Kelowna city staff smell trouble if subdivision built next to dump
Report recommends against proposal for 1,000 homes
Kelowna should reject plans for a major new development in Glenmore because it’s too close to the dump, city council will hear Monday.
Unpleasant smells, dust and noise would bedevil future residents of the proposed 1,000-home Diamond Mountain subdivision, city officials say.
Those future residents, the city worries, would begin clamouring for the dump to be moved or closed decades earlier than planned, costing taxpayers tens of millions of dollars.
“The interests of the community at large and of the potential future residents of Diamond Mountain would not be served by pursuing residential development on the site,” reads part of a planning department report to council.
Staff’s recommendation that council not allow the Diamond Mountain project, on 81 hectares of hilly lands immediately south of the dump, comes after discussions with Troika, a Kelowna development firm, that date back to 2011.
City officials and Troika representatives had discussed various housing styles, the road network and park placement in preparation of a so-called area structure plan.
“We’re pretty excited about this project,” Troika owner Renee Wasylyk told The Daily Courier in December 2012. “Diamond Mountain will be a unique place to live, with a kind of vibrancy and mix of demographic groups that isn’t very common in most neighbourhoods.”
But in late 2016, the site’s proximity to the dump emerged as a major concern.
In particular, municipal officials became concerned that future residents of Diamond Mountain would sue the city for allowing a development where the quality of life was diminished by the closeness of the dump and a large municipally owned composting facility.
A study conducted last year said a previous impact study was not thorough enough and underestimated the degree to which the dump would bother future Diamond Mountain residents.
Those impacts, engineers concluded in the 2017 study, would be “significant,” consisting of foul smells, excessive noise and dust.
That’s in part because future landfilling operations at the dump will happen at the south side of the city-owned site, even closer to Diamond Mountain. Wasylyk weighed in again on Friday. “We want to bring to Kelowna a community that’s sustainable, that relieves the city’s affordable housing issue, that fits a real range of residents and families at different stages of life and scales of income,” she said.
“If the area structure plan isn’t approved, the property is already zoned for agriculture 1, so we would proceed with developing 17 10-acre lots that only the wealthy could afford, and the public parks, lookouts and trails would be lost.”
Wasylyk pointed out the landfill’s operational certificate specifies it is required to mitigate any nuisance it creates within its own site.
“The nuisance report’s findings clearly identify the landfill is not meeting this requirement,” she said.
“What we’re hearing is two different interpretations of the same study. One interpretation is there won’t be any additional impact for 100 years, and the other is the additional impact is significant enough to prevent or at least alter development at Diamond Mountain and the rest of the Glenmore community.”
Wasylyk said other area neighbourhoods could also be impacted, including Quail Ridge, McKinley Landing, Wilden and UBC Okanagan.
“We are concerned about the potential impact of the report’s findings on our campus and on future housing development in the surrounding area,” said UBCO principal Deborah Buszard.
“We believe affordable, mixed housing development in proximity to the campus is in the interest of the community.”
Troika was engaged by Len Tonn, owner of the Diamond-T Ranch cattle and hay operation, to develop the land into a comprehensive housing subdivision.
“Twenty-two years ago, we approached the City of Kelowna with a plan to subdivide our land into several smaller acreages, which would allow us to scale down our cattle farming operations and retire in our much-loved community,” said Tonn in a letter to the editor.
“At this time, the approving officer (at the City of Kelowna) indicated they had concerns with the subdivision of our land, as it was more suitable for a development similar to (the denser) Dilworth Mountain.”
Twelve years ago, the Tonns built their home 500 metres from the dump and have had no issues with stink, dust or noise.
Tonn hopes city council decides to allow Diamond Mountain to move ahead on Monday.
“We realize the City of Kelowna approving officer in 1996 was correct: our land has the potential to become something much greater than a few acreages for the wealthy,” he said.
“We have an opportunity to create sustainable, affordable homes for over 800 families, with access to daycares, senior housing, parks and trails for the entire community to enjoy.”
We want to bring to Kelowna a community that’s sustainable, that relieves the city’s affordable housing issue . . .
Renee Wasylyk