Golden chance
Published Wednesday August 13th, 2008
Dave MacLean
Telegraph-Journal
SAINT JOHN - Many predictable arguments were made on both sides of the debate during Monday's special common council session dealing with the question of whether the city should sell the former Lantic Sugar site to Irving Oil.
Cindy Wilson/Telegraph-Journal
Tim Vickers of ACAP Saint John, at Tin Can Beach. He sees the proposal to sell the former Lantic Sugar site to Irving Oil as a golden opportunity for the city to look at enhancing the popular Harbour Passage walking trail and the neglected beach at the end of Sydney Street.
The city's economic development agencies and uptown business owners are salivating at the thought that Irving Oil might build a $30-million global headquarters that would bring 1,000 jobs to Long Wharf.
Longshoremen and labour unions, on the other hand, are concerned about the future of the city's working port, even though no jobs will be lost due to the proposal and Long Wharf has been used only sporadically over the past decade.
Tim Vickers sees a different kind of opportunity - something beyond the ringing cash registers and additional housing the project could provide.
The executive director of the Atlantic Coastal Action Program (ACAP) Saint John saw Monday's session as the perfect time to make a pitch for a project that would see Harbour Passage extended down Water Street past the Lantic Sugar site to the area known as Tin Can Beach.
During his presentation to council Monday - Vickers was among the presenters in favour of the proposed sale - he noted the proposed sale of the land and possible future land swap was a golden opportunity for the city to look at enhancing both the popular Harbour Passage walking trail and the neglected Tim Can Beach. The beach is at the end of Sydney Street, near the former Lantic Sugar property.
"Over the years," Vickers said in an interview Tuesday, "Tin Can Beach has consistently been an area where residents have called in and said, 'It needs to be cleaned up. We use it and we've used it for years.' Some of our directors have pointed out that it's an area that could be enhanced - it's in the south end, it has value, it's a great vantage point.
"There is a large component of the public that is aware of it. And then it came to my attention in the not-too-distant past that the inner harbour land use plan had already identified that area as a place to be enhanced as part of Harbour Passage. It wasn't necessarily a new idea on my part. But nobody was really pushing it right now and I didn't see it being on the agenda that would push that, which is unfortunate. So I ignored the other environmental issues because I knew they were being covered and I focused just on that."
Vickers said his group is trying to help developers identify worthwhile community projects that could use assistance. For example, there are legislated environmental compensation requirements imposed on projects that cause damage to wetlands.
"So if (developers) damage a wetland, for example, they have to compensate by creating anywhere from four to 10 times as much wetland as they damaged," he said. "Quite often you have developers who are looking for compensation projects - they have to do them. The onus is on them to present the project for approval. If you have some potential projects lined up that are pre-screened, you can say to a developer or a philanthropist, 'Look, here's a place you can invest that money and we'd be more than happy to support you."
Vickers says the Tin Can Beach proposal could tie in to the proposed uptown developments. During his presentation, he showed enhanced photos that show trees lining the proposed Harbour Passage extension from Water Street to Tin Can Beach. There would be lookout stations at Tin Can Beach, similar to the one along Chesley Drive, he said, and possibly a pedestrian wharf that could extend into the harbour.
"We're trying to do more with the initiatives that are going on in the city right now," he said in the interview. "Not just focus on the jobs or the economic benefits, but the value-added quality-of-life issues that sustainable development is supposed to encompass. In this case, we have a public resource (in Tin Can Beach) that the people already use and enjoy the vantage point that it has.
"It was a timely opportunity, given the land transaction proposal, for us to put it in front of council and say Saint John has been working very hard for the last couple of years on just this kind of thing - if a development is happening, don't just look at the development. Look at the ripple effect - the benefits that could come from it. That's where this came from - there's the potential that Tin Can Beach could disappear if it's not looked after properly. With very little effort, we could conserve it for someone down the road to enhance it.
"There's enough on the table right now. It's not a question at this point in time to look at it as some sort of compensation. If it can be secured, that alone would be a huge step in the development."
Vickers felt the time was right to get the idea in front of council.
"Even if they decide not to sell at this point in time, all these concepts that I'm telling them about making sure that every development incorporates this aspect into it is applicable city-wide, whether it's today or tomorrow or next year," he said. "This is the type of thinking and the types of questions that they need to be asking of every single development - 'How does it fit into Harbour Passage?' 'How does it fit into these proposed cycle routes through the city?' 'Is anything that's happening going to stymie our ability to proceed with these projects a few years down the road?'
"I know the council and city staff have a lot on their plates and that's why we try to give them a visual and float something out for them to see. To tell them that Harbour Passage is supposed to go around the southern peninsula and all the way to Courtenay Bay and up Marsh Creek - make sure that when you make a decision that you don't cut into that or take away the ability to do that."
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Saint John Compilation of Proposed Developments (2008)
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