Condo challenge fails
URB rules against complaint that Bedford development violates planning strategy
By AMY PUGSLEY FRASER City Hall Reporter
Fri. Nov 2 - 5:24 AM
United Gulf president Navid Saberi’s company can proceed with their Bedford condo development. (Ted Pritchard / Staff)
A Bedford woman has lost her appeal of a multimillion-dollar development for Moirs Mills Road.
Jan Bird appealed Northwest community council’s decision to approve United Gulf’s residential and commercial project at 910 Bedford Highway.
She said the development, which includes 30 condos, doesn’t follow the planning strategy for Bedford.
However, the Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board, which heard the one-day appeal in September, has denied her appeal.
In a written decision released Thursday, chairman Wayne Cochrane said it’s likely that Ms. Bird, who owns a condo very close to the property boundary of the proposed development, will be affected by it.
"The board does not disagree with the appellant’s assertion that she will experience (if the proposed development goes ahead) among other things . . . some loss of privacy, as well as increased light and sound, which will be generated by development of the subject property," Mr. Cochrane writes in the 24-page decision.
However, the board takes into account the specific provisions in the municipal planning strategy and found in favour of the developer.
"While the appellant is not happy with the (municipal planning strategy) having been amended at all, the board finds that the test which it must apply in the present proceeding is not whether the (planning strategy) amendment was appropriate. Instead, the sole test applicable is whether the decision to enter into the development agreement reasonably carries out the intent of the (planning strategy), including the amendments to which the appellant objects."
When she appealed the decision last October, Ms. Bird was also concerned that only three of Halifax Regional Municipality’s 23 councillors sit on the community council that approved the development.
By comparison, she said, the 27-storey United Gulf development for Hollis Street in downtown Halifax went before all 23 regional councillors at a full council meeting.