Year-Round Frozen River

Appropriate for the current weather we bundle up and take a stroll down the footpath on the south end of the Emergency Operations Centre, located at 673 First St. N.E. in Crescent Heights, and explore a year-round Frozen River. The metallic framed wire mesh sculpture, filled with local river rock, resembles a glacial river with a gesture to the people of the native glacial and prairie landscape.

 Inspired by Calgary’s elemental force and beauty, the artist Stephen Glassman portrays the rolling prairie amongst a metallic sky, and the arctic air forming a glacial river from the emerging mountains with his artwork. He was awarded the $266,000 project through an open call process as part of the Public Art Program for the new Emergency Operations Centre that opened in November of 2014.

The Fire Department has been operating emergency services from this location on the Rotary Park site since 1948. The new EOC replaces the former EOC that operated since the 1990s here and will provide logistical support and communication to the public on an emergency situation.  

This is one unique public art sculpture you can see while going for a stroll in the park that has some amazing vistas of Downtown Calgary. Witness the path a glacier river takes inside the ice as this sculpture the Frozen River depicts.