Opinion: Edmonton's zoning bylaw offers opportunities for young people
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However, the youth perspective has been largely left out of the narrative. As a busy 25-year-old Edmontonian who was unavailable to speak at the recent public hearings, where city councillors rightfully approved new design regulations for infill housing, I want to share part of my current perspective in the hopes that it will help shape your perspective.
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Infill housing has always been a controversial subject in Edmonton, even going back to policies such as lot-splitting and the mature neighbourhood overlay, which are now generally accepted as enabling positive infill housing. The new zoning bylaw takes it up a notch, but particularly contentious is mid-block row housing (or eight-plexes, if you want to make it sound more scary) in mature neighbourhoods. Illegal pauses of such infill housing (which would take away individual property rights) have been floated, but row housing under the new zoning bylaw has played, and continues to play an important role in tackling Edmonton's housing crisis.
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According to general building permits data in Edmonton's Open Data Portal, so far in 2025, there have been 2,073 units in row housing with five-plus units that were issued building permits — just under 70 per cent of the total number of units for apartments. There is a narrative that gentle density in mature neighbourhoods, largely through row housing, is not making a meaningful dent in housing supply. The numbers show otherwise.
Before you jump in and say 'but this infill housing is not affordable!' hear me out. While new infill housing can be a bit pricey upfront (it is new after all), it creates more homes for Edmontonians using economies of scale, and opens up homes elsewhere in Edmonton when people move into the infill housing. Such added supply puts upward pressure on vacancy rates, which have consistently moved opposite to inflation-adjusted rent changes in Edmonton over the last few decades, according to vacancy and rent data I sourced from Government of Alberta datasets. The concept of supply and demand has proven to ring true for housing in Edmonton.
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The zoning bylaw is ultimately about fairness, especially for younger Edmontonians like myself who want an affordable and livable city. Any neighbourhood that restricts infill housing forces other neighbourhoods to pick up the slack. Putting all our infill-housing eggs in the downtown basket is not fair — many Edmontonians would prefer to live closer to the ground and neighbourhood streetscape rather than in 'skyboxes,' not to mention downtown having to further subsidize the property taxes of existing low-density neighbourhoods. And limiting infill housing mid-block (the vast majority of lots) would decimate where missing-middle housing can practically be built.
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In the context of the ongoing conversations around Edmonton's zoning bylaw, it seems Edmontonians have been thinking about and talking about infill housing more than ever before. While there have been years of public engagement leading up to this moment, it is fantastic to see Edmontonians becoming more engaged on infill housing. Article content However, the youth perspective has been largely left out of the narrative. As a busy 25-year-old Edmontonian who was unavailable to speak at the recent public hearings, where city councillors rightfully approved new design regulations for infill housing, I want to share part of my current perspective in the hopes that it will help shape your perspective. Article content Article content Article content Infill housing has always been a controversial subject in Edmonton, even going back to policies such as lot-splitting and the mature neighbourhood overlay, which are now generally accepted as enabling positive infill housing. The new zoning bylaw takes it up a notch, but particularly contentious is mid-block row housing (or eight-plexes, if you want to make it sound more scary) in mature neighbourhoods. Illegal pauses of such infill housing (which would take away individual property rights) have been floated, but row housing under the new zoning bylaw has played, and continues to play an important role in tackling Edmonton's housing crisis. Article content Article content According to general building permits data in Edmonton's Open Data Portal, so far in 2025, there have been 2,073 units in row housing with five-plus units that were issued building permits — just under 70 per cent of the total number of units for apartments. There is a narrative that gentle density in mature neighbourhoods, largely through row housing, is not making a meaningful dent in housing supply. The numbers show otherwise. Before you jump in and say 'but this infill housing is not affordable!' hear me out. While new infill housing can be a bit pricey upfront (it is new after all), it creates more homes for Edmontonians using economies of scale, and opens up homes elsewhere in Edmonton when people move into the infill housing. Such added supply puts upward pressure on vacancy rates, which have consistently moved opposite to inflation-adjusted rent changes in Edmonton over the last few decades, according to vacancy and rent data I sourced from Government of Alberta datasets. The concept of supply and demand has proven to ring true for housing in Edmonton. Article content The zoning bylaw is ultimately about fairness, especially for younger Edmontonians like myself who want an affordable and livable city. Any neighbourhood that restricts infill housing forces other neighbourhoods to pick up the slack. Putting all our infill-housing eggs in the downtown basket is not fair — many Edmontonians would prefer to live closer to the ground and neighbourhood streetscape rather than in 'skyboxes,' not to mention downtown having to further subsidize the property taxes of existing low-density neighbourhoods. And limiting infill housing mid-block (the vast majority of lots) would decimate where missing-middle housing can practically be built.
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