Okotoks (, originally ) is a town in the

Calgary Region The Calgary Metropolitan Region (CMR), also commonly referred to as the Calgary Region, is a conglomeration of municipalities centred on Calgary, the largest city in Alberta. With the Government of Alberta's establishment of the Calgary Metropol ...

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

, Canada. It is on the

bedroom community A commuter town is a populated area that is primarily residential rather than commercial or industrial. Routine travel from home to work and back is called commuting, which is where the term comes from. A commuter town may be called by many o ...

of Calgary. According to the 2016 Census, the town has a population of 28,881, making it the largest town in Alberta.

History

The town's name is derived from ''"ohkotok"'', the Blackfoot

First Nation Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...

word for "rock". The name may refer to Big Rock, the largest glacial erratic in the Foothills Erratics Train, situated about west of the town. Before European settlement, journeying First Nations used the rock as a marker to find the river crossing situated at Okotoks. The tribes were nomadic and often followed large buffalo herds for their sustenance. David Thompson explored the area as early as 1800. Soon trading posts were established, including one built in 1874 at the Sheep River crossing in the current town. This crossing was on a trade route called the

Macleod Trail Macleod Trail is a major road in Calgary, Alberta. It is a six- to eight-lane principal arterial road extending from downtown Calgary to the south of the city, where it merges into Highway 2. South of Anderson Road, Macleod Trail is an express ...

, which led from

Fort Benton, Montana Fort Benton is a city in and the county seat of Chouteau County, Montana, United States. Established in 1846, Fort Benton is the oldest continuously occupied settlement in Montana. The city's waterfront area, the most important aspect of its 19 ...

to Calgary. In 1879, the area saw the killing of the last buffalo. Government leasing of land for one cent per acre ($2.47/km²) began in 1880. This created a major change in the region. The first settlers arrived in 1882. A community grew around a sawmill that was established in 1891, and it would grow in size. The last stagecoach stopped in Okotoks in 1891 when rail service between Calgary and

Fort Macleod Fort Macleod ( ) is a town in southern Alberta, Canada. It was originally named Macleod to distinguish it from the North-West Mounted Police barracks (Fort Macleod, built 1874) it had grown around. The fort was named in honour of the then Commis ...

replaced horse-drawn travel. By 1897 the community name had changed three times, first from Sheep Creek, to Dewdney after

Edgar Dewdney Edgar Dewdney, (November 5, 1835 – August 8, 1916) was a Canadian surveyor, road builder, Indian commissioner and politician born in Devonshire, England. He emigrated to British Columbia in 1859 in order to act as surveyor for the Dewdney ...

the Lieutenant Governor of the Northwest Territories, and later being informed by post office authorities in Ottawa of an older settlement named Dewdney in Lower Mainland, British Columbia, the name Okotoks was chosen by local businessman

John Lineham John Lineham (21 March 1857 – 21 April 1913) was a territorial-level politician and businessman from Northwest Territories, Canada. Lineham was born 21 March 1857 to Thomas Lineham and Barbara McIntyre in Mitchell, Upper Canada. He married ...

. The rail line is still a main line south to the U.S. border, but the last of the passenger service ( Dayliner unit) ended in 1971. In 2007, the energy efficient Drake Landing Solar Community was established in Okotoks.

Flooding

Okotoks has experienced three major flooding events, in 1995, 2005 and 2013. The 2005 event, which affected much of southern Alberta, flooded virtually all lands adjacent to the

Sheep River The Sheep River is located in southwestern Alberta, Canada, and is part of the Bow River watershed. The river begins in the mountain valleys of Elbow-Sheep Wildland Provincial Park,2013 Alberta floods In the days leading up to June 19, 2013, parts of southern and central Alberta, Canada experienced heavy rainfall that triggered catastrophic flooding described by the provincial government as the worst in Alberta's history. Areas along the Bo ...

Heritage conservation

Numerous old buildings have been restored, and one house was even resituated blocks away to avoid destruction by the widening of the highway through the townsite.

Geography

Land annexation

Effective July 1, 2017 the Government of Alberta approved the annexation of approximately 1,950 hectares (4,900 acres) of land. Okotoks and the Municipal District of Foothills reached an agreement more than three years after the town first issued its notice of intent to seek more land to accommodate its long-term growth plans. Okotoks will gain a 60-year land supply that will enable the Town to develop housing and other services over the next several decades.

Water conservation

Although the

Sheep River The Sheep River is located in southwestern Alberta, Canada, and is part of the Bow River watershed. The river begins in the mountain valleys of Elbow-Sheep Wildland Provincial Park,artesian wells near the river supply the town with its water. In September 1998, Okotoks became one of the first communities in Canada to recognize its environmental limits to growth were restricted by the carrying capacity of the local watershed. In concern for the supply of water, the town announced a unique and controversial suggestion of capping its population at 25,000 residents. In an interview on '' The Current'', Mayor Bill McAlpine stated that this objective may be politically difficult due to the surrounding region.

Climate

Okotoks experiences a

humid continental climate A humid continental climate is a climatic region defined by Russo-German climatologist Wladimir Köppen in 1900, typified by four distinct seasons and large seasonal temperature differences, with warm to hot (and often humid) summers and freezing ...

(

Köppen Köppen is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Bernd Köppen (born 1951), German pianist and composer * Carl Köppen (1833-1907), German military advisor in Meiji era Japan * Edlef Köppen (1893–1939), German author and ...

''Dfb''), with generally warm summers and long, cold winters. Rainfall is usually limited to the summer, with most of it falling between the months of May and September.

Neighbourhoods

Neighbourhoods of Okotoks are: * Air Ranch * Central Heights * Cimarron * Cornerstone * Crystal Shores * Crystal Ridge * D'Arcy * Downey Ridge * Drake Landing * Green Haven Estates * Hunter's Glen * Mountainview * Olde Towne * Rosemont * Ranchers Rise * Sandstone * Sheep River Ridge * Skunk Hollow * Suntree * Tower Hill * Wedderburn * Westmount * Westridge * Woodhaven

Demographics

In the

2021 Census of Population The 2021 Canadian census was a detailed enumeration of the Canadian population with a reference date of May 11, 2021. It follows the 2016 Canadian census, which recorded a population of 35,151,728. The overall response rate was 98%, which is sli ...

conducted by Statistics Canada, the Town of Okotoks had a population of 30,405 living in 10,476 of its 10,750 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of 29,016. With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021. In the 2016 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, the Town of Okotoks recorded a population of 28,881 living in 9,667 of its 9,840 total private dwellings, a change from its 2011 population of 24,511. With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2016. The population of the Town of Okotoks according to its 2015 municipal census is 28,016, a change from its 2014 municipal census population of 27,331. At its current population, Okotoks is the largest town in the province and is eligible for city status. According to Alberta's ''Municipal Government Act'', a town is eligible for city status when it reaches 10,000 residents. Almost 3% of Okotoks residents identified themselves as aboriginal at the time of the 2006 census. About 93% of residents identified English as their

first language A first language, native tongue, native language, mother tongue or L1 is the first language or dialect that a person has been exposed to from birth or within the critical period. In some countries, the term ''native language'' or ''mother tongu ...

while 1.4% identified French and 1.0% identified German as their first language learned. The next most common languages were

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

, Tagalog, Chinese,

Korean Korean may refer to: People and culture * Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula * Korean cuisine * Korean culture * Korean language **Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl **Korean dialects and the Jeju language ** ...

, and Slovak. Okotoks2007

Economy

The sawmill that was established by

along the Sheep River in 1891 operated for 25 years and was a major part of the local economy. At one time it employed 135 people, producing an average of 30,000 feet (9,000 m) of lumber per day. The growth of the Canadian Pacific Railway created a demand for railway ties and the mill helped meet that demand. Logs were brought down from the west via the Sheep River. The mill has long since disappeared but one building (one of the oldest remaining in the township) still stands. It housed an award-winning (butter) dairy from the 1920s to the 1940s. It currently houses a law office and restaurant. In May 2015 the Old Creamery was severely damaged following a suspected arson attack. On 15 June 2015 the Town Council voted to demolish the building. In 1900, just west of Okotoks, four brick-making plants were opened. Many of the first brick buildings in Okotoks (of which a number still exist) were constructed using locally-made brick. The industry reached its peak in 1912, when twelve million bricks were manufactured. The outbreak of

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

caused the shutdown of “Sandstone” as it was known. By 1906 the population had hit 1900, a figure that would not be reached again until 1977. Oil was discovered west of Okotoks on October 7, 1913. Okotoks became the supply centre. In its heyday, from 1913 to the 1960s, Okotoks was busy with horses, wagons, and transports hauling all types of equipment to the oil fields, and crude oil back through town to refineries in Calgary. The Texas Gulf sulphur plant (known as CanOxy) opened in 1959, employing 45 people. It was not unusual to see the bright yellow, three-story high, block-long, block-wide pile of sulphur waiting to be melted or ground up and poured into railway cars. Since 1974, Okotoks has been hosting a collector car auction in late May. It is the longest running collector car auction in Canada. Okotoks was one of the few communities its size with its own airport. A number of small air shows were held there over the years. It was the home of an aircraft charter company, flight school, and a

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

flying school. The site has now evolved into an airpark community called the

Calgary/Okotoks Air Park Calgary/Okotoks Airranch Airport is located south of Calgary, Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by ...

, where the property owners, if they wish, can build homes with attached hangars for their private planes. There is also a small private aerodrome, Calgary/Okotoks (Rowland Field) Aerodrome. Otherwise, like other communities in the vicinity of Calgary, it is served by Calgary International Airport. Okotoks2013ii

References

External links

* {{Authority control 1899 establishments in the Northwest Territories Towns in Alberta