Alberta

Fall voting in Edmonton could feature more than just ballots to select an alderman, a mayor and school trustees. The cloudy future of Edmonton's City Centre Airport may also be voted on in a fall plebiscite.

The Town of High River and its partners broke ground in late August on a building not normally associated with municipal governments - a new $6 million medical clinic.

Alberta's windy city is looking to blow more business activity into its west side. The City of Lethbridge is in the process of crafting what's been dubbed as the West Lethbridge Employment Centre area structure plan.

Calgary's recovering housing market took a step back in August, with single-family house sales slipping by 32 per cent from August 2009 and condo sales off 42 per cent from the same month a year ago.

That means the relatively modest growth of the past two years - only 1.4 per cent annually from 2008 to 2010 - could easily be surpassed.

Don't expect growth to slip too much in 2010 and 2011 with the planned completion of the 32nd Street traffic corridor.

Its plans for Medicine Hat and area include two new high-voltage lines that total 110 kilometres in length northeast and southeast of the Gas City, as well as other major upgrades to the southern Alberta network.

Alberta has another city with a population over 60,000. St. Albert, Edmonton's largest suburb, topped that mark officially with completion of its 2010 census. The bedroom community grew at an annual rate of 1.

Building activity is down slightly from last year in the Stampede city, but up significantly in Alberta's capital, leaving Calgary and Edmonton almost neck and neck for building-permit values in the first half of 2010.

While Calgary's residential vacancy rate was up this spring, Edmonton's multifamily sector appears to be stabilizing, even as vacancy increases.