Banff Delays Heritage Rules Amid Density Transfer Pushback

Banff council has delayed a suite of proposed heritage conservation measures until October following significant opposition to a density-transfer proposal.

Council voted to recess the public hearing for proposed Bylaw 497 until Oct. 13, leaving the hearing open for additional public input while allowing time to consider information from a heritage symposium planned for Sept. 15.

The proposal would allow owners of legally protected heritage properties to transfer unused building rights to another eligible property in Banff. For example, if a property could legally accommodate a larger building but doing so would require demolishing or significantly altering its historic home, the owner could preserve the home and transfer the unused development potential elsewhere. The property receiving those rights could then build more floor space than would normally be allowed, while still following existing height and setback rules.

The measure is intended to give owners a financial incentive to preserve heritage buildings by allowing them to benefit from development potential they cannot use while retaining the existing structure. Many heritage homes are located in relatively high-density residential districts where preserving the existing building can prevent owners from developing the maximum allowable floor area.

Several lower-density residential districts, including areas of Middle Springs, Tunnel Mountain and the Marmot and Rundle neighbourhoods, would be excluded from receiving transferred density.

Since 2024, there have been 11 applications involving demolition or redevelopment that included demolition for properties on the Town’s heritage inventory. Two prominent Victorian-era homes on Muskrat Street, the Kidney Residence and McKay Residence, were demolished in 2022.

As of February 2025, Banff had 175 sites on its heritage inventory, but only 15 had been designated as Municipal Historic Resources and legally protected.

Several speakers at the public hearing urged the council to scrap the density transfer tool entirely.

Doug Leighton, a professional planner and Banff’s former director of planning, said transferable density can work in larger cities but questioned whether Banff has enough development flexibility to make the tool effective. He said recent land use bylaw changes have already maximized allowable building envelopes, including density, height and site coverage, on many properties.

“I strongly object to the proposed transferable density tool and I am speaking as a professional planner with a lot of experience; that one is going to cause you and successive council and staff a lot of problems,” Leighton told council.

Leighton also said that administering a transferable density system could create complicated questions about how development rights are accounted for and whether they are tied to property owners or the land itself.

“I think moving density around…gets the planning department back into the heritage accounting role,” Leighton said. “I just think it’s a can of worms.”

Former Banff mayor and councillor Leslie Taylor urged council to remove the density transfer mechanism, arguing the land use bylaw should provide residents with predictability about what can be built around them.

Taylor also questioned why some lower-density districts would be shielded from transferred density while other areas that recently saw increases in allowable density could receive additional density through the transfer mechanism.

“If density transfer is really a fair mechanism, then it should be fair in all districts. If it is an unfair mechanism, it is unfair in all districts,” she said.

The Municipal Planning Commission recommended that council remove the density transfer provision. Commissioners questioned whether a viable residential density-transfer market would develop in Banff, noting such a market is currently non-existent and could involve complicated transactions without an established way to price transferred development rights.

The commission also raised concerns about excluding certain lower-density neighbourhoods.

“This exclusion may be perceived as non-egalitarian, introduces geographic bias, and concentrates transferred density into select neighbourhoods,” the commission said in a written statement.

If council ultimately proceeds with the mechanism, the MPC recommended stronger safeguards, including keeping final approval authority with the commission rather than delegating decisions to a development officer. It also recommended mandatory MPC review of developments receiving transferred floor area to ensure public visibility and formal consultation with adjacent property owners.

The public hearing is scheduled to resume Oct. 13, following the Sept. 15 heritage symposium.