More challenges are emerging for the huge Elfrida urban boundary expansion plan that is expected to house 80,000 new residents on what are currently farms and wetlands in upper Stoney Creek. City planning staff are unhappy about the provincial growth rules governing greenfield development but finding no sympathy from city councillors who have more supportive of intensification inside the already built-up area of Hamilton.
The strains were evident in a recent planning committee discussion over how Hamilton should respond to Ford government proposals that would re-write key features of the provincial growth rules. One proposed change is to reduce the density requirements on new greenfield development like Elfrida from 80 persons and jobs per hectare (pjh) down to 60 – something staff wanted councillors to endorse.
“At that high density it would be very difficult to plan for what we call complete communities,” explained staff planner Heather Travis, “so a variety of housing forms, the other services that are required to be included to achieve what we call complete communities, parks and recreation, and services, and local commercial uses. To achieve 80 persons and jobs per hectare and still provide what we call complete communities would have been very challenging.”
Councillors didn’t agree with the staff position. Terry Whitehead led the charge arguing that lower densities in new greenfield areas necessarily means higher densities will be required in existing neighbourhoods to accommodate new residents. He pointed to the low densities allowed in the past in mountain development as “mistakes” that have resulted in the current push for infilling and intensification and suggested planners would be “replicating the same mistake” by pushing for lower targets.
Whitehead said his own west mountain neighbourhood near Garth has more than 80 residents per hectare and that the staff argument essentially is that older areas of the city “have to eat up more growth to meet the targets.” And although he expressed support for the Elfrida expansion, he called it “a beach ball outside the urban boundary”. The Elfrida expansion plans date back about 15 years to a time before provincial growth rules so it was originally envisioned by city officials and developers as much lower density.
Environment Hamilton executive director Lynda Lukasik also criticized the staff move to water down the density requirements on greenfields. She pointed to benefits of higher density such as less consumption of rural agricultural land, more efficient use of infrastructure, and reduced auto dependence supporting transit, walking and cycling. A density of 80 per hectare is considered the minimum requirement for efficient transit, with some experts arguing for at least 150 – the target already set for areas near Hamilton LRT stops.
On a motion by JP Danko councillors overruled the staff position and voted unanimously “that the city’s position is to retain the density target of 80 pjh.” In an additional rebuke to staff, a motion by Maureen Wilson was approved to add “that climate change is an important issue and previously identified targets should be incorporated in any Provincial Growth Plans” – a reference to the Ford government’s proposed elimination of all such references in their revised growth plan.
Planning staff and the majority of councillors disagreed with many of the Ford government proposals including an acceleration of intensification targets. Currently the city is supposed to plan for 40 percent of new growth to take place within the built-up area – although in 2017 it only hit 26 percent.
The Wynne government legislated those targets to rise to 50 percent by 2022 and then 60 percent after 2031, but the province is now proposing an immediate jump to sixty percent. Staff strongly criticized this change and that position was approved by council, but Whitehead was joined by Maureen Wilson and Brad Clark in voting against it.
The Elfrida expansion plans are the topic of a public meeting on Wednesday, March 7 at Winterberry Heights Church starting at 6:30 pm. It is being organized by several groups including Environment Hamilton.