General Updates and News

[fenwick16]

Thank you for the pictures and unbiased report Dmajackson. I am sure that the Harbour Solutions project has had a positive effect on the Halifax Harbour. Your pictures and pictures by others provide the evidence of a successful wastewater treatment project.

[-Harlington-]

I think its definitely better than it was, everytime im near the waterfront it does seem like it got a lot clearer.

although you still wouldnt catch me swimming in there yet.

[Northend Guy]

Originally Posted by JET

Someone had posted that recently, but can't remember when or what thread. The site is on Portland, below five corners, across from the Tim's. Sounds good

I don't think it's the same site. The site I am referring to is right at 5 corners. My understanding is that it will be replacing something that is already there.

[Jstaleness]

Originally Posted by Phalanx

Yeah, the system seems quite flawed... given that it seems to back up just about any time there's a storm. And the fact that one of the collection stations occupies a chunk of prime real estate downtown will always annoy me. Surely there could have been other locations?

I mentioned this as well in a comment on the cbc.ca news story. Last time I checked I received over 45 thumbs down for saying "job poorly done". It appears that the few of us on here are they only group of people that feel a sewage treatment plant doesn't belong directly in the downtown.

[worldlyhaligonian]

Originally Posted by Jstaleness

I mentioned this as well in a comment on the cbc.ca news story. Last time I checked I received over 45 thumbs down for saying "job poorly done". It appears that the few of us on here are they only group of people that feel a sewage treatment plant doesn't belong directly in the downtown.

Most of the folks that post on CBC.ca don't have a clue. I wish we could educate people through this forum. Its a terrible spot for the plant, I hope something can be developed over top of it some day.

[fenwick16]

There are two issues regarding the wastewater treatment plant:
1) The location of the wastewater treatment plant
2) The effectiveness of the wastewater treatment plant

If the argument is that the wastewater treatment plant is not effective then most people won't accept that argument, since all they have to do is look at the harbour and see the big improvement.

Regarding the location, I also wonder why that location was chosen but I haven't seen stories in the newspaper recently about odours coming from it. It doesn't look that much out of place next to the Halifax Dockyards.

In my opinion, the Mayor and Councillors who supported the wastewater treatment project deserve a lot of credit. And of course, there are many HRM staff members who worked on it behind the scenes. It seems to be a great success at a manageable cost.

When I consider the benefits of Mayor Kelly's term and Councillors, I consider the following as positives:
1) The harbour cleanup
2) The skating oval
3) BRT expansion
4) Significant employment growth
5) The Canada Winter Games event was a great success within a manageable budget.

Negatives
1) the Commonwealth Games result; in my opinion, it should not have been axed but instead the budget cut drastically. Then if Halifax didn't win the bid to be the host Commonwealth city, there wouldn't have been the lasting black eye on the municipality.
2) Slow movement on building an economical stadium and attracting a CFL team.
3) Too many development opportunities were turned away.

I consider the HRM_by_Design to be both a negative and positive. The planning and implementation were a great achievement but the height controls are too restrictive. It hasn't provided the building boom that it was intended to achieve.

[JET]

Originally Posted by Northend Guy

I don't think it's the same site. The site I am referring to is right at 5 corners. My understanding is that it will be replacing something that is already there.

I can't think of anything right at five corners that would be replaced. There are three nice old homes, a large apartment building and a duplex (small lot) on the five corners. Lets hope that it's not the nice old buildings.

[JET]

the facade on mitchell's enviro on Gottingen st is coming down today. There is an excavator digging on the empty lot across the street next to the Company House

[terrynorthend]

Originally Posted by JET

I can't think of anything right at five corners that would be replaced. There are three nice old homes, a large apartment building and a duplex (small lot) on the five corners. Lets hope that it's not the nice old buildings.

Are they referring to the Portland/Pleasant intersection, or the Portland/Canal intersection down the hill? I've heard both of these intersections refered to as five corners by different people. I could see something replacing the old Moffatt's Pharmacy building, or maybe the building beside Bluebell Cabs...

[Jonovision]

Originally Posted by terrynorthend

Are they referring to the Portland/Pleasant intersection, or the Portland/Canal intersection down the hill? I've heard both of these intersections refered to as five corners by different people. I could see something replacing the old Moffatt's Pharmacy building, or maybe the building beside Bluebell Cabs...

Five corners is the intersection of Portland and Pleasant and at one point Albert street used to come into it as well, hence the 5 corners.

I believe what is being referred to here is just down Portland Street from five corners. There was a public meeting a few weeks ago regarding a 40 or 60 unit 4 storey building to be built where the fire was a few years back. Here is the street view of the site.
http://maps.google.ca/maps?q=Dartmouth,+...BiYMGBbfEuJyaptaA&cbp=12,142.36,,0,-3.31

[JET]

Originally Posted by Dmajackson

The site for the 4 storey apartment building at 222 Portland Street:

Just down from the pleasant/albert/portland five corners. Good potential there.

[spaustin]

Geez the Knotweed sure loves a vacant lot. That fire wasn't that long ago and it looks like it's already well on its way to filling it in.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by spaustin

Geez the Knotweed sure loves a vacant lot. That fire wasn't that long ago and it looks like it's already well on its way to filling it in.

One thing HRM does better than any place in the nation is to encourage the growth of weeds. It's the dandelion/knotweed/creeping charlie capital of Canada.

[TheNovaScotian]

The developer bought the blue and yellow houses in the picture, the lot for the yellow house is actually quite large, so he now owns quite a large chunk of prime downtown dartmouth property. I'm hoping that at the public meetings because the developer is going to need a DA, that the city allow the developer to maybe add a few stories to make it more economical to use good materials and make sure its not set too far back from the street hopefully maintaining the feel of the area.

[Empire]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

One thing HRM does better than any place in the nation is to encourage the growth of weeds. It's the dandelion/knotweed/creeping charlie capital of Canada.

True, if you need some good examples just stroll through the Public Gardens.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by Empire

True, if you need some good examples just stroll through the Public Gardens.

Which is tragic.

[eastcoastal]

Originally Posted by fenwick16

There are two issues regarding the wastewater treatment plant:
1) The location of the wastewater treatment plant
2) The effectiveness of the wastewater treatment plant

If the argument is that the wastewater treatment plant is not effective then most people won't accept that argument, since all they have to do is look at the harbour and see the big improvement.

Regarding the location, I also wonder why that location was chosen but I haven't seen stories in the newspaper recently about odours coming from it. It doesn't look that much out of place next to the Halifax Dockyards.

In my opinion, the Mayor and Councillors who supported the wastewater treatment project deserve a lot of credit. And of course, there are many HRM staff members who worked on it behind the scenes. It seems to be a great success at a manageable cost.

Effectiveness: The Federal Government requires Secondary Level treatment, Tertiary is better, and the most responsible course of action, this project only achieves Primary.

Let's not pat ourselves on the backs for finally treating our sewage as it flows directly into our harbour. Do we really want to tell the world we are backwards enough to feel like Primary treatment is a progressive accomplishment for a capital city in the developed world in the Twenty First Century? We can do better.

Location: While there is no stunning urban context for this to fit into at this point, are we really at the stage where we feel like living up to the low standards of the dockyards is a positive? What about the idea that the city leads by example, and that this was an opportunity to use a piece of civic infrastructure to advance an agenda of great city planning? We can pretend that the values espoused by HRMbyDESIGN were not in place yet, but they are hardly new concepts.

The city should have used this project to be a little more forward thinking than: "Well, it only reaches the first level of treatment, although we know that the federal government is going to require at least the second level in the future, this is good enough. I suppose it's no worse than pseudo-industrial military dockyards, and I know that this is really one of the few 'gateways' to downtown, this is good enough. We are only Halifax."

[fenwick16]

Originally Posted by eastcoastal

Effectiveness: The Federal Government requires Secondary Level treatment, Tertiary is better, and the most responsible course of action, this project only achieves Primary.

Let's not pat ourselves on the backs for finally treating our sewage as it flows directly into our harbour. Do we really want to tell the world we are backwards enough to feel like Primary treatment is a progressive accomplishment for a capital city in the developed world in the Twenty First Century? We can do better.

Location: While there is no stunning urban context for this to fit into at this point, are we really at the stage where we feel like living up to the low standards of the dockyards is a positive? What about the idea that the city leads by example, and that this was an opportunity to use a piece of civic infrastructure to advance an agenda of great city planning? We can pretend that the values espoused by HRMbyDESIGN were not in place yet, but they are hardly new concepts.

The city should have used this project to be a little more forward thinking than: "Well, it only reaches the first level of treatment, although we know that the federal government is going to require at least the second level in the future, this is good enough. I suppose it's no worse than pseudo-industrial military dockyards, and I know that this is really one of the few 'gateways' to downtown, this is good enough. We are only Halifax."

All well said, and I believe that what you said has merit. But I believe it is being referred to as advanced primary treatment and there is the capability to upgrade to secondary treatment - http://www.halifax.ca/HWWTF/Myths.html. It should also be noted that advanced primary treatment in Halifax will be far more effective than such a system in Toronto that doesn't have ocean currents to disperse the discharge from the treatment facilities. (and unless all sea creatures start using toilets with wastewater treatment facilities then the ocean will always contain some biological discharge).

One question - if secondary treatment would have improved the harbour quality by an additional 10% then would residents have wanted to spend the much higher cost of such a facility? As is often the case, municipalities and individuals have to accept what they can afford. I am sure that many people would like to live in mansions, but instead live in smaller homes that they can afford. I don't want to sound sarcastic, but talk is cheap. I feel that the HRM got the best that it could afford. However, if residents are willing to pay much higher taxes then there is room for improvement.

On a related topic, the Cogswell interchange is a blight on the community and should be removed as soon as possible. This area looks far worse than the wastewater treatment plant - http://maps.google.ca/maps?q=halifax,+ns...8JPFRA4DKD80ybipg&cbp=12,136.55,,0,-2.81 . The Scotia Square Trade Mart looks worse than the wastewater treatment plant, in my opinion. The wastewater treatment plant is hardly even noticeable from Barrington Street.

[Empire]

The location of the sewage treatment plant is a blight on downtown. The building was designed to hide an extremely cheap facade. This location is the gateway to downtown and all efforts should have been exhausted to locate it elsewhere. I think the original location was under the bridge but a property dispute canned that location.

There certainly was no effort to engage the public on ways to improve the usefulness or appearance of the structure. If the STP is not an objectionable operation then let's put a bus shelter on the top or perhaps a tourist bureau welcoming people to downtown.

The effectiveness of the plant is still up for debate. I walk along the boardwalk at noon and it is still hit or miss if the water is clear. There are still the occasional floatables and murky water. The murky water is not always due to storm water swamping the plant but can be any host of discharged liquids. An outfall below Summit Place still discharges a light grey product on occassion. Generally it is better but certainly not guarnteed. For +400 million we should be seeing clearer water most of the time.

[Northend Guy]

Originally Posted by JET

Just down from the pleasant/albert/portland five corners. Good potential there.

The drawing I saw says its 230 Portland St.