Avenue Magazine did an article on the best neighbourhoods in Edmonton. They polled readers and added in some data including crime stats from the Edmonton Police Service and came up with the Top 10 neighbourhoods in Edmonton. The results are a little surprising.
Their readers prefer older homes to newer homes, and said proximity to parks was more important than proximity to shopping. I hope developers are listening! Here are the top 10 neighbourhoods in Edmonton, according to Avenue Magazine:
1. Strathcona – wins for walkability, character homes and social life. Check out homes for sale in Strathcona.
Whyte Ave.
2. Garneau – for it’s range of housing options and sense of community. Garneau homes for sale.
3. Westmount – trendy, close to downtown, revitalizing. Westmount homes for sale.
4. Oliver – Edmonton’s most densely populated neighbourhood offers convenience, an urban lifestyle and plenty of housing options. Oliver condos for sale.
5. Cloverdale – Cozy, quiet and close to downtown plus free tickets to FolkFest. Cloverdale homes for sale.
6. Crestwood – unique homes and a strong sense of community. Crestwood homes for sale.
7. Highlands – beautiful old homes surrounded by not the greatest areas. Highlands homes for sale.
8. Belgravia – on the River Valley and the LRT. Belgravia homes for sale.
9. Windermere – the only new community on the list! Windermere wins for it’s ammenities. Windermere homes for sale.
10. Parkallen – Convenience, close to a lot of the higher end neighbourhoods with a lower price tag. Parkallen homes for sale.
What are your favourite neighbourhoods in Edmonton? I would definitely consider living in some of the neighbourhoods chosen by Avenue Magazine, but there are definitely some others I’d consider as well – Riverdale, Laurier Heights, Rossdale, Patricia Heights, Parkview (Valleyview), most areas in Riverbend and plenty of others.
Of course, living in one of most popular neighbourhoods in the city comes at a price. A good portion of our clients wish for a newer or renovated home in an old neighbourhood, until they see the price.
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Sara MacLennan is the Director of Marketing at Liv Real Estate and a licensed Real Estate Associate. The bulk of Sara’s experience and wealth of expertise lies in on-line technology and marketing both for agents and consumers. Sara is the former National Director for Interactive Marketing for Coldwell Banker Canada where she was responsible for an extensive training program traveling to offices across the country training agents and brokers on marketing and technology. Find Sara on Twitter @edmontonblogger.
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Not surprising: mostly trendy areas close to downtown and the university.
Surprised that Westmount rated so high, also no Glenora (which has some great and not so great areas)
It appears they polled readers of their magazine “Avenue”. Which I would say is probably a good representation of people who live in these neighborhoods but a poor representation of Edmonton. I think that a broader poll would put more emphasis on schools, safety and community ammenities and less on walkability, character, cultural events and night life.
It probably should be “The Best Neighbourhoods in Edmonton as rated by trendy people”
Exactly. You just can’t have an objective result by polling people. If you poll the entire world. The best place would likely be somewhere in China or India.
IMO, the best locations are: Westbrooks Drive, Windermere Drive, Heffernan Drive. But I guess no one living there had the time to respond to the poll.
The authors claim the rankings weren’t based solely on the reader poll, but I agree it would still be skewed towards their readers.
1. Strathcona – 82nd is just too busy; good area for recreation, but not good for living there.
2. Garneau – probably the best among older areas.
3. Westmount – trendy??? seems they don’t know what to say
4. Oliver – so so
5. Cloverdale – I don’t know much
6. Crestwood – pretty noisy with 142 and 149. no point unless you are buying ones backing onto the river
7. Highlands – “Cash Shop” everywhere. Enough said..
8. Belgravia – Noisy close to the LRT. Inconvenient where it’s not close to the LRT. I mean, it’s not a bad area. Just that given the very high price level, I would expect something better than that.
9. Windermere – Langdale looks crappy. Windermere South is worse. Windermere North has a mosque. The only remaining good areas are Upper Windermere and the land north of it (Windermere Grande + some other area) currently being graded. Sorry, but Ambleside is not Windermere, it’s … Ambleside. Glenridding is not Windermere either.
10. Parkallen – In contrary, I find it to be very inconvenient. Convenience is not about direct distance to downtown. If you travel from Parkallen to the U of A or downtown, you still can’t avoid the most congested part of the trip someone living in WIndermere makes. You can’t walk to a nearby Safeway. There is no Park and Ride at Belgravia. There is no shopping mall, etc …
Sorry, have to strongly disagree on Crestwood. Unless your on the main streets, it is not noisy at all.
Windermere Scales from the Henday to 41 ave SW Check out windermere Ridge and the upcoming Keswick. Will be an amazing upscale community. I sell new homes in this area and yOu can buy a 2100 sq ft home for under $500000 with all the bells and whistles hard to find a $1200 sq ft tear down in some of the other areas on the list.
Kenswick is not Windermere. But I agree that it could be a very high end area, especially since there isn’t any apartment planned west of Ellerslie on the NSP.
A lot of times, an area is defined by its time and developer. Magrath/Larch Park, for instance, could have been great, as it’s almost the last parcel of land in Riverbend. Instead, the development experienced the peak of the market, and the developer cheaped out. The land is not graded properly (many streets are too steep) and the lots are small. Come on, 4000sf house on a 7000sf lot? Right now, Larch Park is selling some very over priced rear lane homes. Not a high end area by my definition.
Windermere, being released after the crash, on the other hand, has much larger lots, and tighter architectural controls (in Upper, and Grande anyway). It’s a no brainer.
WSN, you should grab a bicycle and get to know some of these neighbourhoods away from the main streets that outline them. I’m not sure why you are hating on so many of these areas as most of them have pros that outweigh the cons.
Well there are only 8 blocks from 142 to 149, that means that, in Crestwood, the furthest I can get from a busy through-flow street is 4 blocks. Sorry I have to pass.
City of Edmonton website has really handy stats on every neighborhood as well.
Everything from number of violent crimes to number of houses needing repair to percentage of houses that are rented to average income of people living in the area.
Extremely helpful for anyone looking at specific neighborhoods.
link to edmonton.ca
Thanks Karl, there is a ton of excellent information on that site. http://maps.edmonton.ca is also great.
Hey WSN
How about your short list of affordable Edmonton hoods? Not everyone has or wants to drop on those streets.
Where do you live?
I live in McConnachie, the area is developing. I hope they would start building that school that they promised 6 years ago…
“Their readers prefer older homes to newer homes, and said proximity to parks was more important than proximity to shopping. “.
This sure makes it sound like there are no parks in newer home areas, in fact there are tonnes of open space/parks in newer developments.
If you want to live in Edmonton, there are some nice areas, however St. Albert gets my vote. Just sold our home there to do some travelling for the next year or two, but there is lots of green space, city with the most trees, lots of paths to bike, walk, etc. good schools, shopping, safety etc. The only downside is the taxes, and the mayors obsession with photo radar as a revenue generator – but at least when they graded our street in the winter, a bobcat came behind and cleared the driveways.
St. Albert does have its own strength. But whatever good about it, you can also find it in Windermere. The two major disadvantages of St. Albert are:
1) Higher taxes (FYI, the city of Edmonton also graded my area last winter)
2) Connecting to the industrial area of Edmonton. Windermere, on the other hand, only connect to other residential areas.
wsn, didn’t I mention the taxes? – and when the city graded your street, did they clear the pile of snow that was graded and blocking your driveway? St. Albert does. From what I remember, that was a big complaint from Edmonton residents.
My driveway was never blocked as far back as I can remember.
I feel sorry for people living in the newer neighbourhoods with tiny boxed in backyards, and ugly garage doors all out front. I don’t know how some of the houses will ever get re-painted, they are so close together. It makes me claustrophobic to look at them. My old neighbourhood might be a little shabby, but the space between houses definitely helps neighbour relations. Since garages are in the back, we get to look out at front yards with pretty flowers, instead of cars and garage doors. I don’t see my neighbours unless I want to, thanks to all the trees, and I never hear them. (But don’t get me wrong, I love my neighbours.)
Maybe someday developers will wake up to the fact that now everyone wants to live like squashed up battery hens. Until then, I’ll keep renovated my old house, and appreciating our gorgeous trees and pretty streets.
I feel sorry for people living in the newer neighbourhoods with tiny boxed in backyards, and ugly garage doors all out front. I don’t know how some of the houses will ever get re-painted, they are so close together. It makes me claustrophobic to look at them. My old neighbourhood might be a little shabby, but the space between houses definitely helps neighbour relations. Since garages are in the back, we get to look out at front yards with pretty flowers, instead of cars and garage doors. I don’t see my neighbours unless I want to, thanks to all the trees, and I never hear them. (But don’t get me wrong, I love my neighbours.)
Maybe someday developers will wake up to the fact that now everyone wants to live like squashed up battery hens. Until then, I’ll keep renovating my old house, and appreciating our gorgeous trees and pretty streets.
There’s bigger lots to be had, just have to pay for them. Since people don’t want to pay an extra 100-200k for more space the developers don’t build it that way.
While I see the draw of a tree lined street with spaced out houses theres lots of people in the world that live in duplexes, townhomes and apartments with virtually no space between them and they go on to live happy lives (with less yardwork). These close together homes are just a step above those. By taking up less space it’s even more enviromentally sustainable. Just saying you shouldn’t feel too sorry for them.
I agree GM. When we were having an open house for the sale of our home we took a drive to look at some of the new development in the NW and West. Lot sizes have definetely got smaller which is why I believe people think that new houses are less expensive than older ones. You get no land. And let’s not even talk about some of the new townhomes. There was one where you couldn’t have anyone park in front if you wanted to as the road was divided so they could plant trees, etc. which left no room for visitors to park in front. And the rear detached garages looked more like large garden sheds.
Our home in St. Albert was only 8 years old but had a large lot, but even the newer development have smaller lot sizes depending on the area. The rear decks are pretty well at the rear property line..
birdlady, let’s be more specific about lot size and compare apple to apple.
In Belgravia, a typical torn-down shack will cost you $400k+, the lot size is exactly 4350sf with a 33ft lot witdth (37ft pocket). The next step up will be about $500k for 1.5x the standard lot.
In new areas, expensive ones, $400k~500k will give you anywhere from 10,000sf to 20,000sf with a pocket of 50~90ft.
You get 3 times as much land in a new area.
I meant to say “27ft pocket” for Belgravia, not “37ft”. It’s a typo.
I would never ever live in a house with back yard garage; you might love hauling grocery bags in the snow from your car to the house; I like my family/kids to get into my “warm” car without walking through the snow.
If you think an extra meter or two between your “old” houses are sound barriers you deserve an award.
The current standards of building is way better than what it used to be (insulation, materials such as cabinets, bathrooms, etc, as well as safety features), and on and on and on…
A common guy, I am a Red Seal Journeyman carpenter and licensed home inspector who has built numerous houses over the last 12 years. I do not agree that current standards of building are way better than they use to be (you’d be amazed at the deficiencies I’ve found at my inspections of brand new or almost new homes, homes that have all been passed by city inspectors and been granted occupancy permits.)
If I take my 1969 bungalow (with large properly graded lot, solid fir beams and joists, plywood sheathing and subfloor, non flammable stucco exterior, simple roof line with minimal hips and valleys) and compare it with what is built today (tiny lots with limited and usually undesirable grading options, almost the whole house structure is OSB or glorified OSB, highly flammable and always cheap vinyl siding, and complicated roof lines that love to leak…. and on and on and on I could go ) I would much prefer my old bungalow.
Sure I’ve had to spend some money to update the finishes. I’ve upgraded my electrical to make it safer and changed my furnace, insulation and windows to make it more efficient, but to say that current standards are way better is just not true. Newer does not always mean better, and in many cases the opposite is true.
Let’s go step by step; I know a bit about building houses too:
There is a lot of hype/myths about OSB vs plywood. Some old school type people think plywood is better in all aspects which is obviously wrong. There is a lot of evidence (just search a bit and you’ll find) that there are advantages and disadvantages to each. Plywood de-laminates a lot faster than OSB is broken apart. There is absolutely no advantage to plywood for walls; for roofs the opinions/test are mixed some arguing for one and others for the other. For subfloors, plywood is preferred. So to say a wall sheathing with plywood is better is just an opinion.
If you have done some demolition you’ll notice how easier plywood is torn apart vs. OSB. OSB is stronger in several aspects (again compare the data sheets of both).
Now if you want to compare exteriors compare apples to apples; many houses today get stucco exterior.
You have already pointed out the better electrical code/standards today. Same for pipes/plumbing applies.
The insulation in walls/windows are far better (and we are not even talking about spray foam insulation). Many houses from 70′s and have asbestos insulation.
Furnace, water tank, all are much improved over years.
You talk about solid wood beams: again, engineered beams are as good (if not better in almost all situations) than solid wood. There are many advantages to engineered beams/joists vs solid wood (some are discussed here for example link to bct.eco.umass.edu)
There are bad builders out there for sure and you can find a better “older” house than a “new” one but to say the standards are better in the old days is bit of stretch at best.
The only good thing about old houses is that there are people who prefer them!
ParklandCountyResident, I don’t understand where your complaint is coming from. If you prefer plywood vs. OSB, then use plywood. If you prefer stucco, then use stucco. If you like a larger lot, buy a larger lot.
I am about to build a second house in Upper Windermere. As I last checked, EVERY house on that street under construction uses T&G plywood for floor and roof. And EVERY house here use stucco, except for the mandatory 400sf stone cladding requirement. The smallest pocket on the that street is 52ft, and that’s only 1 lot. The 2nd smallest pocket is 56ft. The side yard is a minimum of 6ft on each side (vs. the standard 4ft required for RSL zoning).
A commong guy:
I graduated with a Master degree in Cellulose Fiber Composites (not from UMA.). In my thesis, I reviewed the 40~50 years of history of engineering wood penals, almost none of them could be compared to natural wood. Your “advantage” is from commercial. Oh, on bio-degradation and specific strength, engineering penals are better. How many states in US allow using engineered beams for houses?
I know that OSB is supposed to be better in some aspects than plywood, I ‘ve done a bit of research into it too, but in real world applications I find plywood to be far superior. Every engineered shear wall I’ve ever built has had plywood as the specified material to use. If OSB is exposed to water or moisture it deteriorates a lot quicker than exterior grade plywood in my experience. OSB doesn’t hold fasteners as well, I wouldn’t put a metal roof down over top of it without strapping it with 1×4 first. OSB is cheaper, but I think that’s the only upside to it.
As for engineered beams, I like the spans, and I can’t really complain about them too much. I don’t like TJI’s much, mostly because I can’t stand OSB, I’ve done a lot of reno work, and like I said, any moisture and they just fall apart.(have you ever had to replace a rotton TJI, it sucks.) Now I know, joists aren’t supposed to get wet…. but they do. In a perfect world where nothing ever goes wrong, OSB would be fine. Unfortunately this is not a perfect world, that is why I prefer solid lumber. It holds up better when something does go wrong, which is almost inevitable.
Electrical is better now, but It’s not too difficult to upgrade an older house. Unless it has aluminum wiring, or old knob and tube. As for plumbing, I prefer my old copper lines to PEX and ABS. (Though I mast admit I use uponor/wirsbo pex-a whenever I’m doing a little plumbing, it’s much easier/faster to work with, and cheaper too.)
WSN, I can’t just buy whatever materials I want when I’m not the one buying the materials. I’m not a private home builder, I’m a carpenter. I build what I get told to build. If it was up to me I would use plywood, and have a huge lot and use Hardi siding on every house. But it’s not up to me. Most affordable houses aren’t on huge lots with great siding and superior building products. Take a drive through a lot of new sub-divisions, it’s so crammed I can’t even find a place to park my truck (especially if I have my trailer). Drive through the alley and it’s even worse, two vehicles couldn’t even get past one another. And six feet to your property line isn’t much when you’ve got two massive houses side by side. I’ve got about 25 feet to my side property line. Maybe 10 to the other side and I’ve got a massive yard. My house has a 1000sq/ft footprint (and detached garage), so it’s not huge, but it’s not tiny.
Anyways, I know that some people prefer new and I get it. I’m lucky in that I can do most of the reno work myself, so I like older houses and neighborhoods. It’s substantially cheaper for me to buy an older house and sink $100,000 into it to make it look and perform the way I want it to, most people aren’t able to do that.
ParklandCountyREsident, if it’s not your own house, why complain?Plywood + stucco probably would cost a typical home buyer $30k~50k. It’s not like they are extinct. It’s just some buyers choose not to buy them.
Regarding the 20ft side yard, I don’t think that’s a valid old vs. new debate item. It’s more of a rural vs. urban thing. A 20ft side yard has never a part of city living, not in Belgravia, not in Glenora. It could only happen in Westbrooks and on Windermere Drive. In either case, you will need about $1M to buy a lot.
I’ve read many OSB vs plywood arguments. Most arguments are repetitive and result in “I prefer” conclusions. I think what people neglect to take into consideration is ‘what is appropriate to use in what cases’ because I think when you’re building a house some people often choose the ‘overkill’ route where they use premium material for everything even for those that doesn’t require it at all. I’m not a home builder so I don’t know what part of a house requires what kind of material. I think a good builder should know what are the APPROPRIATE materials to use so that he can reduce cost not only for themselves but hopefully for the buyer as well.
ParklandCountyREsident, when you say that “Now I know, joists aren’t supposed to get wet…. but they do. In a perfect world where nothing ever goes wrong, OSB would be fine.”, have you ever considered maybe problem you should be attacking here is not what wood is used used for the joist, instead it’s WHY IS YOUR JOIST GETTING WET?? I mean, if I built a house and the builder tells me that I should be using solid wood when my OSB wood rots from moisture, I’d be asking why the heck is it rotting and where is the moisture coming from? I won’t be asking why wasn’t solid wood used…just sayin.
John, here’s a couple situations that I’ve seen more than once.
Framing a house in spring, get a big dump of spring snow and it melts, drenching all of your framing and decking. Over the course of a few weeks until the roof is on, this happens a few times drenching your framing repeatedly.
Framing a house in the summer like this one, constant rain is drenching your framing and decking consistently.
After the house is built, there can be thousands of possibilities for why your joists may get wet. Here’s a few.
Siding has failed letting a small but consistant amount of water into the wall structure and floor structure.
Gasket on your shower is old and fails. Everytime you shower a bit of water drips and follows the plumbing, through penetrations in floor members.
Teenager showers everymorning, leaving puddles on the bathroom floor that end up in the floor register. Again the water travels along the ducting escaping throug any holes it finds.
There are so many reasons I’ve had to repair old rotton joists. Granted, solid wood rots too, and I’ve had to repair many solid wood structures as well. In my experience the damage isn’t as bad, and that TJI’s are harder to fix/replace.
The issues you’ve described doesn’t seem to be an issue with the choice of wood for the joist. Correct me if I’m wrong but isn’t rotting wood is a result of trapped moisture that can’t evaporate. So even if it rains and water contacts your wood as long as the moisture can escape and evaporate your wood should be fine?
Problems with gasket, siding, teens showering, etc…those are all problems of areas of the house and should be treated seperately.
Solid wood may be able to withstand moisture and rotting longer than osb, but the eventual outcome will be the same.
Of course, if I had the option of choosing plywood over osb for free I would do it in a heartbeat. But if the cost is significantly higher, then at this point I’ll have to make a choice to see whether it’s worth the money. Kind of like buying extra coverage for a TV from futureshop.
Live in Stony Plain and work in Sherwood Park. I’ve never understood the apeal of Sherwood Park. Air quality is poor at times when the wind blows right, the refinery smell is lovely. Ill take Parkland County any day for the outdoors. You ask someone from Strathcona county where they fish, they say up north or out west. Ask somewhere from Stony Plain, and they give you a list of places off all their fingers within 20 minutes from their house where they fish, and the air smells normal.
The rest of those areas are trendy downtown areas. Something tells me the critera is a wee bit skewed.
John, the cost is definitely higher for plywood over OSB. But in the scope of building a whole house it might work out to be a few hundred dollars more.
A lot of times the problem is that builders chose to spend money on asthetics, and not the structure, underlying materials or mechanical components. Most home buyers dont know and don’t care what the house is made of or the quality of the products used or the installation/building method, they care how the house looks.That being said, I can take low quality materials and make it look good, it just doesn’t stand up to every day wear and tear as well and the mechanical arent’ as efficient, so it looks like crap a lot quicker and costs more money in the long run.
Anyways, to make a long point short, I believe it’s in a homeowners long term interest to pay for higher quality materials when building a new home. It’s the biggest investment most people will ever make and not a time to cheap out.