Calgary is spread out enough that where you work should shape where you look — more than almost any other single factor.
Three genuinely different approaches, and they suit different lives:
These sit close together in the inner northwest, which makes that quadrant unusually strong for medical and university staff. Established communities within a short drive or a walk include Varsity, Brentwood, University Heights, Charleswood, St Andrews Heights, Parkdale and Montgomery.
Several of these are also on the Red Line, so a household with one hospital worker and one downtown worker can often solve both commutes from the same address — which is a genuinely useful thing to know when you are choosing. Varsity vs Brentwood →
The deep southeast, and the communities around it were largely built after it. Auburn Bay and Mahogany are adjacent, with Seton immediately beside the hospital and increasingly a destination in its own right. Cranston, Copperfield, New Brighton and McKenzie Towne are all short drives.
The trade-off is honest: excellent if you work there, a long way from downtown if your household's other commute goes the opposite direction. Mahogany vs Auburn Bay →
Most households have two, and they frequently point in different directions. The instinct is to split the difference and land somewhere central-ish. That often produces two mediocre commutes rather than one good one.
Usually the better answer is to optimise for whoever commutes more often, or whoever has the least flexible hours, and let the other drive against traffic. Two twenty-five minute commutes are often worse than one fifteen and one forty, because the forty is frequently the easy direction.
Whatever you decide, drive both routes at the actual times before committing. It is the single most valuable hour you will spend house hunting in this city.