Questions: What are your…

Questions:
What are your thoughts on the proposed core elements to be included in a streamlined province-wide land use planning policy instrument?

"Settlement Area Boundary Expansions – streamlined and simplified policy direction that enables municipalities to expand their settlement area boundaries in a coordinated manner with infrastructure planning, in response to changing circumstances, local contexts and market demand to maintain and unlock a sufficient supply of land for housing and future growth"

- Settlement boundary expansions should be limited until intensification is maxxed out in urban areas to prevent sprawl that costs municipalities too much and creates further housing affordability challenges

"Rural Housing – policy direction that responds to local circumstances and provides increased flexibility to enable more residential development in rural areas, including rural settlement areas"

- settlement should be directed towards urban areas in general. Most rural residental development through severances is not affordable housing and creates challenges for servicing and incompatible activities such as agriculture.

"Natural Heritage – streamlined policy direction that applies across the province for Ontario’s natural heritage, empowering local decision making, and providing more options to reduce development impacts, including offsetting/compensation (Proposed Updates to the Ontario Wetland Evaluation System)

Natural and human-made hazards - streamlined and clarified policy direction for development in hazard areas, while continuing to protect people and property in areas of highest risk

Cultural heritage –policy direction that provides for the identification and continued conservation of cultural heritage resources while creating flexibility to increase housing supply (Proposed Changes to the Ontario Heritage Act and its regulations: Bill 23 (Schedule 6) - the Proposed More Homes Built Faster Act, 2022)"

- The 'streamlining' in this case just seems to be measures to make it easier for development to bypass considerations for cultural and natural heritage. Avoiding duplication or redundancy in protecting these features is laudable but rather that reducing protections, the province should help provide the resources and staff necessary to implement policy relating to the protection of these features during development process

What land use planning policies should the government use to increase the supply of housing and support a diversity of housing types?

- The government should set minimum density targets for lands undergoing new development that are higher than existing average densities in communities to encourage more efficient use of land, and end exclusionary zoning policies. Additionally, coupled with policies to produce robust public transit systems, the government should implement policies that limit the amount of space that can be dedicated to cars (ie parking) in urban areas. This is perhaps the single largest drain on land and it causes a huge of amount environmental and financial problems and social disparity. Dedicating land that is currently locked up in unproductive parking lots, car infrastructure and wasted marginal space towards developable commercial and residential land would be a huge boon for the housing supply and community development.

How should the government further streamline land use planning policy to increase the supply of housing?

- Policy can only be "streamlined" so much before in becomes ineffective. Rather than focusing on continuous streamlining, the government should streamline what they can, and then focus on providing the resources, funds, and expertise to ensure than policy is implemented in an efficient and effective way.