Alberta Infrastructure reviews 2024 progress

Hundreds of infrastructure projects completed or underway throughout 2024 helped build Alberta communities, boost the economy and support thousands of jobs.

Throughout the province, Infrastructure worked in collaboration with industry, school jurisdictions, Alberta Health and municipal and community partners to deliver the new, modernized and well-maintained public facilities that house the vital programs and services Alberta families and communities rely on.

“This past year, we completed hundreds of projects across Alberta, providing growing communities with new and modernized facilities. We also passed the Real Property Governance Act, a piece of legislation that helps the government better manage assets for Albertans and ultimately provides better value for our tax dollars. As we move into 2025, our team is committed to delivering the essential infrastructure needed to support the demands of our growing and robust economy.”

Pete Guthrie, Minister of Infrastructure

With a strong outlook for Alberta’s construction market, 2025 is shaping up to be another productive year. Alberta Infrastructure remains committed to completing work on schedule and on budget, while maximizing the value of taxpayer money.

This past year saw a focus on further developing relationships with industry partners across various trades, backgrounds, specialities and sectors. In 2025, this work will continue through Industry Liaison Committees, roundtables and other opportunities that will maximize collaboration and productivity. Alberta’s future is strong, competitive and full of opportunity.

2024 Infrastructure highlights

Schools

In September, Alberta’s government announced a generational commitment of $8.6 billion to build schools now. This investment will award up to 90 new schools and up to 24 modernizations or replacements over the next three years.
- In addition, a new in-budget approval process has been introduced for school construction that will accelerate project progression through development stages, reducing project timelines by as much as six months.
In 2024, 10 schools were built across the province, creating space for more than 9,600 students in nine communities, including:
- Blackfalds, Calgary, Coaldale, Edmonton, Fort Vermillion, Grande Prairie, Langdon, Leduc and Wabasca-Desmarais.
Entering the new year, another 82 school projects are underway, progressing through various stages of planning, design and construction.

Health Facilities

As announced in Budget 2024, a modern, standalone Stollery Children’s Hospital in Edmonton remains a key priority with $20 million budgeted over the next three years for early planning.
Redevelopment of Calgary’s Rockyview General Hospital Intensive Care Unit, Coronary Care Unit and Gastrointestinal Clinic were completed in 2024.
Renovations of operating rooms and support areas in Rocky Mountain House through the Alberta Surgical Initiative (ASI) wrapped up this past spring.
- Through the ASI, 31 projects are underway in planning, design or construction in Brooks, Calgary, Edmonton, Innisfail, Lethbridge and Olds.
Another 53 health projects are underway going into 2025.
- This includes awarding the construction manager contract for the Red Deer Regional Hospital Centre (RDRHC) this past summer and making progress on the new patient tower and redevelopment.
  - The procurement process for the RDRHC Ambulatory building is ongoing, with contractor selection expected in spring 2025 and groundbreaking in summer 2025.

Government Facilities

The Lakeview Recovery Community in Gunn completed construction and was handed over to Mental Health and Addiction for operations.
- Construction of the Calgary Recovery Community is anticipated to be complete in early 2025.
The new $203-million Red Deer Justice Centre completed construction and will provide the community with 12 courtrooms when it officially opens in the first quarter of 2025.
Another 20 new government facility projects are underway, such as recovery community facilities in Grande Prairie and Edmonton, and campus upgrades to the Yellowhead Youth Centre.

Capital Maintenance and Renewal

Work done through Capital Maintenance and Renewal (CMR) helps upgrade existing government facilities and assets. In 2024, work finished on 85 CMR projects, including construction of the new reflecting pool and fountain at the Alberta legislature grounds in time for Canada Day celebrations.
Another 212 CMR projects are underway at government facilities going into the new year, with an additional 516 specifically at health facilities.

Public-Private Partnership (P3) Awards

In May, Alberta’s government completed construction of five high schools in Blackfalds, Langdon, Leduc and two in Edmonton. All finished on schedule, on budget and ready for the 2024-25 school year.
- This bundle received a Silver Award for Design & Construction at the 2024 National Awards for Innovation and Excellence in P3s.
Procurement is underway to deliver another bundle of new Alberta schools in Airdrie, Blackfalds, Calgary, Chestermere, Edmonton and Okotoks.
The Evan-Thomas Water and Wastewater Treatment Plant in Kananaskis won Best Operational Project at the P3 Partnerships Bulletin awards.

Legislation

In May 2024, Infrastructure’s Real Property Governance Act received royal assent. The act helps increase transparency and reduce red tape by creating consistent rules across government for the disposal of property and creates a centralized inventory of public lands and buildings to help government better manage these assets for Albertans.
In November 2024, Alberta’s government introduced amendments to the Public Works Act (PWA) that mandate payment timelines and invoicing provisions for public infrastructure work, helping ensure contractors and subcontractors are paid fairly and promptly.

Related Topics:AlbertaHealthFacilities AlbertaInfrastructure AlbertaSchools feature

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Alberta takes big step towards shorter wait times and higher quality health care

Published on April 9, 2025

Todayville Content Team

From the Fraser Institute

By Nadeem Esmail

On Monday, the Smith government announced that beginning next year it will change the way it funds surgeries in Alberta. This is a big step towards unlocking the ability of Alberta’s health-care system to provide more, better and faster services for the same or possibly fewer dollars.

To understand the significance of this change, you must understand the consequences of the current (and outdated) approach.

Currently, the Alberta government pays a lump sum of money to hospitals each year. Consequently, hospitals perceive patients as a drain on their budgets. From the hospital’s perspective, there’s little financial incentive to serve more patients, operate more efficiently and provide superior quality services.

Consider what would happen if your local grocery store received a giant bag of money each year to feed people. The number of items would quickly decline to whatever was most convenient for the store to provide. (Have a favourite cereal? Too bad.) Store hours would become less convenient for customers, alongside a general decline in overall service. This type of grocery store, like an Alberta hospital, is actually financially better off (that is, it saves money) if you go elsewhere.

The Smith government plans to flip this entire system on its head, to the benefit of patients and taxpayers. Instead of handing out bags of money each year to providers, the new system—known as “activity-based funding”—will pay health-care providers for each patient they treat, based on the patient’s particular condition and important factors that may add complexity or cost to their care.

This turns patients from a drain on budgets into a source of additional revenue. The result, as has been demonstrated in other universal health-care systems worldwide, is more services delivered using existing health-care infrastructure, lower wait times, improved quality of care, improved access to medical technologies, and less waste.

In other words, Albertans will receive far better value from their health-care system, which is currently among the most expensive in the world. And relief can’t come soon enough—for example, last year in Alberta the median wait time for orthopedic surgeries including hip and knee replacements was 66.8 weeks.

The naysayers argue this approach will undermine the province’s universal system and hurt patients. But by allowing a spectrum of providers to compete for the delivery of quality care, Alberta will follow the lead of other more successful universal health-care systems in countries such as Australia, Germany, the Netherlands and Switzerland and create greater accountability for hospitals and other health-care providers. Taxpayers will get a much better picture of what they’re paying for and how much they pay.

Again, Alberta is not exploring an untested policy. Almost every other developed country with universal health care uses some form of “activity-based funding” for hospital and surgical care. And remember, we already spend more on health care than our counterparts in nearly all of these countries yet endure longer wait times and poorer access to services generally, in part because of how we pay for surgical care.

While the devil is always in the details, and while it’s still possible for the Alberta government to get this wrong, Monday’s announcement is a big step in the right direction. A funding model that puts patients first will get Albertans more of the high-quality health care they already pay for in a timelier fashion. And provide to other provinces an example of bold health-care reform.

Nadeem Esmail

Senior Fellow, Fraser Institute

Alberta

Alberta’s embrace of activity-based funding is great news for patients

Published on April 9, 2025

Todayville

From the Montreal Economic Institute

Alberta’s move to fund acute care services through activity-based funding follows best practices internationally, points out an MEI researcher following an announcement made by Premier Danielle Smith earlier today.

“For too long, the way hospitals were funded in Alberta incentivized treating fewer patients, contributing to our long wait times,” explains Krystle Wittevrongel, director of research at the MEI. “International experience has shown that, with the proper funding models in place, health systems become more efficient to the benefit of patients.”

Currently, Alberta’s hospitals are financed under a system called “global budgeting.” This involves allocating a pre-set amount of funding to pay for a specific number of services based on previous years’ budgets.

Under the government’s newly proposed funding system, hospitals receive a fixed payment for each treatment delivered.

An Economic Note published by the MEI last year showed that Quebec’s gradual adoption of activity-based funding led to higher productivity and lower costs in the province’s health system.

Notably, the province observed that the per-procedure cost of MRIs fell by four per cent as the number of procedures performed increased by 22 per cent.

In the radiology and oncology sector, it observed productivity increases of 26 per cent while procedure costs decreased by seven per cent.

“Being able to perform more surgeries, at lower costs, and within shorter timelines is exactly what Alberta’s patients need, and Premier Smith understands that,” continued Mrs. Wittevrongel. “Today’s announcement is a good first step, and we look forward to seeing a successful roll-out once appropriate funding levels per procedure are set.”

The governments expects to roll-out this new funding model for select procedures starting in 2026.

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The MEI is an independent public policy think tank with offices in Montreal, Ottawa, and Calgary. Through its publications, media appearances, and advisory services to policymakers, the MEI stimulates public policy debate and reforms based on sound economics and entrepreneurship.