If you're a general contractor building out a subcontractor list, or a developer awarding landscape scope on an Edmonton project, this page tells you what you need to know to prequalify us and put us on the bid. No sales pitch — just scope, capacity, and compliance, laid out the way a GC's estimating and safety departments actually ask for it.
The short version: Landscape Specialists Ltd. is a bondable, insured, COR-certified landscape contractor that self-performs grading, hardscape, and softscape across Edmonton and the surrounding region. We've been building here since 2009 and we schedule around your build sequence, not the other way around.
One Subcontractor Across the Full Landscape Scope
Most landscape packages on a commercial or multi-family site get split across two or three trades — a grading contractor, a hardscape crew, and a softscape crew — each with their own schedule, their own supervision, and their own gaps to coordinate. We self-perform all three. That means one point of contact, one safety program on your site, and one crew accountable from rough grade to final walkthrough.
Grading
Rough grading and final grading to the approved lot grading plan, including City of Edmonton grade certificates. This is our core discipline — 200+ lots graded per season.
Hardscape
Structural retaining walls, Barkman paving stone, and site hardscape built to spec — including engineered walls where the drawings call for a stamped design.
Softscape
Kentucky Bluegrass sod, irrigation systems, and Zone 3–4 hardy tree and shrub planting — the finishing scope that closes out a landscape deficiency list.
Capacity Built for Volume
Commercial and multi-family work lives or dies on schedule. A landscape sub that can't keep pace with your build sequence becomes the reason your development permit landscape conditions slip into the next season. Ours doesn't.
- 200+ lots per season completed across infill, 4-plex, and multi-family developments.
- 400+ lot capacity for 2026 — headroom to take on additional commercial scope without stretching the crews already committed.
- We move to your schedule. Rough grade when the site is ready, final grade and softscape sequenced around occupancy and possession dates.
Prequalification & Compliance
Here's what your prequalification package needs — every item below is available on request, and we'll turn a complete document set around quickly so we don't hold up your bid list.
| Safety | COR (Certificate of Recognition) safety certified since 2015. Documented safety program, hazard assessments, and toolbox / tailgate meeting records suitable for a GC-governed site. |
| WCB | WCB Alberta account in good standing. Clearance letter provided for your project on request. |
| Insurance | Commercial general liability coverage of [INSURANCE LIMIT — e.g. $5,000,000]. Certificate of insurance issued naming your project as required. |
| Bonding | Bondable. Bid, performance, and labour & material payment bonds available on request through our surety. |
| Experience | Operating in Edmonton since 2009. Owner Ryan Pon holds a Diploma in Landscape Architectural Technology (2015). |
| Industry | BILD Edmonton Metro member. |
Why this matters to your estimator: A sub that's already COR-certified, bondable, and insured to your limits is one you can carry onto a tender without a compliance scramble at award. Send us the prequal form — we complete them properly the first time.
Builders Who Already Trust Us
We're a known quantity to some of the region's most active builders. Our residential and multi-family grading and landscaping work includes projects for Akash Homes, Brookfield Residential, Melcor, and Cantiro — organisations that don't hand out repeat work to subs who miss grade certificates or hold up a schedule.
We're now expanding that track record into general commercial and institutional work, and we bid actively across the Edmonton market. If your commercial division hasn't worked with us yet, this is the introduction.
How We Handle a Commercial Tender
By the time a commercial or multi-family project reaches tender, you usually already have professionally engineered landscape drawings from a design firm. That's exactly what we want to price from. We have the software and the experience to read professional landscape and grading drawings, take off quantities accurately, and return a proposal that's tied to the actual specified scope — on budget, with addenda accounted for, not a napkin number we'll walk back with change orders later.
Where we add value beyond a clean bid is on the drawings themselves. Owner Ryan Pon is a Landscape Architectural Technologist, so we don't just build what's drawn — we read it critically. If something in the design will cause a problem down the road — a drainage or grade transition that won't hold, a plant selection that struggles in a Zone 3–4 winter, a wall detail that won't last — we flag it and suggest an adjustment before it's in the ground. GCs and developers get a proposal grounded in the design intent, plus a second professional set of eyes protecting the longevity of the finished project.
What this means when you hire us: you're hiring professionals, not a landscaper you have to babysit and second-guess. We understand the drawings, we work independently on your site, and we tell you when something needs attention instead of building a problem and handing you the bill later.
What to Send Us to Bid or Prequalify
To get a fast, accurate response from us on a commercial or multi-family project, send:
- Landscape and grading drawings plus the relevant spec sections.
- The approved lot grading / drainage plan if grade certificates are in scope.
- Site address and access details so we can factor in staging and equipment access.
- Your bid deadline and prequalification form — we work to your timeline.
Add us to your bid list, or send a project to price. Contact us here or call (780) 709-0358 and ask for Ryan.