Walk down from Oleskiw toward the river this month and the big open field in the middle of Jan Reimer Park looks unfinished. There is temporary fencing and turned soil. There are fewer weeds than there used to be, and almost nothing has been planted. If you expected saplings by October, the City expected them too. Its August 2026 update had trees, shrubs and native seed going in this fall.
A wet summer changed that. The field still matters to anyone who uses the valley below the neighbourhood, because what is happening there is unusual for a city park project. Nothing is being built. A piece of land that people farmed and golfed on for most of a century is being handed back to forest and prairie meadow. The City is also leaving out the parking lots and washrooms that people have long asked for, on purpose.
A Field That Was Never Really Wild
The open ground looks like natural meadow, but it has been worked land for more than a hundred years. The Oleskiw River Valley Park Master Plan from January 2020 tells the story. The Edmonton Country Club bought 426 acres here in 1910. In 1913 it opened its lower holes on the southern part of what is now the park, and they stayed there until 1930, when play moved up to the upland course.
After the golfers left, Curtis and Edith Munson ran Wolf Willow Farm on about 480 acres of the valley land. They grew hay on the open fields and kept the forest stand to the east. The farm closed in 1970.
By 2002 the land belonged to Centennial Valley Properties, which planned to develop it. Public outcry and a City bylaw against development in the river valley stopped those plans, and the City then set out to acquire the property. In 2021 the park was renamed for Jan Reimer, Edmonton's first female mayor, who as mayor worked to preserve the river valley and extend its trail system. The neighbourhood itself keeps the older name. It honours Professor Joseph Oleskiw, who visited Alberta from Ukraine in 1895 and promoted Ukrainian immigration to the province.
That history explains why the field looks the way it does. The City's Concept Design Report from January 2025 calls the central field ruderal grassland. That means ground disturbed by tree clearing and farming, and it is now dominated by non-native agronomic grasses and weeds. The goal of the restoration is to bring native plant communities back to that ground.
Seven Areas, and Most of the Work Lands on the Old Hayfield
The Jan Reimer Park page lists the park at 193 acres. The restoration covers about 30 hectares of it, or roughly 74 acres, split into seven areas.
| Area | Size | What happens there |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Existing Natural Forest Regeneration | 4.2 ha | Weed control only. It is already regrowing on its own |
| 2. East Forest Restoration | 10.1 ha | Soil inversion, then native grasses, wildflowers, shrubs and trees |
| 3. North & South: Restoration of Prairie Meadow | 11.1 ha | Stays open as Aspen Parkland meadow, seeded with native grasses and wildflowers |
| 4. South West Forest Restoration | 0.5 ha | Weed removal, then natural regrowth with no planting |
| 5. West Forest Restoration | 2.3 ha | A planted forest community |
| 6. North West Forest Restoration | 0.7 ha | Shrubs and wildflowers on disturbed flat ground |
| 7. Shrub Transition Area | 0.65 ha | A band of shrubs between the aspen and the meadow |
Areas 2 and 3 together make up about 21 of the 30 hectares, so most of the effort goes into the former hay ground. The two areas are headed in different directions. The east side becomes forest. The north and south sections stay open meadow, the kind of view people already walk down for, but with native prairie grasses in place of farm grass. Along the shared-use path, the plan calls for native meadow sod and islands of wildflower plugs.
Several parts of the park are not being touched. The riparian forest along the eastern and northern edges stays as it is, and so does the forest on the western and northwestern slopes. That includes the groupings of caragana, which will be managed rather than removed.
The plant list ties back to the land's past. The report counts saskatoon, wild sarsaparilla, wild rose, trembling aspen and Sweet Cicely among the plants already growing here. In the City's What We Heard Report, a Traditional Ecological Knowledge Working Group suggested additions. They included high and low bush cranberry, wild rose, red dogwood, willow, chokecherry, saskatoon, prairie grass and juniper, with sage, sweetgrass and gooseberries raised later. The City says fruit-bearing plants are on its planting lists.
Why the Fencing Went Up Before Anything Was Planted
The first crews were not gardeners. Construction started in October 2025 with Historical Resources field work and temporary fencing to mark out the work areas. According to the Concept Design Report, earlier studies in the park recorded four precontact archaeological sites. The provincial Historical Resources Act application submitted in 2018 required archaeological and paleontological impact assessment once the design was finished.
Some fencing protects plants. The concept calls for fencing around identified rare plants to limit ground disturbance, and it marks Sweet Cicely communities for protection. The bare soil comes from soil inversion, a technique the plan schedules for late summer or early fall in Areas 2 and 3. It turns the soil over to bury the weed seed bank before native seed goes in.
What the Rain Changed
The schedule held until this summer. In its August 2026 update, the City said the contractor had started fencing, weed control and soil preparation, though June and July rain had already delayed some work. That update also noted an Indigenous ceremony in June 2026 to mark the start of planting. The September 2026 update changed the timing:
"Planting of trees and shrubs, along with naturalization seeding is delayed due to record rain events in 2026 and is now scheduled to begin in the Spring of 2027."
Here is the timeline as it stands for the rest of the project:
- Now through winter 2026–27. The site stays prepared but unplanted.
- Spring 2027. Tree and shrub planting and native seeding begin.
- The 2027 season. The City plans to finish the remaining planting and focus on getting the site established.
- End of 2029. The project is scheduled for completion.
The delay has not added cost. The City's capital projects tracker, Building Edmonton, lists Jan Reimer Park Naturalization at $5.51 million approved and forecast, and on budget.
What Is Deliberately Not Coming
Some things are missing from the plan, and that is by design. The What We Heard Report states that no work is planned in the existing forests and that the project adds no new infrastructure meant to draw more recreation. The 2020 Master Plan did envision pit washrooms, waste bins, resting points and lookouts, granular trail connections and nature interpretation. Of the whole plan, only the restoration piece received funding, in the 2023–2026 Capital Budget.
The Master Plan looked at public vehicle access as a possible opportunity and then recommended against it. It called instead for limited access for service and emergency vehicles, parking outside the park and pedestrian-only access from Wolf Willow Ravine. As a result, the park will stay one that people reach on foot or by bike, mostly from the neighbourhoods above it.
Engagement opinions were mixed. The What We Heard Report counted 251 online survey participants and 16 open-house attendees. Some wanted more trail access for cycling, mountain biking, walking and running. Others preferred minimal intervention and a return to native meadow and forest. Respondents also warned that more recreation could make erosion and human impact worse. The funded work follows the restoration side of that debate.
Getting Down There Between Now and Spring
The usual short route from the Westridge side is closed for now. CTV News Edmonton reported on September 18, 2026 that the City had closed the pedestrian bridge over Wolf Willow ravine, between Westridge and Oleskiw, for erosion repairs. The story's headline gave the closure as six weeks. Six weeks from mid-September runs to about the end of October, so check the City's notices before relying on that crossing.
The paved pathway through the park connects from the Fort Edmonton Footbridge to the north and from Terwillegar Park to the south. The park is open from 5 a.m. to 11 p.m. Parking and the nearest accessible portable toilets are at the Terwillegar Park lot. The City's footbridge fact sheet describes the west-side trail running through the Oleskiw lands toward the Terwillegar footbridge and the dog park. Parking restrictions apply at Terwillegar, and the City plans to expand that lot next spring.
For winter, the City's snow-clearing policy puts paved river valley park trails at Priority 2. They are cleared within 72 hours after 2.5 centimetres of snow, unless they are part of the priority bike network. Gravel trails are left in their natural state. The paved path along the meadow should stay walkable after snowfalls, while the informal trails through the restoration areas will stay unplowed. When spring planting starts, the City's earlier updates expected trails in the work area to remain open and asked walkers to follow construction signs and flaggers.
For more on the routes down from the neighbourhood, see our weekend-on-foot guide to Oleskiw and the Oleskiw neighbourhood page.
At Rimrock Real Estate, we pay attention to the land around the homes we build and sell, including the slow changes like a hayfield returning to forest over the next three seasons. If you live above the valley and want to talk about how a home could open toward that future meadow, or how a property on the ridge sits beside it, we'd be glad to start that conversation.
