Ontario Construction News staff writer
Oakville Mayor Rob Burton has called for Distrikt Developments and the Province to postpone the company’s April 8 Ontario Land Tribunal (OLT) hearing on its applications to build high-rise towers on land opposite the Oakville GO station.
The company’s latest proposal includes 45 and 61-storey towers designed by Teeple Architects.
Along with about 1,200 residential units, the two towers would contain about 1,000 square metres of office space and 2,700 square metres of retail and commercial space.
The mayor made the request in his annual State of the Town Address, delivered to a special meeting of Council and the public.
The mayor spoke on a theme of participation and consultation. He announced Oakville had been invited to participate in the Bloomberg-Harvard Ash Center program in which 25 cities will each win a $1 million grant to implement their winning innovation projects. He called on successful entrepreneurs to help compete for a $1 million grant called the Mayors Innovation Challenge.
Burton cited three reasons for delaying the OLT hearing.
- Town staff are already stretched by having to simultaneously prepare for the hearing and finish the update of the town’s 2009 Midtown policies.
- When adopted, these new policies will guide the development of the areas of Midtown not covered by applications under appeal.
- In May the province brought in a new provincially run planning process, the Transit-Oriented Communities (TOC) program, to deal with the four applications.
“It is unfair and unrealistic to expect us to handle the OLT case, the OPA update, and the province’s new TOC process all at once,” he said. “We are receiving many applications in Midtown. That makes it urgent to finish our OPA even while the TOC goes on,
“Only by working together can we develop a better plan than the province would make without any input from us,” he said.
The mayor also requested additional resources from the provincial and federal governments to deal with the city’s “housing emergency”.