Efficient, sustainable growth must be the priority
More urban sprawl threatens to keep housing unaffordable and further drain resources
Once again the city is embarking on a plan for growth. It starts with estimates of predicted national growth. It is then divided into territories and provinces and subsequently into cities and regions.
Nowhere is there any consideration for the quality of growth. Neither is there any leadership shown to direct the growth to where it would be beneficial and away from regions where there are challenges. Next they hire a conventional consultant to allocate the population to a combination of greenfield and existing urban areas.
The consultants, like politicians, are not expected to provide insight, leadership or innovation — they want to do what is popular and reconfirm the status quo. They are guided by 70 years of growth since the Second World War which showed a pronounced preference for single family, low density, suburban houses which were affordable due to low energy prices, multiple levels of subsidies, environmental illiteracy and new infrastructure.
In order to appropriately plan for our future we need to give due consideration to the realities of the environment, society, including the changing demographics and financing. For example, the City of Hamilton has allowed the infrastructure deficit to exponentially increase to over $200 million per year, each and every year.
Like others, Hamilton has too much infrastructure and/or too few paying customers. In 15 years the city has got $3 billion behind and it has no plan to resolve this monumental threat. The consultants either don’t understand this or they choose not to acknowledge it. They are recommending that present residents subsidize and build more infrastructure without warning the city of the dire consequences.
Many cities have recently announced that they are in a state of “climate emergency.” What we failed to do is recognize the connection between suburban developments and excessive fossil fuel consumption. Put simply, suburban sprawl favours single family and low density homes separated from other commercial, industrial and recreational functions. Single family houses represent the highest energy inputs to build. They are the least efficient to heat and cool, and their location requires automobile dependence. Further, the infrastructure servicing these low density units is expensive, elongated and inefficient and public transit in these areas is impractical and unaffordable.
As in other communities near the GTA, there is a severe shortage of affordable, rental housing. There is a strong disconnect between the “bricks and mortar” costs and market rents which contain an increasing large component for the land costs.
Pro-sprawl advocates are advancing the wrong-headed notion that further sprawl will lower housing costs as they have for decades, but the truth is suburban sprawl as corroborated by countless independent studies causes taxes to rise. What is needed is a means to reduce or eliminate the land costs from housing rents.
For example, if all low- and medium-density housing units were permitted, with conditions, to add an adjacent, energy efficient dwelling unit the land issue could be isolated by choice. A 600-square-foot unit could be reasonably built for $120,000 providing a very positive, income stream; tax assessment for the municipality; and reasonable rents if officially controlled.
Urban consultants are often unaware of the significance and importance of the renewable resources of the prime, agricultural lands surrounding the city. Very few urbanites understand that the productive capacity of Class I farmlands provides more than twice as much food as medium Class IV farmlands given identical inputs (including energy) and practices. To build over the farmlands is to permanently destroy a local, natural resource, which is increasingly important given growing concerns for food security.
Finally, there is going to be a significant reduction in lands zoned solely for commercial uses due to new and evolving online shopping behaviours. Moving toward mixed uses (commercial and residential) will provide substantial opportunities for residential development. Imagine the thousands of residents who could be housed at a redeveloped power centre or outlet mall.
In spite of these critical issues, challenges and opportunities, the consultants have chosen to refurbish or recycle plans of decades past. They promote more sprawl and low density housing, thereby exacerbating climate change, city services and affordability. You have to wonder if the consultants were solely focused on growth and not its consequences.
We have the option of facing the future with all its expected challenges or letting the conventional forces threaten our neighbourhoods, our environment and our ability to pay our way. The priority today needs to be on efficiency and people not unimaginative, repetitive, inefficient and expensive expansion.