I am not in support of the…

I am not in support of the replacement of greenbelt lands. Living close to the tract that will be exiting the Greenbelt in Pickering, I am strongly opposed to the scale of what is proposed in Pickering. I believe that the Government should be working to improve protections of the environment, which is good that a tract of land is going to be added to the Greenbelt, especially a region important for water quality. However, the areas that are at the edge are not places development should occur. While there might be services nearby, they are still at the edge of the city which is not a very liveable location due to distance to community services. Building communities that rely on people driving their car is not a future thinking plan.
For the Pickering segment, the amount of land that will be opened up is extremely large and is nearby to the Rouge National Urban Park. While I believe some homes could be built along Altona, opening up the area to development is not going to lend itself to homes that affordable or dense. This region is important to protecting the neighbouring park and waterways.
The proposal should be more focused and targeted to solely protected countryside with a buffer to nature as clear cutting and filling in natural heritage system is not beneficials for animals to have a space where they can move around communities and migrate.
Lastly, the government needs to do more to protect land and the flora and fauna that exist. The Greenbelt is supposed to surround the dense communities, however a lack of density has caused sprawl to encroach further and further away. Opening up land from the Greenbelt is not something that can be reversed and should be treasured for generations.