Thomson Family Park is officially open. On October 14 ,2016, a grand opening celebration was attended by the Mayor, Councillor, Director of Parks and the Thomson Family. This new inner-city green space will give residents of the Beltline community further outdoor recreation opportunities and a chance to engage with nature right outside their doors.

• walkways
• picnic area
• open green space with overhead lights
• outdoor skating
• playground

The redeveloped site provides a substantial addition to the public green space in the Beltline, and an opportunity to experience the entire space as a contiguous park. It also allows us to celebrate the cultural heritage of this site, one that continues the theme of bringing people together in an outdoor environment and engages our future generation through Public Art’s Street Art Program for Youth. This park creates a stronger sense of community with laughter, adventures, community events, special occasions and enjoying nature.

The site was redeveloped with the help and generosity of the Thomson family whose contribution supplemented funds for the park's improvements and for which the park is named in recognition of their gift. The Thomson family share strong personal connections to the community and a vision of a family-oriented urban park space that serves as a dynamic hub for the neighbourhood.

As you stroll along the sidewalk on 11th Street S.W., there is something remarkable underfoot. Installed under the concrete pavement is a series of engineered cells supporting the weight of the sidewalk.

These engineered cells are made of 100% recycled materials, and are filled with a special blend of growing medium that helps retain moisture, filter storm water and provide healthy soil volume for street trees to grow.

The system serves as storm water retention during rain events and as a filter to remove pollutants from storm water before it hits our rivers. Rain water run-off from the roadway is directed through catch basins at the curb and into the soil cell system below the sidewalk, providing passive irrigation for new street trees on 11th Street. The extra soil volume will help the trees grow healthy and strong, providing shade and beautification to the streetscape.

Learn more about other LID projects in the City of Calgary!

This site was first recognized as a park in 1929, when space on the site was developed for use as a lawn bowling green. Over the years, the site has been used for a variety of other reasons as well, including a picnic and sitting area, and a play area equipped with a small playground for kids in the community.

The site is listed on Calgary’s Inventory of Historic Resources. While it will no longer service the Calgary Lawn Bowling Club, there are physical elements of the site that can be retained and celebrated within the context of changing the site into a publicly accessible park.

Parks has had many successes with updating and altering cultural landscapes in Calgary while still retaining the heritage value of the sites by following The Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places in Canada.

The Calgary Lawn Bowling Club (CLBC) and Parks have been working together since 2009 to find a suitable new home for the club. A new location in the SW community of Spruce Cliff has been identified and plans are underway.

There’s already an active senior’s group in the community which provided Parks with the opportunity to build a new joint-use facility for the two seniors’ groups to use. The new facility will provide many advantages and synergies for the groups and will become a new community hub for Spruce Cliff.​​​​​​​