The original organizers of Jane's Walk YEG are stepping aside to let the Edmonton City As a Museum Project take over the festival of community-led neighbourhood tours.
"They've got the social media folks, and web people with more web skills, and a broader range of contacts in the community," said Ian Hosler, one of the first organizers of the Edmonton version of Jane's Walk, which marks its 16th anniversary this year, starting on May 1. "So we see it as a really positive and more sustainable sort of transition."
ECAMP, a program born out of the Edmonton Heritage Council, focuses on exploring history in unique places around the city.
"It is essentially a museum without walls," said Kesia Kvill, the community engagement manager for the heritage council. "We're really all about promoting what it is to be Edmontonian and connecting people with each other and the community through the heritage and stories of the city."
So Jane's Walk is a good fit, and ECAMP plans to keep the festival free, grassroots, and diverse.
Jane's Walk began as a celebration of Jane Jacobs, an American-Canadian urban activist who wrote The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Jacobs was instrumental in stopping the lower Manhattan expressway in the 1960s.
"In her later years, she moved to Toronto and carried on with a lot of that work," Hosler said. "After her passing, some of her friends thought, 'Wouldn't be a great legacy for her life to host these walks?'."
Jane's Walks now happen all over the world on the first weekend in May, and Edmonton has held one annually since 2010. To both Hosler and Kvill, handing the festival to ECAMP made sense based on the shared interests of both organizations.
"We realized that there was potentially some opportunity for us to step into that space to ensure the sustainability and ongoing success of Jane's Walks," Kvill told Taproot. "It's kind of a perfect extension of the summer tour programming that we offer now."
Sen. Paula Simons led a Jane's Walk called "Leggin' it Around the Leg" in 2025. (Jane's Walk YEG)
Jane's Walks can be hosted on virtually any topic, but the common through-line is getting people to see their city in a unique light.
"We get people out into their communities, walking with their neighbours," said Hosler. "The range of topics can be quite broad."
Hosler said the most interesting tours he has participated in are ones that get derailed by interesting stories from passersby.
"One of the walks I led in Westmount, the librarian from the school actually knew Jane Jacobs," Hosler said. "(She) was able to share snippets of her memories of Jane."
He recounted other walks through the city's archives and the Citadel building.
"It can be whatever (makes someone think), 'Hey, this is something I'm interested in, I want to take 25 of my closest friends or random people and share that with them,'" he said.
Jane's Walk kicks off on May 1 and features tour leaders from all walks of life. Paths for People will be hosting a guided bike tour through Blatchford; Sen. Paula Simons will be taking participants through Borden Park; and Hosler will be leading his own walk about the history in his neighbourhood of Westmount.
"This year, we're really hoping we'll get some more diverse walks," Kvill said, "whether that means from different communities that we haven't seen putting together a Jane's Walk yet, or neighbourhoods that we haven't visited."
Applications to lead a Jane's Walk are now open, and the walk schedule will be populated as walks are approved. A walk leaders' organizational meeting is set for April 14.
Tours will also be hosted virtually through Story City as the weekend progresses.
Taproot is co-hosting a YEG Trivia Night with ECAMP on April 23, focusing on Edmonton's food history.