Cowboys Park will be the new home for the Cowboys Music Festival and as part of the ten-year sponsorship agreement, provides additional funding for upgraded infrastructure and improvement work to begin in 2025.  

The agreement will increase activations year-round in Cowboys Park which supports activating culturally vibrant areas and reinvigorating the city centre. These events will be open to the public.  

In times where there are no scheduled festivals and events within Cowboys Park, the space is open for public use.  

This important partnership with Cowboys is a key step in implementing The City’s Downtown Strategy to bring vibrancy to Calgary’s downtown by creating additional activation of park spaces and driving further economic activity in the area.  

Festivals and events are important to our city and several historical and new festivals and events will continue to call Cowboys Park home. They celebrate Calgary’s cultural diversity, are good for the local economy and make Calgary a vibrant place to live and visit year-round.  

Planning for additional park improvements (Phase 2) is underway that will see further upgrades to the park in 2025 and beyond – feedback from community groups and other interested parties will be used to help guide these plans.   

An online engagement opportunity for public feedback in March will allow the community to guide the future design, programs and activations they’d like to see in Cowboys Park. Further details will be announced as they are confirmed. 

Improvements to the park specifically for future festivals and events will require some hardening of spaces so deep underground utility work and site regrading can happen. 

Phase 1 construction will include the removal of 50-80 trees required for underground utility upgrades and the regrading of the park. This work will be conducted in compliance with the Tree Protection Bylaw.

We understand how vital trees are to the character and vibrancy of Calgary’s neighbourhoods; we are thoroughly considering design aspects and construction decisions to maintain as many trees as possible. 

We are working closely with Urban Forestry and Conservation and will be adhering to tree protection and compensation plans. Our future improvements to the space will also include replanting trees and other shrubs and greenery wherever possible. 

To support the Cowboys Music Festival and in accordance with the agreement, work is already underway on a plan to install hardened surfaces at two locations within the park. One will expand the basketball court on the Southwest side of the park and the other will be located centrally in the park in front of the stage. Parks is working on designing something that will fit with the park design as well as meet the needs of large-scale music festivals.  

The hardened space will better accommodate Calgarians with mobility considerations and host various events, including farmer’s and holiday markets, hard surface sport and other recreational events, food festivals, and more.

The City has been in discussion with Cowboys since October 2022 to explore interest in naming and booking dedicated event space at Millennium Park. The previous agreement between The City and Shaw Media ended in 2019.   

Cowboys have signed a ten-year sponsorship agreement with The City that will include events in Millennium Park starting in Summer 2025. The agreement was approved by City Council on June 18, 2024.   

A public Request for Information (RFI) was issued in April 2023 and advertised on The City’s website for two months in accordance with The City’s Sponsorship of City Assets Policy.  Cowboys was the sole applicant through this process as it closed in June 2023.   

Agreements like this are a creative funding source that enable improvements to a park that will benefit all users without requiring additional public funds.