Regina's residential areas, apart from the remaining residential portion of the original town between the CPR tracks and Wascana Lake to the immediate south of the central business district, are largely typical of western Canadian cities, mostly consisting of unremarkable post-World War II single-family dwellings on substantial lots.
(1) The downtown business district;
(2) the West End (latterly deemed the "Cathedral Area");
(3) the historic and affluent Crescents area, immediately to the north of Wascana Creek west of the Albert Street bridge and dam which creates Wascana Lake);
(4) Germantown, originally an impoverished and ill-serviced ghetto of continental Europeans;
(5) South Albert Street, adjacent to the provincial Legislative Building and office buildings, a neighbourhood of imposing mansions dating from the before the First World War through the post-War '20s boom;
(6) the Warehouse District, formerly — obviously, as its name suggests — the reception zone for freight arriving from eastern Canada and the USA for sale by Regina wholesalers, and latterly, with the eclipse of rail shipping, being redeveloped as desirable residential accommodation, upscale restaurants and fashionable shopping precincts; and
(7) the latterly notorious North-Central district, an area of low-rent housing nowadays characterised by serious problems of crime, drug use and prostitution.
According to the 22 November 2004 report of the Regina Planning Commission to the Mayor and City Council, "The current directions of residential [growth] for Regina (northwest, southeast and infill in existing areas of development) were essentially established in 1961…and …[i]n the most recent review of the Development Plan undertaken in 2001, it was determined that these directions continue to be the most appropriate for the next 20 years."[1] An eighth general residential category, therefore, is:
(8) the newer residential subdivisions in the east, north and northwest precincts of the city, planned in anticipation of gradual urban growth over several decades, a development which now with Saskatchewan's recent and unexpected economic boom is occurring in a matter of years rather than decades.
Downtown business district
The downtown business district, latterly and somewhat confusingly to the historically minded deemed "Market Square" by civic boosters (the historic Market Square was on the current site of the Regina City Police headquarters and was the site of the
Regina Riot), is located between Saskatchewan Drive and the CPR line to the north, Albert Street to the west, Broad Street to the East and Victoria Avenue to the south. The historical heart of Regina and noted nationally for its widespread destruction in the Regina Cyclone
of 1912, it is nowadays possibly more to be noted for its former significance as commercial and residential growth has relocated to the periphery of the city, and indeed many historically significant landmarks and buildings have long since been demolished and forgotten.
New apartment buildings and condominium residential development in older commercial and office buildings in, for example, the Scarth Street Mall and the Motherwell Building, show promise of revitalising the city core; the Cornwall Centre, an impressive inner city shopping mall originally with
Old Post Office on 11th Avenue; the conversion of the Union Station to a casino and the construction of several new hotels are bringing new night life vitality to the Central Business District, albeit with the urgent caveat that urban crime spilling over from the North Central remains a serious issue. Currently, the downtown covers 82 hectares, 0.82 km2 (0.32 sq mi).[2]
"Cathedral Area" (the West End)
In 1927, the City of Regina passed its first zoning bylaw, setting the patterns for land use in the area. Over time, additional bylaws encouraged the construction of high-density housing, which replaced older housing near Albert Street. A 235-hectare (581 acres) largely residential area west of downtown Regina, this neighbourhood is defined as the area west of Albert Street, northeast of Wascana Creek and south of the CPR mainline. The area has some commercial properties on the north and east and along the 13th Avenue shopping district, the neighbourhood's main street.
Holy Rosary Roman Catholic Cathedral on 13th Avenue opened in 1913, and it is the source of real estate agents' now popular sobriquet of the "Cathedral Area," the area previously having been known as the West End. Immediately to the east of Holy Rosary on 13th Avenue is Westminster United (formerly Presbyterian) Church, also a construction of 1913, and the other major place of worship in the West End. When Holy Rosary found itself without a meeting house after the catastrophic fire of 1976 Westminster gladly provided it with a worship space for the duration of the repairs. In recent years the West End has come to be perceived both as a bohemian enclave and an area of economic need. [citation needed] There are, however, pockets of decidedly affluent housing throughout the Cathedral Area, extending intermittently from the immediate west of Albert Street right to Pasqua Street. [citation needed] Holy Rosary Cathedral has always been a centre of high culture in Regina and Westminster Presbyterian, later United, Church has been an élite bastion throughout its history while never forsaking its liberal Evangelical Protestant mandate of doing good as well as being good. Both Holy Rosary and Westminster (perhaps as well as St Mary's Anglican in the Crescents) draw parishioners — and make it a matter of urgency that they do so — not only from among the British élite but also from among the less advantaged persons in their geographical purview.
On the perimeter of the West End on Albert Street is First Presbyterian Church, built in 1926 and founded by non-concurring dissidents from Westminster, Knox and Carmichael United Churches who objected to their several Presbyterian Church congregations' entry into the United Church of Canada — all Regina Presbyterian congregations had entered into the United Church. First Presbyterian, however, is perhaps a church more of the posh South Albert and Lakeview precincts than of the West End, the latter having been amply served by the two existing United Churches of Westminster and Wascana. (Wascana's plain vernacular style wooden meeting house originally stood on 14th Avenue as Fourteenth Avenue Methodist Church and was moved in 1925 to its new site at 13th and Pasqua; it was sold in the 1960s when Wascana United built a new church; the congregation subsequently merged with that of Westminster.)
By the 1970s, inner-city problems had arisen to some extent — declining and aging population, decreasing quality of housing stock, increasing crime, heavier vehicular traffic and fewer parking places — although, unlike other older residential areas of town, the population base and indeed the number of young families remained sufficiently high that the now nearly century-old Connaught Public and Holy Rosary Separate Schools remained continuously in use while several other elementary schools were demolished and not replaced. By the middle of the 1970s, area residents organised the Cathedral Area Community Association. Through the work of the associations — as well as joint municipal, provincial and federal social programs — local conditions improved. In addition, the spread on non-residential properties and high-density housing was controlled, and a large number of older homes in the area were renovated extensively.[3] The Cathedral Area in recent years has become a desirable residential neighbourhood by reason of its latter-day atmosphere of rakishness: the old Sacred Heart Academy, formerly a private girls' high school operated by the Western Canada-based Sisters of Our Lady of the Missions, immediately adjacent to the Roman Catholic Cathedral on 13th Avenue at Garnet Street, has been redeveloped as tony townhouses; many formerly rundown houses have been expensively renovated. On the other hand, recent cuts to the Cathedral Area Community Association have put many of the community programs and festivals, that created the renewed atmosphere, in jeopardy.
Wascana Creek in Les Sherman Park, West End, downstream from the Albert Street Bridge and Wascana Lake
Westminster Presbyterian, later United, Church on 13th Avenue, next door to Holy Rosary Cathedral
Connaught Public Library, corner of 13th Avenue and Elphinstone Street, opposite Connaught Public School
Blessing of Holy Rosary Cathedral, 3125 13th Avenue at Garnet Street, 1913
The former Sacred Heart Academy, now converted to private strata-title residences, but also housing the Roman Catholic Synod Office
The Crescents
The Crescents, taking its name from Leopold, Angus and Connaught Crescents, the principal residential streets in the precinct, is the historically most desirable residential area of Regina. In zoning parlance a part of the "Cathedral area," it is a discrete residential zone, its posh 1920s villas, mock-Tudor ambience and large lots a striking contrast to the more matter-of-factly working persons' housing of the 13th Avenue neighbourhood. It made the list of "Best Old House Neighborhoods 2011: City Living" in This Old House Magazine.[4]
Originally a property development of the McCallum-Hill property company to the immediate north of Wascana Creek after the Wascana bridge was relocated to the east of its original location, it soon became one of Regina's most attractive and prestigious residential neighbourhoods. Regina's Roman Catholic Archbishop and Anglican Dean live here, as do many of Regina's social élite. It is wholly devoid of any commercial development; the only local church is the Anglican Church of St Mary the Virgin and non-Anglican church-going locals are largely parishioners of the "Cathedral Area" Holy Rosary Cathedral and Westminster United Church on 13th Avenue and First Presbyterian on Albert Street. The local primary school, Davin Public School, is named for Nicholas Flood Davin. Low-lying areas immediately adjacent to Wascana Creek are less desirable (and contain less impressive residences) owing to their being subject to flooding in particularly wet springs when the creek overflows its banks; a flood in 1915 is pictured; the most severe flood in the city's history occurred in 1971.[5]
Albert Street South
The McCallum-Hill property development company pounced on the opportunity provided by the new Albert Street bridge, developing an imposing row of still-impressive mansions along south Albert Street and in the immediately adjacent old Lakeview precinct during the years immediately following the establishment of the province of Saskatchewan and designation of Regina as the provincial capital through until the beginning of the depression.[6]
The mansions of Walter Hill (built in 1911),[7] E.D. McCallum (1912)[8] and H.M. McCallum (1913),[9] the principals of the McCallum-Hill company, remain standing on Albert Street South; the Hill residence is a designated municipal heritage site;[10] the E.D. McCallum house was owned by the Sisters of the Precious Blood and used by them as an enclosed convent from 1948 to 1959.[11]
Regina's early promise soon failed with the stock market crash of 1929 and the long years of prairie drought which followed; the neighbourhood remains the closest approximation in Regina to Toronto's Forest Hill and Bridle Path.