The following serves as input to the proposed development at 180 Gordon Street by the Guelph Civic League (GCL).
The GCL strongly supports two aspects of the development proposal:
– it makes use of a vacant lot in a highly visible location, and
– it helps to increase residential density in an area near the downtown.However, we are concerned that the Official Plan Amendment proposed for 180 Gordon Street exempts this property from the 30 m vegetated buffer setback requirement that applies to all properties along the very important Speed/Eramosa Environmental Corridor.
The objective of retention and restoration of a naturalized corridor along the Eramosa/Speed Corridor has been successfully implemented since the adoption of the Official Plan in 1995, and this implementation is a continuation of citizen-based efforts that started decades earlier with the Speed River Project.
This effort has produced a highly valued environmental corridor on both banks of the Eramosa within the City limits and beyond. The existence of this length of natural channel is rare in the Province of Ontario and the urban portion is particularly distinctive and valuable.We suggest that Council should adhere to the spirit of the Official Plan and protect this corridor. The proposed amendment for 180 Gordon Street should be opposed, and the proposed development should be revised so that the parts of the structure that are closer than the 30 m setback are removed.
Doing this will also mitigate the impacts of the proposal on Marianne’s Park, since a smaller structure would causing less crowding of this culturally important park. DS