Lakeview residents oppose proposed McDonald's site

It was a crowded house at the North Glenmore Park community centre Wednesday night where hundreds of people from the surrounding area lined up to see exactly what McDonald's Canada is proposing to build in their neighbourhood.

"It would be a blight on that corner. It's not very nice to look at, the smell from the restaurant, the increased traffic," said Lakeview resident Glenn Geddes. 

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The fast-food chain wants to build a 24-hour restaurant with a dual-lane drive-thru at the site of a former gas station at the corner of 63rd Avenue and Crowchild Trail S.W., in Lakeview Plaza.

It first proposed to build a restaurant at this location in August, 2014. 

At that time, the community petitioned against it because of concerns about increased traffic. In fact many people, like Ron Lewis, thought the project was dead.

"This surprised me the other day to all of a sudden see in my mail box an open house invite to a proposed Mcdonald's," he said.

The company presented its latest renderings of the fast food restaurant. It also provided the results of a recently commissioned traffic study, which purported to show the restaurant would have minimal impact.

Alan Summers has lived in the community for 10 years. He lives right across the street from the proposed site.

"It doesn't matter how much it is. There is going to be more traffic ... they're going to be going through my area, right in front of my house, more and more and more all the time," he said. 

Summer says there are already traffic problems in the community. Whenever there are tie-ups on Glenmore Trail, commuters cut through Lakeview, making U-turns to get around the traffic jam.

Summers, and others, say their opposition has nothing to do with the company itself, just the traffic.

"McDonald's does a lot of really good things, like with their Ronald McDonald houses, and stuff like that. They give a lot back to charity and stuff. It's just, this is not the right place to do it."

According to the Lakeview Community Association's Facebook page, the company held the open house to get feedback from residents before it applies for a city development permit. 

No one from the company was available to do an interview.