Stoney Creek Update

[thistleclub]

Clark calls Taro redesign OK sellout to ‘corporate interests’
(Stoney Creek News, Richard Leitner, Dec 5 2013)

Stoney Creek Councillor Brad Clark is accusing the province of selling out the environment to “corporate interests” with the approval of a plan to raise the Taro dump’s height by nearly a third over the city’s objections.

Owner Newalta Corp. received Ministry of the Environment permission on Nov. 22 to proceed with the redesign, which Clark has predicted will leave neighbours staring at “mountain of crap” and experiencing more offsite dust and other nuisances.

But Greg Jones, the company’s communications director, said the decision reflects Newalta’s success in consulting the community on the plan over the summer and addressing any concerns.

In return for permission to pile waste 4.5 metres higher than originally approved in 1996, Newalta has vowed to limit the site to its existing footprint and use clean fill to bring a remaining 18 hectares of empty quarry by Green Mountain Road up to grade.

The change reduces the dump’s original area by about one-quarter, but it will now rise to 18.45 metres, or 60.5 feet, above ground level at its highest point. That’s up from the old limit of just shy of 14 metres, or nearly 46 feet.

“Like we stated all along, we think that it’s a beneficial thing, not just for us, but, in the long term, for the community and the environment,” Jones said.

Newalta has argued the smaller footprint will cut the volume of leachate the dump sends into the sewer by one-quarter, while benefitting neighbours by increasing the distance between waste and homes being built to the north.

The change also eliminates plans for a new entrance off Mud Street across from Penny Lane Estates.

But Clark, who was unaware of the approval until contacted by a reporter, said if the ministry were truly interested in public consultation on the redesign, it would have subjected it to an independent review.

The ministry instead deemed the plan a “technical amendment” to the dump’s operating licence, exempting it from an appeal process under Ontario’s Environmental Bill of Rights.

“The Ministry of the Environment, in my opinion, has become nothing more than a public relations body for the government,”Clark said. “They’re not protecting the environment. It’s all about protecting the corporate interests.”

The approval comes as Newalta has filed a new application seeking ministry permission to expand the service area of a Hamilton plant that ships waste to Taro to all of North America.

Jones said the Brant Street transfer station can presently only accept waste from Ontario and the change would allow it to take shipments from Newalta facilities in Quebec and Atlantic Canada.

The company’s other Hamilton plant, located on Imperial Street, already services North America. Unlike Brant Street, it treats hazardous wastes, including to render them acceptable for disposal at Taro, licensed for sold, non-hazardous waste.

Jones said the Brant Street plant’s economic viability has been undercut by last year’s successful application to allow Taro to take wastes that don’t require processing directly from anywhere in Ontario.

The dump had previously only been permitted to accept wastes directly from locations in Hamilton, which required all outside shipments to first go to Brant or Imperial streets.

“For the most part, Brant Street’s been taken out of the equation, in terms of what we send to the landfill, so we needed to find a use for it,” Jones said.

“It’s primarily for our own materials, to keep things in-house that currently we might have to go elsewhere with.”

But Clark said he sees the application as the first step in Newalta coming up “with some cockamamie scheme” to fill the unused 18 hectares of quarry with more waste.

He said the application is especially galling because during the site’s approval amid vociferous opposition, people were repeatedly told it was needed to serve local industry.

“Now we can see that’s bull,” Clark said. “Why the hell should Hamilton receive Quebec’s waste? And how do we even know that the Quebec environmental process is akin to ours?”

Unlike with the dump redesign, the Brant Street application has been posted on the environmental registry, which makes the ministry’s decision subject to appeal. The public has until Jan. 6 to comment.

Geoffrey Knapper, district manager of the ministry’s Hamilton office, said the decision to exempt the redesign was made by the approvals branch in Toronto and likely reflects that the dump already underwent an environmental assessment in 1996.

The Brant Street plant, by contrast, significantly changes the intended use from when its licence was approved, he said.

[thmx]

Stoney Creek Parkette construction update:


Source

[thistleclub]

Taro dump’s CLC kept in dark on Newalta waste bid
(Stoney Creek News, Richard Leitner, Dec 19 2013)

Newalta Corp. says there’s nothing “nefarious” about its decision to keep Taro’s community liaison committee in the dark about a proposed licence change at a north-end plant that could see more imported industrial waste go to the dump.
Communications director Greg Jones said the company didn’t raise the matter at the CLC’s Dec. 2 meeting because it’s “not related to the landfill’s operations.”

Newalta is seeking the Ministry of the Environment’s approval to expand its Brant Street transfer station’s service area, currently limited to Ontario, to all of North America.

The public has until Jan. 6 to comment on the application, posted on the province’s environmental registry on Nov. 22, the same day Newalta received ministry approval to raise the quarry dump’s height by nearly a third.

In return for the latter change, the company will limit the site to its existing footprint and vows to use clean fill to bring a remaining 18 hectares of empty quarry up to grade.

“It’s not something that is material to the landfill’s operations. It’s a separate facility and so we didn’t think to bring it up,” Jones said of the Brant Street bid. “It appears to me that people are looking for something nefarious here, but that’s not the case.”

Among the mandates of the CLC, according to its terms of reference, is to “review, comment and make recommendations on applications for new or revised proposals pertaining to the (dump) site.”

John Williams, the CLC’s citizen chair, said he “absolutely” believes the Brant Street application should have been raised if Taro is the end destination for shipments received there.

Newalta says the broader service area will allow it to take loads from other company operations, primarily in Quebec, where disposal charges are much higher than here.

“It’s quite the change; that’s a long way,” said Williams, adding he plans to get more details on the proposal and make sure other citizen members know of the Jan. 6 deadline so they can submit comments if they wish.

“Effectively we’ll just operate as informed citizens ourselves.”

Stoney Creek councillor Brad Clark, who is a CLC member but was unable to make the Dec. 2 meeting, called Newalta’s assertion the Brant Street plant isn’t related to the dump “nonsense.”

The plant can receive up to 8,000 tonnes of waste per day and will “significantly increase” the number of truckloads and imported waste going to Taro if the licence change is approved, he said.

“There is no rational explanation as to why they would not have informed the CLC and it is nonsense that their application is not going to impact the landfill,”Clark said. “I think they’re playing a semantic game to try to avoid public scrutiny.”

The application is also prompting the head of Environment Hamilton to question if Newalta is betraying an earlier commitment to reduce truck traffic in the north end.

Lynda Lukasik said cutting truck trips to and from the Brant Street plant was one of the key justifications the company gave when it successfully applied last year to expand the dump’s own service area to all of Ontario.

Taro had previously only been allowed to take waste directly from locations within Hamilton, requiring any shipment from elsewhere in Ontario to go to Brant Street.

Lukasik said any benefit the north end saw from the change to Taro’s service area “kind of gets cancelled out” if the Brant Street change is approved.

At open houses in the summer of 2012, Newalta said letting Ontario waste go directly to Taro would eliminate about 35,000 truck trips to and from Brant Street per year, cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 135 tonnes.

Lukasik said she wonders if Brant Street will once again periodically “have trucks lined up around the corner onto Burlington Street waiting to get in,” as in the past.

She said the application also seems like “an end run” around Taro’s service-area restrictions, effectively making it a dump for North American waste, contrary to promises it would be used for local waste when the site was approved without public hearings in 1996.

Another Newalta plant on Imperial Street that uses cement and other treatments to render hazardous waste suitable for disposal at Taro can already take North American waste.

“Does that (Taro service area) serve an important purpose, and if it does, then is this sort of approach problematic?” Lukasik said. “If it doesn’t serve an important purpose, what is the point of it? That’s the fundamental question we need to be asking.”

But Jones said the change will merely see Brant Street take Quebec waste that presently goes to Imperial Street and doesn’t need processing, relieving traffic bottlenecks at the latter.

Brant Street will only take four or five loads per week on average, he said, rejecting that Newalta is doing an end run around Taro’s service area restrictions.

“It’s no different than the situation we had with Brant Street before,” he said of the period before Taro could take waste directly from Ontario locations outside of Hamilton.

But Clark said he sees the application as a step toward Newalta eventually seeking approval to fill Taro’s remaining 18 hectares of empty quarry with waste.

He said the city’s lawyers are drafting an official comment, but he doesn’t believe the company would go through the trouble and expense of changing Brant Street’s licence for four or five loads per week.

“That’s ridiculous and that again is just spin,”Clark said. “There’s a lack of trust now for me because the company keeps saying one thing and doing something else.”

Details of the application are available at ebr.gov.on.ca. The EBR registry number is 012-0499.

[thistleclub]

Expect an OMB showdown on Fruitland Winona secondary plan
(Stoney Creek News, Mike Pearson, Feb 19 2014)

Despite assurances that homeowners’ properties won’t be expropriated for parkland, the city should expect a showdown at the Ontario Municipal Board over the newly revised Fruitland Winona secondary plan.

During a Feb. 6 community meeting, Ward 11 councillor Brenda Johnson said she plans to introduce a motion at the April 15 planning committee meeting to prohibit the city from expropriating land to create a community park. City planning staff is also looking at reducing the height requirements for developments along Barton Street. It has already been reduced from six to four storeys.

But Cal DiFalco, chair of a now-dissolved community advisory committee, said the city is still attempting to force a wrong-headed plan on the community that will increase building densities, boost congestion, create higher traffic volumes, and have a negative impact on tender fruit farming.

If the new plan wins the support of Hamilton’s planning committee and city councillors, DiFalco plans to be among those who will challenge the document through an OMB appeal. DiFalco has unsuccessfully urged the city to return to a plan the committee initially endorsed in 2009.

DiFalco was among dozens of area residents who attended the open house and public information session for the secondary plan, held at Winona Vine Estates....

Fruitland Road residents have continued to oppose the secondary plan, arguing the proposed bypass from Barton to an unknown intersection on Highway 8 is wrong and should revert back to the 1992 plan that included dead-ending Fruitland Road.

On Feb. 28, the open house and public information centre feedback report will be posted on the city website. A staff report on the secondary plan will be released on March 31.

The plan will be presented for approval at an April 15 planning committee meeting and an April 23 council meeting.


Read it in full here.

[matt602]

The Egg and I got demolished? Weird. Did they move to a different location?

[thmx]

Originally Posted by matt602

The Egg and I got demolished? Weird. Did they move to a different location?

I don't think so, I think they went out of business.

[bigguy1231]

Originally Posted by MeIsThomas

I don't think so, I think they went out of business.

They do have one on Upper James just South of Rymal.

[NortheastWind]

Originally Posted by bigguy1231

They do have one on Upper James just South of Rymal.

There's also one on Garner Rd in Ancaster. Just before Wilson St.

[thmx]

New commercial development at Barton and Fruitland in Stoney Creek.

Source

[thistleclub]

Eroding dreams on the shore near Stoney Creek
(Hamilton Spectator, Jeff Mahoney, April 29 2013)

In a way it’s worse than buying that proverbial swampland in Florida.

You can drain swampland.

But what’s happening in the Cherry Beach area of Stoney Creek, on the lakeshore near Millen Road, is like buying up property in the old city of Atlantis after it’s been submerged.

You can’t drain Lake Ontario.

Realtor Steve Ribaric takes me out to the “beach.”

He points out to the lapping of the lake immediately beyond us. Buildings used to stand there. People lived there.

The lot plan map says there are lots where he points. There should be. The city paid for them. But there aren’t. The de facto zoning? H2O.

All that property, once the playground of cottagers, is literally underwater, a big scoop taken out of the shoreline.

Soil erosion. Steve says we lose four feet of shoreline a year.

“The point from the original beachfront to the new, is well over 30 feet. In the last storm alone, at least four feet lost. There’s absolutely no protection.”

“It (the rate of beach erosion) is two to three feet a year, but he’s in the ballpark,” admits Steve Barnhart, manager of landscape architectural services for Hamilton’s public works department.

It’s a matter of “the position on the lake of that piece of shoreline and its exposure to wind and wave action and the material the shore is made of.”

The waste of tax money represented by the submerged property, acquired over the years to position the area for conversion to parkland, is one thing, says Steve the realtor.

But the erosion of the city property is compromising his client’s own efforts to keep back the lake. He represents the owner of a strip of land that runs between Cherry Beach Road and the shore, sandwiched between city-owned lots.

The client’s property, at the shoreline, is fortified by massive heaps of boulders and rocks and other materials piled up as a breakwater.

But beside his barrier, on city land? Nothing. The waves have their way.

“My client is about to lose his breakwall, and his house will be next,” says Steve the realtor. “They (city hall) are unresponsive, and he (the client) would like them to either put up breakwall protection or buy him out.”

[thistleclub]

Winona slams development
(Stoney Creek News, Mike Pearson, May 23 2013)

Winona residents shouted down a development plan that could see their community expand by 17,000 people over the next two decades.

More than 300 residents packed the former Stoney Creek council chambers on Thursday, for a community meeting hosted by Ward 11 councillor Brenda Johnson.

City planning staff will present a proposed secondary plan for the Stoney Creek Urban Boundary Expansion (SCUBE) for approval at a June 4 meeting. The SCUBE area is bounded by Fruitland to Fifty Roads and Barton Street to Highway 8.

The proposed plan will include realigning Fruitland Road and open up land for residential development throughout Winona, starting with the properties east of Fruitland Road.

But members of a citizens advisory committee said the proposed secondary plan going to the planning committee is not the plan they endorsed.

Cal Di Falco, advisory committee chair, said the plan threatens Winona’s small town character by allowing high density development, with stacked townhouse units up to six storeys.

“The plan you’re seeing here today has lost its way,” said Di Falco. “I can’t stand here today and support this.”

Residents expressed a litany of concerns, including the new placement of the Fruitland Road bypass.

Grant Cook, advisory committee vice chair, said the new bypass route would re-direct heavy truck traffic into a residential area at the corner of Barton Street and Sunnyhurst Ave.

Other residents were concerned by the impact of large scale development on property values.

Michelle Sergi, city manager of community planning and design, said the SCUBE area will be designed with a goal of 70 people and jobs per hectare, to ensure the community meets the guidelines of the province’s Places to Grow legislation.

Johnson plans to oppose the secondary plan when the document is presented to the planning committee.

“I’m not recommending this; the city (planning) staff is recommending this,” she clarified for the audience.

[thmx]

The Stoney Creek Plaza is being demolished. This is where Boilers was.


Source: My photo

[mattgrande]

Interesting. Any idea what's going in there?

[thistleclub]

Stop me if you think you've heard this one before.


Ministry mothballs Taro dump’s government inspector
(Stoney Creek News, Richard Leitner, Mar 14 2013)

Upper Stoney Creek’s Taro industrial dump won’t see the return of a government inspector to check loads going into the site as part of licence changes that now allow it to take waste directly from anywhere in Ontario. Geoffrey Knapper, district manager at the Ministry of the Environment’s Hamilton office, said inspections will instead continue to focus on owner Newalta Corp’s two transfer stations in the city’s north end. The ministry scrapped the on-site position, which was funded by Newalta at a cost of about $80,000 per year, in December 2011 and initiated a pilot project that saw inspectors do one random visit to the stations every three months.

Knapper said the company does its own inspections at Taro which are audited by the ministry. Newalta says it does at least five random inspections of the 1,666 loads the site receives on average each month. The government inspector did nine. “We found it worked,” Knapper said. “The inspections at both the landfill and our transfer stations did not show any environmental issues, so we’re satisfied that the strategy that we put in place is appropriate.”

The change is one of three amendments to Newalta’s operating licence for the dump, approved in July 1996 without public hearings despite vociferous community opposition. The site had only been allowed to accept waste from within Hamilton, but this included imported loads received at the transfer stations, located on Brant and Imperial streets. It can now also take up 750,000 tonnes of waste in any 12-month period, rather than just within a calendar year.

Unlike with the inspector’s position, Newalta had sought the latter two licence changes and conducted an environmental screening process last summer and fall that included sparsely-attended open houses. Knapper said the changes give Newalta greater flexibility while maintaining all existing rules on acceptable waste, which can only be what the province classifies as solid, non-hazardous waste – a designation that can include treated hazardous wastes.

Efforts to reach Stoney Creek Councillor Brad Clark for comment were unsuccessful, but he spearheaded a motion passed by city council last spring that demanded the on-site inspector be kept in place.

None of the amendments have been posted on the province’s environmental registry, which allows for appeals of the decisions.

Newalta communications director Greg Jones said little has changed from the company’s perspective and plans are underway to hire a third party contractor to do on-site inspections to address Clark’s concerns. “We continued to do at least five random inspections per month on our own, as we did previously while the inspector was in place,” he said. “We continue to follow the same rigorous operating procedures in terms of analyzing incoming materials to ensure they are acceptable for receipt, as well as ongoing monitoring of the conditions at the site.” Jones said the ministry found “no just opposition” to the other licence changes, which he said will reduce traffic and improve air quality by the transfer plants.

At open houses last year, Newalta said requiring imported loads to go to the transfer stations lengthened the haul route by 12.5 kilometres for about 35,000 trucks per year, the equivalent of 135 tonnes of carbon dioxide. It argued this made it less competitive because most other dumps have Ontario-wide service areas. According to the company’s annual report for 2010, the site received about 334,000 tonnes of outside waste from the transfer stations, out of a total of 560,000 tonnes dumped there.

[thmx]

edit

[vinchops]

The drywall on the commercial developement on barton and fruitland are all up and they have started painting the walls. also around the doors they are using stone. it actually looks quite nice.

[thmx]

The new medical office building that is under construction on Barton near Grays Rd is nearing completion.


Source: My Photo

[vinchops]

The former Carmen's paintball arena beside player's paradise is being converted into an Ultimate Exotics store. They have a Ferrari f430, Lamboroghini Gallardo, Maserati Grandturismo, Dodge Viper, and a Shelby GT500 which you can either test drive or preform in track days. ALSO!!! (yes it gets better!) every monday there are going to be holding car shows!! opens May 1st I have to admit, im pretty excited!

[Breze27hunter]

The owner retired and was just tired of it, wanted to just spend time with grand kids. It will be an LCBO building.

[thistleclub]

Clark blasts Taro dump redesign as ‘mountain of crap’
(Stoney Creek News, Richard Leitner, June 6 2013)

Stoney Creek Councillor Brad Clark is warning neighbours of the Taro dump that they will be staring out at “a mountain of crap” if owner Newalta Corp. gets permission to raise its final grade by nearly a third at its highest point.

Clark lashed out at Newalta officials in several testy exchanges on Monday after they unveiled the proposal at a meeting of the community liaison committee for the site, rejecting their suggestions people won’t notice the difference.

The plan, which requires approval from the Ministry of the Environment, would see all dump elevations rise by 4.5 metres, raising the final grade from ground level to between 11.55 and 18.45 metres from the existing range of 7.05 to 13.95 metres.

In return for being allowed to pile waste higher, the company is proposing to limit the site to its existing footprint. This would scrap the original plan to expand it toward Green Mountain Road and create a new entranceway off Mud Street.

Clark said the proposal is all about saving Newalta money, calling it a “complete betrayal” of promises made to the community when the dump was approved in 1996 over the objections of 10,000 people who wrote letters of opposition.

He criticized Newalta for not raising the height issue with the city as it planned the new entrance and surrounding housing developments like Penny Lane Estates.

“I’m absolutely stunned that this suggestion is even being made,” Clark said.

“To just dump it like this is so irritating, especially given all the money that was invested in all these houses around here,” he said. “You think they want to see a mountain of crap?”

But Newalta communications director Greg Jones said the proposal will only result in a “slight increase” to the dump’s height while eliminating the nuisance from constructing five new waste cells on 18 hectares of land by Green Mountain Road.

The new design will also increase the distance between the dump and homes planned to the north by 275 metres, keep the Upper Centennial Parkway entrance and reduce leachate volumes going into the sewer because of a smaller waste footprint, he said.

“We’re not going to deny that this project will result in cost savings, but we believe there are a number of benefits,” Jones said, estimating the dump will remain open for another 10 years.

“Frankly, we don’t think that four and a half metres are going to make any difference to anybody,” he said. “We’d be able to keep the access where it is. We believe that not having an entrance across from Penny Lane Estates would be beneficial to those people.”

But Randy Valchuk, a community member of the committee, said the increase in height “does sound rather high” and could affect the view from neighbouring homes.

“You’re talking about pretty well a two-storey house (higher),” he said. “Some of those people, if it was cut down to a reasonable thing, they could probably see over the city. You might actually block their view.”

It could always be worse.