My strong opposition to…

My strong opposition to removal of the indicated lands from the Greenbelt concurs with those put forward by environmental law experts. Namely, there is a need to expand the Greenbelt, not shrink it.
The Greenbelt is a system made up of natural heritage features and areas, linkages intended to provide connectivity and improve ecological features in the future, protected countryside and urban river valleys. In fact, it contains some of Canada’s most ecologically and hydrologically significant natural environments and scenic landscapes, including the Oak Ridges Moraine and the Niagara Escarpment. These natural areas clean the air, provide drinking water, provide diverse flora and fauna habitats, including pollinators, and they provide opportunities for recreational activities that benefit public health and overall quality of life. “It is a system of farm and forest, water and air, that can’t be segmented without damaging the way the system functions as a whole.”
The province’s proposal to take 15 areas of Greenbelt land out of the protected area, reducing its size by 7,400 acres and adding only one small area of the Paris Galt Moraine and making it part of the Greenbelt is not a fair exchange . The government stated that a series of 13 urban river valleys, totaling approximately 9,400 acres, would be given “new” protection. However, some of these urban valleys proposed to be “added” are simply expansions of urban river valleys that are already in the Greenbelt, and all of those urban river valleys were already announced to be protected and added to the Greenbelt earlier this year.
Habitat fragmentation is the consequence of habitat loss in which large, continuous habitat is broken up into many smaller fragments, separated from one another by human-modified land. When fragmenting the Greenbelt, we are creating boundaries in forests, wetlands and other natural areas as well as isolating others. These boundaries, or edges, are not the same as whole forest or wetland complexes because when you clear a section in the middle of the forest, new forest edges are created and the interior forest habitat that was there is both much smaller and is now fragmented.
The effects of fragmentation are loss of biodiversity, increases in invasive plants, pests, and pathogens, and reduction in water quality. These wide-ranging effects all stem from two basic problems: isolation between forest communities and edge effects. When a forest becomes isolated, the movement of plants and animals is inhibited. Fragmentation is a threat to natural resilience, and connectivity of forest habitats may be a key component of forest adaptation and response to climate change. Edge effects alter growing conditions within the interior of forests through drastic changes in temperature, moisture, light, and wind.
Finally, the Provinces own expert panel found that adequate lands are already available for development within the current boundaries to meet the provinces growth targets. Removal of lands from the Greenbelt as proposed is unfounded and should be rescinded.