Hi,

We have our moving date set for the 13th August 2009 and are well excited.

We will be renting a place in McKenzie Towne and commuting into the city centre. I'll be starting my police training in September 09.

I have three questions for anyone who can help.

What is the traffic/parking like from Mckenzie Towne to the centre?

What is the C-train like at rush hour?

What is the shift pattern for the Uk police 10 week course?

Any advice would help,

Cheers.

The parking will depend upon where you wish to park (downtown, at a C-Train station, etc. you should be able to park downtown without too much difficulty, although it would be an expensive option for any length of time).

The C-Train is always full at rush hour. Imgaine a train into Birmingham, Manchester, London at rush hour and that will give you some idea. It runs every 5 minutes or so at rush hour and, the closer to downtown you get on, the less likely you will be able to elbow your way on.

From Mackenzie Town, you could take the C-Train from either Somerset, Shawnessy, Fish Creek, Canyon Meadows or Anderson stations and you should be OK. You could take it from stations further north, but I would not recommend it.

I will leave the other question for others to respond to.

Cheers mate. I am used to the London/Kent traffic. The C-train may be the best option. A bit of barging never hurt anyone!

Hi Pauland Dawn,

Welcome to BE.

Wouldn't disagree with anything Almost Canadian has said above.

This thread in the Police Forum might help you on your final question...
http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=415497

If you send us an email, we can connect you with a number of others who will be starting their training in April so will be able to give you a very current view of what the process is like. You can get our email by left clicking on "Getting There" on the left of this post and selecting the appropriate option.

Best wishes with the move across. By the way...McKenzie Towne...nice spot.

Eamonn & Janet.

Parking Downtown is expensive.
Parking at C-Train Stations is difficult after 6.30am as they are quite full.
There is bus from Mckenzie to somerset c-train and also to downtown.

I get the C-Train from Somerset (i can walk in 15mins from my home) and get a seat every morning it takes 25-30mins to downtown.
I used to live in London,the evening calgary rush hour i dont find it too bad, yes its busy but you always get on the first c-train that comes even though its a squeeze and after 10mins people start getting off in large numbers so space becomes available.

We are also former London and surrounds commuters and although we are not regular downtown Calgary commuters, when we have done it, we haven't seen anything on either Calgary Transit or on the roads here that has remotely compared to the unpleasantness of commuting into and around London. Yes, there are peak time crowds and slow traffic but if the south east of the UK or one of the other major UK conurbations is your reference point, we think you will find Calgary commuting bearable by comparison.

Eamonn & Janet.

Hi there,

We just arrived into McKenzie Towne this week, cant comment on too much at the moment as we are new and have yet to use transport and experience rush hour etc but wanted to say hi and to say that McKenzie Towne has been everything we had hoped for.

Give me another week or 2 and drop me a message if you have anymore questions as I should be abit more in the "know" and be able to help abit more.

regards
Jan

the course is mon-thur in the main 10 hours a day with the odd exception

martin

Hi there! Thanks everyone for all the very helpful answers to hubby's questions! I am trying to contain my excitement about the move as we still have 6 months & sister-in-law's wedding to go before we leave. I have applied to start a course at the University of Calgary in September but if I don't get in I'll be looking for a job in the mental health field (assistant psychologist, mental health clinician etc). If anyone has any advise I would be very grateful! I'm also really pleased to hear so many positive things about McKenzie Towne, we just fell in love with the place last time we were over looking at houses. And it's even more exciting to know that the bakers have just moved there from here! Good luck!

I can't comment on the commute from McKenzie Towne, as my fiance travels from Evergreen, but once you are on the police training course you do get parking downtown. There also seems to be alot of travelling around to other training sites with alot of kit to carry, so a car will probably be easiest.

The time the course starts in the morning means you miss alot of the traffic!

A very belated answer to this thread. You should be able to get a parking pass to park in the CPS lot during your training. Allow about 20-30 mins before the start time to 'faff about' with walking over to the training centre, changing, kit and lockers and uniform and stuff.