Ramsden, executive director of the Arts and Heritage Foundation of St. Albert. Commissioned by Father Albert Lacombe in around 1862, it was the first mill readily available to local settlers.
“It's an early attempt by St. Albert to diversify its tax base,” Ramsden joked.
Jerrott hoped to have residents comment on the plans through an online survey on the project's website by June 19. Construction of the $700,000 project is supposed to start this fall and wrap before the year's end.
Copies of the plans for Phase 2 can be found on the city's website by clicking on capital projects under the City Hall tab.
