Canmore

Canmore is a town in Alberta, Canada, located around 81 kilometres or 50 miles west of the City of Calgary near the southeast boundary of Banff National Park. It is situated in the Bow Valley within Alberta's Rockies. The town of Canmore shares a border together with Kananaskis Country to the south and west and the Municipal District of Bighorn No. 8 to the east and north.

The town of Canmore was named officially during 1884 by Canadian Pacific Railway director Donald A. Smith, who was later on named 1st Baron Strathcona and Mount Royal. In 1886, Queen Victoria granted a coal mining charter to the town of Canmore, and during the year 1887, the No. 1 mine was opened.

By the 1890s, a North-West Mounted Police barrack had been instated on Main Street, but it was vacated in 1927. The building was refurbished in the year 1989 and it is under the care of the Canmore Museum and Geoscience Centre.

During part of the 20th century, the town of Canmore had a booming coal mining business. The town of Canmore boasted a population of over 2,000 residents in the year 1965, and was established as a town during that very same year. In the 1970s the market for coal was diminished, and in the year 1979 Canmore Mines Ltd. stopped operations. As a result of safety and reclamation policies instigated by the province of Alberta, all but a few mining structures were demolished in the subsequent year; just the lamp house and several mine entrances remain at present.

Canmore was originally dependent upon the coal mines for jobs. The Winter Olympics in the 1980's helped to revive the slowing economy, helping to make the town of Canmore a high-end bedroom and get-away community and a thriving tourism and construction industry. In the year 2008 the signs of the times were plainly visible all-over the town of Canmore. Development projects went into receivership and foreclosures were more and more common. Canmore had almost completed the Community Sustainability Plan when some obstacles in the early spring of the year 2009 essentially put the bylaw on the shelf. During the period of 2008-2009 the local economy shriveled. New housing starts dropped by 95%.

Originally constructed for the 1988 Winter Olympic Games, the Canmore Nordic Centre was the site for biathlon, cross-country skiing, nordic combined, and blind cross-country skiing events. The Canmore Nordic Centre provides world-class trails to be used by mountain bikers, hikers and cross-country skiers. It has provincial park status and is administered by Alberta Development. It has some 60 kilometres or 37 miles of world-class cross-country and biathlon trail systems intended to meet international Nordic competitive standards. The trails are groomed and trackset so as to accommodate both skating and classic techniques on the same trail. A 6.5 kilometres (4.0 mi) track is illuminated for nighttime skiing.

The Canmore Nordic Centre has a Day Lodge which offers several services such as a cafeteria, information and maps, day lockers, showers, washrooms, lessons and equipment rentals. The centre converts in the summer months to house mountain biking facilities and to play host to several yearly national and international mountain bike events. The Nordic Centre also operates an 18 "hole" disc golf course in summertime.