Urban Growth Boundary Expansion

[jammer139]

Latest LFP article on this today.

https://lfpress.com/news/local-news/elbow-room-by-how-much-should-london-grow-its-urban-boundary

[ssiguy]

I don't have a problem with expanding urban growth boundaries per se. London's growth over the last decade as been much faster than forecast. For me, it depends on what that land is for and how it is zoned.

I would have no problem for expanding land zoned for industrial uses and especially along the 401/402 corridor. A major project can take up monstrous of land along with the companies created to support it. The VW battery land is a prime example of that.

I also don't have a problem if all the areas expanded for housing MUST only be approved if the housing is either medium or high density ie no SFH. This makes the development far more affordable by high property tax revenue while making it cheaper per unit to build needed community infrastructure and makes transit to those areas far more sustainable. Any commercial development must have VERY restrictive parking amounts making big box developments impossible to build.

Cities grow and the amount of land required to allow it to often doesn't fit into previously prescribed boundaries. The cities must have containing sprawl as their primary goal but at the same time, growth boundaries shouldn't be written in stone. If it is too restrictive, all that happens is developers will build just outside the city boundaries to places like Middlesex Centre and that makes the situation vastly worse.

[Snark]

[QUOTE=haljackey;10446288]Video regarding the proposed urban growth boundary expansion

• Video Link


Tolerating this guy for over 30 minutes of basically just him in front of a camera was torturous. His extreme snappy/hyper delivery, exaggerated expressions and dramatic body language, perfect hair (and trendy corduroy jacket), and dizzying super quick cut editing of himself talking/yelling (he seemingly can’t string more than 2 sentences together before yet another edit cut) all point to the presenter’s main concern being not urban issues but rather wanting to be a Youtube star/social media influencer. It was basically 30 minutes of “watch me, and, oh ya, I’m gonna try to put an argument forward so try to listen, but really just watch me perform”. This might play well with 18 year olds watching yet another juvenile video on their phone, but in the real world where there are actual grownups dealing with socially consequential and financially substantial matters this guy manner is shrill, immature, and grossly unprofessional – to the point of discrediting his argument (whether it is valid or not). This was amateur (half) hour.

As for the matter of his actual argument, a large portion of his presentation is the basic assertion that city councillors are corrupt/on the take, and little more than puppets of large, greedy, evil developers (without presenting any evidence). Regardless of this lack of evidence (or perhaps because of it) I guess his approach is to be as bombastic as possible in presenting and that will make it true. In the end, he offered few alternatives in any detail that a complex issue such as urban growth requires, but I’m unsure if giving a well thought out and socioeconomic realistic alternative in his argument is as important as the number of hits that his videos receive.

[GreatTallNorth2]

Great video and nice to have someone local who can articulate and demonstrate the reasons we need to think through what we are doing here in London.

[jammer139]

CBC article on growth. Specific example using the Southside proposal on Pack Rd. Where their getting it wrong is saying Southside's proposal will be built in 10 years. Very little chance of it even being started in the next 2 years and the build out process will likely take another 15 plus years after that. Realistically more like 20 years.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/london/q-...pment-moves-how-are-they-doing-1.7591964

[CanadianTalk]

After about a year and a half of planning, the proposed expansion of the Urban Growth Boundary will be presented to Council for a final vote this month.

This will be presented to the planning committee on December 2nd, and then to all of Council on December 16th.

If Council votes to approve the urban growth boundary expansion, then it still has to go to the province for final approval.


https://pub-london.escribemeetings.com/filestream.ashx?DocumentId=120521


Here are the sections of land that are proposed to be included within the urban growth boundary


Northwest London





Northeast London






Southeast London





Southeast London (Industrial)





Southwest London (Pack / Colonel Talbot / Southdale area)





West London (Westdel Bourne area)

[jammer139]

Q&A with Chief Joe Miskokomon.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/london/lo...oe-miskokomon-says-not-so-fast-9.6996469

[jammer139]

Committee votes 6-0 to support expansion. Next up full council.

https://lfpress.com/news/local-news/comm...ary-expansion-amid-first-nation-concerns

[MolsonExport]

[MolsonExport]

Hyde Parking-lot Road has become snarled with traffic in the evenings. The expansion of the urban growth boundary is sure to put more pressure on it. It wasn't too long ago that this road was only one lane each direction. Meanwhile, the traffic on Wonderland is getting worse by the hour.

[MrSlippery519]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Hyde Parking-lot Road has become snarled with traffic in the evenings. The expansion of the urban growth boundary is sure to put more pressure on it. It wasn't too long ago that this road was only one lane each direction. Meanwhile, the traffic on Wonderland is getting worse by the hour.

There is no fixing Wonderland at this point, the city was well aware of what that road would become especially when the 401 interchange was started over 10 years ago. Best we can hope for is double left turn lanes, there is no path to avoid the road either.

[MolsonExport]

London very badly needs a limited-access west-end North-South throughway that DOES NOT HAVE retail festooned along the entire way. A parkway, if you will, to the west of Westdel Bourne, going straight from 402 to Egremont Drive.

[GreatTallNorth2]

On another note, when you look at that map you see the rail line that runs from St. Thomas to downtown London. I am not sure if the entire line is complete but it must be as there is a daily freight train or two that runs from St. Thomas to London. If the city was smart they would take a look at development opportunities that run along the tracks and then build a regional rail service from St. Thomas to downtown with a few stops within the city along the way. There are already clusters of apartments at Adelaide/Commissioners that would take advantage of that kind of service and naturally developers would want to build more high density near transit stations.

[jammer139]

There used to be a passenger train that ran from London to Port Stanley back in the day.

Originally Posted by GreatTallNorth2

On another note, when you look at that map you see the rail line that runs from St. Thomas to downtown London. I am not sure if the entire line is complete but it must be as there is a daily freight train or two that runs from St. Thomas to London. If the city was smart they would take a look at development opportunities that run along the tracks and then build a regional rail service from St. Thomas to downtown with a few stops within the city along the way. There are already clusters of apartments at Adelaide/Commissioners that would take advantage of that kind of service and naturally developers would want to build more high density near transit stations.

[Djeffery]

There was talk in the last little while of re-connecting that track in St Thomas to allow the full London & Port Stanley route to be able to happen again. There is a little less than a half mile gap just north of the St Thomas station to Barwick St where the track was removed years ago. The line from London does split off east and west there, although the line ends around Talbotville to the west.

[K85]

This is a terrific map...! IF!!! The region split cost on this, could you imagine something like GO, but smaller, and local, here? Strathroy, St. Thomas, Woodstock, Seasonal Port Stanley and Grand Bend (like, beach goer rail service, 4x daily or something to and fro) Even just this would be an absolute blast if priced right, and actually serviced into being relatively subsidized?

Originally Posted by GreatTallNorth2

On another note,

[MolsonExport]

How many people would take the train from St. Thomas to London every day? Maybe 500? And would they all want to leave and return at the same time? If not, then you have to run multiple trains.

I just don't see how the numbers add up even close to what would be necessary to come remotely close to making it a worthwhile endeavour. Far better to have two light rail lines, one north-south (Masonville, Western, Downtown, WhiteOaks) and one East-West (Oakridge, Wonderland, Downtown, Airport).

[GreatTallNorth2]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

How many people would take the train from St. Thomas to London every day? Maybe 500? And would they all want to leave and return at the same time? If not, then you have to run multiple trains.

I just don't see how the numbers add up even close to what would be necessary to come remotely close to making it a worthwhile endeavour. Far better to have two light rail lines, one north-south (Masonville, Western, Downtown, WhiteOaks) and one East-West (Oakridge, Wonderland, Downtown, Airport).

I think you have to start somewhere and you have to look at it as the entire line and the infill that could happen. St. Thomas is only going to grow bigger with the new factories, etc. Imagine St. Thomas as a city of 75,000 in the not to distant future. Those people might want to visit downtown or need to go to the hospital. Also think of those driving to London on the 401 being able to park for free and be able to take a quick train into the city. Also if this could be extended to Port Stanley beach in the future I think it would get used even more in the summer. Hey it worked before, why not now?

Since we will never build a proper highway in the city, we have to have alternatives. I would love a north/south and east/west LRT line but this gets us a form of better transit without all the expense of trying to buy up homes, creating a ROW in the city, etc. The track is already in place.

[Djeffery]

Also with that rail line, I'm not sure if it's super important but it only has half a wye anymore, there is no connection to go towards downtown. There used to be a full wye there decades ago. A train coming from the south to get to downtown would have to take the curve that's there now to the east and then go in reverse direction to the west, or continue east towards the full wye east of Egerton and turn around there. I agree with ME that I doubt there would be enough regular traffic to run a commuter service, but it would be cool to have the summer train to Port Stanley operating. I don't know how that railway is set up to be able to run as far as London, but that would take a significant amount of their time in a day to run, compared to the short little runs they do now out of Port Stanley.

[jammer139]

Bring back the Doodlebug self propelled rail car.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doodlebug_(railcar)