ALLDRITT TOWER APPROVAL MAKES IT FEEL LIKE 1917
Public engagement is key to good, modern planning practice, writes
As the Edmonton Journal has reported, our city council on April 26 approved major bylaw changes for the construction of an 80-storey building on top of the riverbank parkland just east of the Shaw Conference Centre.
To appreciate how our council and the city’s planning staff work, it is important to trace the process involved in making this decision and recognize the implications for city governance and for Edmonton as a place to live, work and do business.
To start, it is helpful to see how the project was first brought to the attention of council. As far as one can determine, council was meeting to discuss expropriating some of the properties in the area pursuant to its Quarters Redevelopment Plan when a councillor asked that council suspend expropriation proceedings and look at a potential new project.
In this context, it should be noted that the council had established the Quarters Redevelopment Plan after years of painstaking consultations and negotiations with all stakeholders, and the plan had won a merit award.
The plan was the new document to guide developers, city hall, and others in their projects in the area.
Suddenly, council suspended work on the expropriation and moved behind closed doors to discuss the Alldritt project. When they came out from behind closed doors, the planning staff had endorsed both the one-off sale of environmental reserve parkland as well as its rezoning.
Planning staff recommended changing the Quarters plan and numerous existing laws. These laws were developed after decades of experience and deliberations and are designed to promote development in the city that best serves our businesses and communities. The laws deal with such important subjects as the North Saskatchewan River Valley Area Redevelopment Plan, Riverview Area Structure Plan, Capital City Downtown Area Redevelopment Plan, Urban Development and the Environmental Reserve Policy.
When planning staff were asked by a councillor at the April 26 hearing for the reasons behind such a cavalier attitude toward existing laws, the staff simply asserted that the project is of “higher value.”
In other words, existing laws had no value in the face of this project. No data, no analysis, no economic, planning or community-development theory or model that backed up the assertion of “higher value” was offered. One wondered if we were being ruled by officials instead of laws.
Edmontonians, including city council, have no idea if another developer would have paid more for this rare piece of reserve parkland or offered a better design within the existing laws, or both.
This is because we never asked any other developer. It is because of closed-doors deals like this that citizens say, “you can’t fight city hall.” Council approved the project and ignored the fact that an overwhelming majority of the people at the public hearings were opposed to it.
One wondered whether one was living in 1917, and not in 2017 when public engagement and collaborative, community-based planning are considered sine qua non, or an essential element, of sound city planning.
To gain public trust and be a better-governed city, council must seriously review how it conducts its business and sets accountability for itself and city staff. The council should recognize that changing established laws on an ad hoc basis is bad business.
Citizens and developers work best when they know the rules and how they are applied. Edmontonians can also do their part at the next election by asking their councillors how they voted on this vital issue, and why.
Edmontonians ... have no idea if another developer would have paid more for this rare piece of reserve parkland or offered a better design within the existing laws, or both.