By Pepper Parr
February 27, 2015
BURLINGTON, ON
Ontario is celebrating the 10th anniversary of the largest permanently protected greenbelt in the world and looking to the future by reviewing the land use 
plans of southern Ontario. The Greenbelt protects farmland, green space and clean water.
Our Escarpment is a part of this review.
The Province will hold public consultations, across the Greater Golden Horseshoe and Greenbelt area, on the review of four provincial land use plans to grow the Greenbelt, protect prime agricultural land, build transit friendly communities and support economic development. The province will undertake a co-ordinated review of:
• The Growth Plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe
• The Greenbelt Plan
• The Oak Ridges Moraine Conservation Plan
• The Niagara Escarpment Plan
In addition to public consultations, like town hall meetings, Ontarians will also be able to comment through the Environmental Registry.
David Crombie, former Toronto Mayor and one of the best friends Burlington has seems pained at Mayor Goldring’s comments.fourth
The review, which is expected to be complete by early 2016, will also benefit from the input of an expert advisory panel, chaired by David Crombie, former federal cabinet minister and former mayor of Toronto. Other panel members include:
Keith Currie, Vice President, Ontario Federation of Agriculture
Rae Horst, former CAO, Credit Valley Conservation Authority
John MacKenzie, Commissioner of Planning, City of Vaughan
Debbie Zimmerman, CEO, Grape Growers of Ontario
Leith Moore, Senior Vice President, Urban Fieldgate Homes
Having this review panel chair by David Crombie is good news for Burlington. Crombie has been a friend of the city for years and in the past has chided Burlington for not doing all that it could do to ensure there is a consistent Waterfront Trail.
Burlington recently agreed to sell of some prime waterfront property along the edge of Lake Ontario between Market and St, Paul Streets because it didn’t believe there was any real potential for a trail continuation in that part of the city.
The Escarpment is what gives us a large part of our identity.
While the waterfront isn’t within the mandate for a Greenbelt review it is the waterfront and the Escarpment that define this city.
Burlingtonians know that there are still bureaucrats within the Ministry of Transportation who want to push a road through that part of the city
Citizens are invited to make comment on the Environmental Registry. Click here to get to the Registry – and if you can make any sense of it – tell us how you did it.
With the City almost at build-out, you have to wonder just how long the rural-urban boundary being south of Hwy.407 will be maintained. I’m sure the City coffers will want to push north in the next 20 years or so. Where else will additional revenue come from? Higher taxes?
That is one of the reasons why this council in particular the Ward 2 Councillor needs to get working on how best to redevelop the intensification targets within the existing urban boundary limits, and stop resisting new development. Otherwise, the pressure to push the urban boundary to north of 407 will become a reality.
That is also why the mayor should be taking proactive steps forward and making the greenbelt, official plan, and intensification policies, a priority for local debate and discussion. This city cannot resist intensification in the downtown core and hope to freeze the northerly limits of the urban boundary at the same time.
That is another reason why a municipal golf course has no place within urban boundary limits.
Why don’t we ever hear the mayor speak to this issue with some substance dialogue and make this city become a more proactive partner with the other regional municipalities and the province?
People may be interested in attending this March 5th town hall:
Ontario’s Greenbelt Under Threat
https://salsa4.salsalabs.com/o/50999/p/salsa/event/common/public/?event_KEY=2413
Farmland and forests in Ontario’s Greenbelt are at risk of being paved over.
Ask questions and hear from experts about how inappropriate development, unnecessary infrastructure, such as new mega-highways, and the dumping of contaminated soil put our farmland, nature, water and climate at risk.
Speakers
Susan Swail, Greenbelt Program Manager, Environmental Defence
Mayor Rob Burton, Town of Oakville
David Donnelly, Environmental Laywer, Donnelly Law
Faisal Moola, David Suzuki Foundation
Moderator
Vanessa Warren, Rural Burlington Greenbelt Coalition
Thurs. March 5, 2015
6 pm: meet & greet community groups
7 pm – 9pm: panel discussion
Ron Joyce Centre Auditorium
DeGroote School of Business
4350 South Service Road, Burlington
Parking: $3.50
Find out how you can help strengthen the Greenbelt!
greenbeltunderthreat.ca
There are boundaries of the greenbelt that need to be adjusted in certain areas. We can actually expand the greenbelt areas if the release of some current greenbelt lands that should not be within the boundary are released in exchange for more lands to be included in more logical areas.
That also includes accepting the extension of the 407 at about the number 1 sideroad limit to tie in with the new niagara peninsula highway corridor.