Do I want to move to Calgary, Canada?

October 15, 2024 6:49 PM

I’m interviewing for a job in Calgary but I’ve lived on the East Coast of the US all of my life. In theory this would be a career-defining role, but I’m worried about quality of life changes.

I live in Metro Boston right now and have for the past 20 odd years. I’m over 50 and this would be a great job in theory - you never know these days. If this was a job in Vancouver I think I’d be OK but I don’t know anything about Calgary and haven’t been there. I’m married, liberal, love living in Massachusetts for the most part, so I have concerns about leaving my social network and family. Wife is open to the move but shares my concerns.

What red flags should I be aware of? If someone tells me “Calgary is the Cambridge, MA of Canada” I’ll be all set. If someone tells me “It’s the Dallas/Fort Worth, TX of Canada” I will curtail the interview process.

posted by Farce_First to Society & Culture (19 answers total)

As a current Albertan, I wouldn't move here if I had the choice. The Premier of Alberta is dead-set on crushing and draining public healthcare, public education, etc. Yeah, mountains are nice if you're into that, but I'd stay put while our public services are being crushed and forced into (eventual) privatization. (It probably is the Dallas/Fort Worth of Canada, however.)
posted by VirginiaPlain at 7:04 PM on October 15, 2024 [5 favorites]

As someone who lived in Somerville (so next door to Cambridge) for a couple of years, and also spent some time in Alberta for work related reasons, my impression is, Calgary is much more like Dallas / Fort Worth (urban sprawl, oil economy, on the conservative side), except for the weather and the landscape. That part is more like Denver. I would be hard-pressed to find similarities between Calgary and Cambridge.
posted by virve at 7:11 PM on October 15, 2024 [1 favorite]

Calgary is the Dallas of Canada, but it is also the Austin of Alberta. Keep in mind that historically speaking, Canada's right wing has been slightly to the left of the Democrats and while that has shifted, we have nowhere near the same level of evangelicalism pushing our culture wars.
posted by jacquilynne at 7:14 PM on October 15, 2024 [16 favorites]

On the one hand, Calgary is close to Banff, one of the most beautiful places in North America.

On the other, Alberta often gets called "the Texas of Canada" for good reason--and not just the annual Calgary Stampede.

I think you should go through with the interview, and perhaps if they fly you out, you can see first-hand what you think of the city (which reminds me of Indianapolis or parts of Des Moines).
posted by yellowcandy at 7:18 PM on October 15, 2024 [2 favorites]

jacquilynne feels the most right to me, as a resident for ~20 years; there's more arts and culture there than most other places between Vancouver and Ottawa, and it's got a perfectly fine restaurant scene, etc. The mayor is relatively liberal, and the former mayor is currently leading the provincial NDP; as people have said, the current provincial Conservative government is pretty much evil.

What's important to your in your lifestyle in Boston right now? If you like the outdoors, Calgary is great. If a thriving fine arts scene is your thing, maybe not so much.
posted by sagc at 7:25 PM on October 15, 2024 [3 favorites]

if you care a lot about what city you live in, and you love Cambridge, and you hate Dallas, is seems very hard to imagine that you will like Calgary very much. It shares a fair number of things with Dallas (while also being a lot smaller) and pretty much nothing at all with Cambridge
posted by ManInSuit at 8:19 PM on October 15, 2024 [1 favorite]

(Data point: I have lived in Canada for several decades. I can think of friends who live in, and love: Montreal, Toronto, Halifax, Vancouver, Victoria.... I cannot think of a single person who feels that way about Calgary. I do know multiple people who are from there, and left, and are glad. There's selection bias, for sure, but my guess is that I, random person on the green, probably have selection bias that correlates with what you will like.)
posted by ManInSuit at 8:24 PM on October 15, 2024

As a life long Greater Vancouver area person near your age, the only reason I wouldn't move to Calgary is the politics. And I'd feel i'd need to get out of town once a year during Calgary's Stampede craziness. (Well, and the fact the weather patterns there are worse for my migraines, but thats a me problem). That said, putting things into perspective i feel like the american political situation stresses me out much more than canadian political system ever could, even with the Conservative party having a stronghold in Alberta. But the rockies are out of this world gorgeous, and the cost of living is much less than Vancouver, and there are a bunch of other reasons why Canada, even Alberta, is awesome. Yeah, it has problems, but so does everyone. If this is a life changing job opportunity, can you take a long weekend to check out the city and see if you're ok with the vibe?
posted by cgg at 8:26 PM on October 15, 2024 [5 favorites]

Canada has some cool cities. Calgary is... not one of them. The middle parts of Canada are pretty racist, especially against Indigenous people.
posted by nouvelle-personne at 8:40 PM on October 15, 2024

I know plenty of people who love living in Calgary, and a fair number who moved back there or to there from Vancouver. We don't know enough here about you and what's important to you in a city and jurisdiction to live in to say much.

Yes there are loud right-wingers, but there are also plenty of liberals in Calgary. Due to the lower cost of living and better job market, it's more lively than e.g. Vancouver in a lot of ways, I think. Calgary has a reputation for being friendly, I'd say, though that's again by comparison to places considered unfriendly.

There's a lot of reflexive dislike of Calgary from people in other parts of Canada who've never lived there - I'd take those views with a grain of salt and focus on the facts.
posted by lookoutbelow at 9:39 PM on October 15, 2024 [9 favorites]

What do you care about here? Politics? Arts & culture? Dining? Walkability and bikeability? I think how you feel about Calgary is going to depend a lot on what you are looking for and care about.

Calgary is pretty much the Dallas of Canada, but politically it's definitely to the left of Joe Biden (but it's not the Austin of Alberta, that's clearly Edmonton). Alberta overall has some pretty unpleasant politics for Canada, but that's just not that bad in American terms. Like anywhere, there are pockets of people with more or less left-wing views. In Calgary, you'll find them in the areas across the river from downtown, along with other relatively central pockets.

Calgary is full of immigrants, especially from South and East Asia. Are there racists in Calgary? Absolutely, as there are anywhere, but Calgary isn't small-town Saskatchewan and it makes no sense to paint it with the same brush.

Calgary is very suburban and is mostly made up of single family homes, strip malls, low rise apartments, big box stores and terrible six lane stroads. There are somewhat walkable and bikeable parts of town and bearable transit, but the landscape is very car-centric. There are some nice bike paths, especially along the river and other green spaces, but the overall context is a city made for cars.

As many have mentioned, Calgary puts you within about an hour's drive of some very spectacular mountain scenery, world class skiing and lots of opportunities for hiking, camping, etc. It's cold in the winter, but also dry, so you don't get the salty slop that you might be accustomed to.

Overall, Calgary is just not that big of a city and definitely has a lot less going on that Canada's larger, more world class cities (Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal). If being in a big, walkable, dense city with thriving arts and culture and a lot of left-leaning folks is important to you, then Calgary probably isn't for you. If you want to live somewhere cool, Calgary is definitely not for you. If you're willing to move somewhere that's just OK, you'll probably be fine in Calgary. If you love the mountains, you might be very happy. You probably wouldn't love Calgary, but it might be acceptable.

As someone who has lived a few hours drive from Calgary for most of my life (and was just there over the weekend), I definitely wouldn't put it high on the list of places I'd want to move to. But if there was a strong reason to move there, I'm sure it would be bearable.
posted by ssg at 9:49 PM on October 15, 2024 [7 favorites]

In case this helps you, as someone who's lived in both Calgary and Vancouver, main reasons I would not move back to Calgary are the car centricity and the long brown winters (compared to Vancouver - but to be fair, Calgary winters are really sunny which does help).

Reasons I would look forward to being back - nature, even just inside the city where there are lots of nice parks, beautiful summer weather, less old money, friendlier vibes, lower cost of living. But I'd select neighbourhoods carefully.
posted by lookoutbelow at 10:06 PM on October 15, 2024 [1 favorite]

There's a lot to like about Calgary, but it is stuck in the middle of a province with a very right-wing government that will probably be around for a while. If you're ready to enjoy your neighbours and kick against the pricks in the legislature, Calgary may suit you, but take it from someone in Toronto, where our conservative premier is determined to fuck over this city at every turn, that feeling under siege is pretty awful.
posted by maudlin at 10:09 PM on October 15, 2024 [2 favorites]

Saying it's the Dallas of Canada is true but that's like saying Fargo is the most normal Coen Brothers movie. It's still definitely NOT the United States, and such comparisons aren't all that useful unless you're coming from another part of Canada. I figure you should at least go visit for a few days, before making a final decision.
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:30 AM on October 16, 2024 [2 favorites]

I have concerns about leaving my social network and family.

My comment isn't about the places, but this - people often underestimate how important this is until they move. I am speaking from experience here. I'd argue this should be the emphasis of your question, not the shifting of places.

I would only consider this if the career-defining job you get in Calgary could be a ticket to getting another career defining job back in Boston in 3-5 years, and you can potentially fondly look back on your Calgary years as that time you were adventurous and got to see a different part of North America (especially if you enjoy nature). Your friends and family will likely not change radically in 3-5 years, and you can maintain those ties with annual travel and phone calls, etc.
posted by coffeecat at 6:56 AM on October 16, 2024 [19 favorites]

I have family in Calgary who live an excellent life there. While it's not as pretty as some Canadian cities, it is in a fantastic location if you like: mountains, hiking, long bike rides, swimming, hockey, a real 4-season year, etc. As folks have said, the provincial government is butt - but the city itself isn't any one thing, any more than any largeish city in North America with lots of immigration is.

Do the job interview! See what you think. And never ever discount the value of universal health care in your calculations. (I know Massachusetts has this already, so it might feel less urgent to you than to other USians)
posted by Lawn Beaver at 8:23 AM on October 16, 2024 [3 favorites]

Best answer: I don't know much of anything about Cambridge, but I've spent a fair bit of time in all the cities in western Canada and a bunch of midwest and western US cities. I've lived in a lot places, I live in the US, so I know all about those sorts of externalities like state/provincial or federal politics. I would choose to live in Calgary.

Here's the context for the Dallas thing, which seems to be a catching point. Calgary is the fourth largest metro in Canada, much like how Dallas is the fourth in the US. But comparing Calgary relative to other American cities it would only break the top 50 and is actually about the same size as Oklahoma City. Seriously. Part of the association with Dallas is that Calgary also has a reputation as a biz city, - in part because many Canadian corporations are headquartered there. And because the dominant, but waning, industry in Calgary is the extraction of oil and gas, which again, makes for an easy comparison to Dallas.

So that's the seed of why Calgary gets called the Dallas of the north, both by critics and boosters. The locals are proud of the dynamic, vibrant and growing city. On this point it is important to understand that many folks from western Canada can't stand a braggart, and they love to bring someone down a notch.

The Dallas thing becomes a way to talk about Calgary in its context in Canada- where Calgary is seen as too "American", and Dallas serving to represent a very American City. But that "Americanness" is why I think many Americans would find Calgary a good cultural fit.

But Calgary isn't in the middle of the US. I think even the biz/work culture found in Calgary is much more like Denver or Minneapolis. Which is to say, in the context of Canadian culture Calgary is seen as one end of the spectrum, but for Americans it would be middling.

Calgary does the outdoors and the culture bits, but it really has its fun - people have noted the Stampede, and oh boy they love golf, and hockey, and sports ball. There are lots of places in Canada with less enthusiasm for such things. Calgary is also home to a bunch of the WWF/WWE wrestling. They don't take themselves too seriously.

Calgary's popular image is of a cowboy town, but I can't recall seeing one outside of a rodeo event, but fun part is that you can just jump right in if you want. The cowboy bit isn't a whole lifestyle John Wayne thing. Calgary doesn't really have a gun problem, so stuff like school shootings aren't really a thing. I just checked: there was 24 homicides last year. Relative to where I am Calgary is a very quiet and chill place.

Another indicator that Calgary isn't in Texas or Oklahoma: fully a third of the population in Calgary are immigrants. The demographics of Calgary do not resemble any city in Texas or Oklahoma that I am aware of. There are even lots of Americans - so you can live the dream expat life & never have to explain what a bruin is. Fun fact: many immigrant communities are more conservative than the locals, and whatever your politics are they won't map neatly onto any of the 13 political parties.

None of the Canadians have mentioned how good things mostly work in Calgary. Transit is good, health system is decent*, or how good the school system is, because for them it just quietly works, - but it is so much better on pretty much every metric than any public system in Texas. And likely Boston too. That is primarily because in most American urban centers all those poor, hungry folks, especially kids, drag down those quality of life averages. Calgary isn't an economic utopia - and on the outside you'll still see homeless and other problems. So it might take a moment to really feel it, but life just isn't as much of a grind and it's just not as much a winner take all race.

And money is probably one of the biggest differences. There's no slums in Calgary. Or around it. The average wage is over 80k USD there, and yea, relative to the rest of Canada it's not particularly equitably distributed. But relative to the US? What's the racial wealth gap in Boston? Around here in Chicagoland it is immoral. The poverty rate in Calgary is around 10%. And sure, Chicago land is only 16%, but that is mostly kids. Again, Calgary is not a perfect city, but in this way a bit fairer. Fairish.

The final note I have is about what I do know regarding Cambridge - that it's a college town. I know for certain that Calgary isn't a college town - because those don't really exist in Canada. So if the thing you are looking for is the place where you already are, then no, Calgary is not Cambridge, nowhere in Canada is Cambridge.

But Calgary is also very much not Dallas, not in any meaningful way for an American, even if it is for Canadians. This is your change to go meet the people yourself. Go! Check out the Hoodoos in Drumheller Valley. Check that bucketlist Banff stuff and its tourist traffic jams. Ride your bike through the downtown on the beautiful river trail and then have a pint at Fionn MacCool’s.

*oh yea this is a whole political thing that can't be summarized, but it has been my repeated experience that the system is generally better for most people in Canada. However - understand that the Canadians docs don't just jump to testing and there is a general parsimony around medical resources, it feels slower and less responsive. The medical system in Calgary is going to be more similar to what you find in the US than most other places in Canada, which is my generally point here.
posted by zenon at 9:54 AM on October 16, 2024 [14 favorites]

As already mentioned, Calgary is very suburban and car-centric. One of the implications of that is that it will make meeting new people harder, which is likely worth taking into account.
posted by spindle at 5:14 PM on October 16, 2024

Response by poster: Thanks everyone. I’ll see how things progress and certainly visit before making any decisions.
posted by Farce_First at 2:14 PM on October 17, 2024