I have lived and worked in four provinces and found them all to be fine places, largely because they are all part of our exceptional country. I have, therefore, no interest in the province I currently reside in, Alberta, separating from the others.

Indeed, I find the energy/environment conflict, the major source of separatist urges, to be rooted in Ottawa’s greater sense of environmental responsibility. As someone who recognizes the need to achieve a sustainable economy, I tend to find myself on its side.

There is, however, a division in the province I strongly sympathize with. I speak of the division between the province and its two major cities, Calgary and Edmonton, the classical division between town and country, urban and rural.

This division was well illustrated by the recent referendum. The only one of the ten questions on which town and country agreed was the one on separation. The answer to that question was an overwhelming Remain, over 8o percent in Calgary and Edmonton, 75 percent in “other,” i.e. everywhere else.

As for the questions on immigration and the constitution, Calgary and Edmonton voted solidly No, except for Calgary’s Yes on one—proof of citizenship for voting. “Other” voted yes on all nine. One unintended result of the referendum was its clear statement of the UCP’s difficulties with the big cities.

While the premier constantly tells the senior level of government to stay in its own lane, she fails to stay in hers when it comes to the affairs of Calgary and Edmonton.

The bike lane debate is an example. The cities are big on bike lanes but the province not so much. To help “inform the government’s approach to bike lane policy” the province has created an online portal for Albertans to express their views. It offers five options, all are concerns. There are no options for positive views of bike lanes.

The province intends on presenting legislation that will give the province more oversight to approve future bike lanes and the power to remove existing lanes. That Alberta’s transportation minister represents a rural riding may not be irrelevant.

Then there is Calgary’s Green Line story. The line is the next phase of its rapid transit system and the largest public infrastructure project in the city’s history. All three levels of government are contributing to the cost. The feds have left the design up to the city, assuming it knows best what its transportation needs are. The provincial government on the other hand constantly interferes, dictating where the line should go and how.

It has, for instance, insisted on an above ground route through downtown rather than the city’s proposed underground, even though all Calgary stakeholders prefer the latter. In 2024, the province pulled its funding just over a month after saying that its pledge was “100 per cent” secure. The city has now agreed to a surface line that stops short of the final leg across downtown, and the province has restored funding.

Provincial legislation in a number of other areas reflects rural sensibilities over urban, including restrictions on the books libraries may display and the rights of trans people. The Charter’s notwithstanding clause is applied as necessary.

At the moment, accusations of gerrymandering swirl around the province’s new riding map. The map is revised every decade by an impartial commission. However, the UCP didn’t like the commissions’s version, so it appointed a politically biased panel to draw up something more amenable. The panel rejigged ridings on the borders of Calgary and Lethbridge, diluting urban votes by adding large rural areas. A court case looms.

None of this is surprising. In the 2023 election, the UCP were shut out in Edmonton and won fewer seats than the NDP in Calgary while nearly sweeping the rural areas. They are essentially a rural party with a very vocal base, and they serve their people.

So about this separation thing. Could the big cities separate? Some Edmontonians suggested just that during the recent referendum. The answer is not likely. Cities have no constitutional presence and therefore exist at the pleasure of the provinces.

Not that it hasn’t been seriously considered. The “Province of Toronto Movement” has promoted the idea for generations with supporters from urban activists such as Jane Jacobs to Paul Godfrey, former chairman of Metro Toronto.

The idea pops up in Montreal as well, at least among Anglophones, whenever a Quebec government starts promising another separation referendum. The separation of Montreal from Quebec if that province separates has been suggested by politicians from former prime minister Jean Chrétien to former Quebec premier Philippe Couillard.

The current Quebec government is currently promising a referendum, so the idea of Montreal becoming the 11th province might yet be tested. Another referendum cannot be ruled out in Alberta either, so Montreal’s experience could be of interest to Calgary and Edmonton.

It will bear watching. Some creative legal geniuses might come up with a way the big cities could get out from under oppressive provincial regimes and govern themselves in accord with urban sensibilities. Or at least force greater sensitivity to those sensibilities from the provincial overlords.