We need better long term…

We need better long term planning. I question the real need for more urban development. I question why are we using viable land that can be used to feed our province to build huge estate homes that will only house 10 - 12 families. I question what we will be leaving future generations to work with. Growth for the sake of growth is not a good plan.

The following is an excerpt from Tim Grey, Executive Director for Environmental Defence, and I support his views. Also included are links to two other websites with similar justifications to continue to protect our land and waters.

"For almost 40 years, successive Ontario governments have been incrementally encouraging less urban sprawl, more compact urban growth, and moves toward greater public transit capacity.
But this will now change if the Ontario government’s proposed weakening of the Growth Plan proceeds.
These proposed changes include:
• Allowing urban boundaries to expand without proper evaluation of need. This will increase rates of sprawl and eat up more farmland and natural areas. We know that this is not needed as provincial data shows there is enough land designated to meet housing needs to at least 2031.
• Reducing the requirements to build within cities instead of outside them. This lowers the priority of building new development within the existing town or city and also lowers the priority that new areas are developed more densely than the past. In other words, it encourages low-density sprawl over redevelopment and revitalization.
• Removing the requirement to plan for future housing needs based on what is actually needed. This marks a return to the bad old days of building more detached single family homes on farmland because that is what was done in the past.
• Allowing new public transit stations to be built and developed around in areas of low population and employment instead of in mobility hubs that service large numbers of people. This is the return of the “GO station in a cornfield” model which encourages more sprawl, cars and highways.
In the long run, a return to sprawl-focused development will eat up the farm lands and natural areas that surround our cities and towns. It will decrease our quality of life, increase our commute time, increase our property taxes and diminish the quality of our air, water and food. It will also eventually bring development right to the boundary of the Greenbelt and other protected lands which could lead future government to argue for opening them up to development.
The proposed changes to the Growth Plan are huge mistakes. Instead of gutting our efforts to make our cities more livable and keep our farmland, water and natural areas protected we should:
Keep the existing 2017 Growth Plan approach to maintain denser, compact cities and towns that can only grow after a full review based on evidence
Save farmland for healthy local food, employment and food security
Revitalize our urban areas by keeping intensification targets for missing housing types, so housing that people want and need (e.g. rental, row houses, town houses, smaller mainstreet condos, smaller homes for seniors and new buyers) is what is built – not monster homes on big lots.
Build purpose built rental housing and supportive housing options near major transit hubs (subway, bus and train stations)
Base Growth Plan changes on good information, involvement by local citizens and long term planning of infrastructure needs, costs and tax implications."

Once we have given up our precious farmland and wetlands to urban sprawl we will never be able to replicate or recover those resources again.

Thank you for taking my comments into consideration.