The site is a valley, located in NE Calgary, with the Renfrew Community at the West and the Nose Creek at the East. There is a pedestrian pathway in between, walking on which gives a very linear feeling with no East-West connectivity thus, making it an abandoned valley. This long linear landscape has lots of opportunities which gave birth to this design intervention.

The valley was formed by glacier flow with clean runoff from the slop at the West, running towards the Creek, which once had a meandering shape. This historic Creek shape was first effected by the introduction of the CP railway and then the Deerfoot Trail in 1979 making this and the overall landscape very linear. The human development on the West also effected the water quality that runs down the Creek. Therefore the two main objectives were to break the linearity of the landscape and reestablish the historical hydrological process.

The first strategy to address this challenge was to create East-West visual connectivity and the second was to revisit the existing stormwater outlets on the site which are located perpendicular to the pedestrian pathway.
The existing site elements like the desire lines for pedestrians, buffer from the CP railway, connection of the Renfrew community to the existing linear pathway, the stormwater outlet right next to it and the existing native vegetation which needs to be restored were key factors that guided the design form.

A curvilinear pathway (The Ribbon) with pockets of experiential spaces was designed and a stormwater treatment system was developed on the node, connecting the community with the pathway. This design approach will create wayfinding and surprises for pedestrians with a seasonal design consideration, breaking the linearity and drawing people in this abandoned valley to reactivate this urban landscape.