The History of Springfield/Spall, Kelowna

Springfield/Spall, Kelowna

Spall Road carries the name of the Spall family, among the earliest settler families to farm the central Kelowna benchlands in the late 19th century, at a time when the land between the townsite and the surrounding hills was divided into irrigation-fed orchard plots and homestead properties. Springfield Road takes its name from "Springfield," one of the early farm properties in the area — an English place name applied by British settlers, many of whom came from the Old Country and instinctively named the new landscape after places they'd left behind. For most of the 20th century the corridor remained what it had always been: a practical transit zone between Kelowna's commercial core and its residential and agricultural outskirts, characterised by a mix of older homes, small farms, and light industrial uses that didn't attract much real estate attention. The arterial network that defines Springfield/Spall today — connecting Orchard Park Mall, Kelowna General Hospital, UBCO, and the downtown — came with the city's post-war expansion as population growth required both roads and the services those roads could supply. What had been orchard and farmland was rezoned and developed through the 1970s, 80s, and 90s as Kelowna's population climbed and the value of central land became obvious to developers and investors. Orchard Park Mall, which opened in 1975, was a defining moment for the corridor — establishing it as Kelowna's retail spine and permanently cementing the area's role as the city's service-dense central artery. The pioneer family names on the road signs are the only remaining physical evidence that orchards and homesteads once occupied the same ground now covered by big-box retail, bus stops, and apartment buildings.