I have submitted a separate…

I have submitted a separate comment on the Employment Lands section of the proposal. This is for the other parts of the proposal.

I am afraid of my city encroaching upon the rich agricultural lands in my are. While some of these re protected through the Greenbelt legislation, and should remain so, some of these good lands fall outside current protection, and are ripe to be taken up by those seeking only profits. I feel that we need to strongly protect all prime lands for agriculture, to maintain our ability to grow our own food. This will become more important as we get increasing global weather change: foodstuffs from California and Mexico will become harder to get, and thus more expensive. We can grow much of what we eat, but not without land. And of course, once it becomes housing or business land, it will never again be farming land. Currently in my area, there is a lot of land which is in the “white belt” around the city boudaries. The city must be prevented from taking over this land, at least until there is full use of land within its boundaries to the densities outlined.

Within the city boundaries, the intensificarion targets have merit, particularly along major transit corridors. I am pleased to see these maintained, and in some ways strengthened.

We also need land in cities for affordable housing. This is not addressed in the plan (at least as far as I can see). And we need to have land use which takes climate change into account. We are having more severe rains, flooding, wind storms, wave damage, and so on. There is no mention that I am aware of in the plan that these issues will become more freequent.