Province has big-city housing goals for Peterborough

A provincial plan to ask Peterborough to start building more apartments and fewer single-family houses isn’t going over well at City Hall.

Neither city council nor staff believes the province’s new growth targets for Peterborough are realistic.

In a new blueprint for growth across Ontario, Peterborough is expected to use the same strategies for intensification as cities such as Oshawa and Hamilton.

The city would be expected to build 60 per cent of all its new residences within already built- up areas (up from 40 per cent).

To meet that goal, city staff says Peterborough would need some new mid-rise and high-rise apartment buildings – never mind single-family houses.

Coun. Dan McWilliams said that’s unrealistic to expect Peterborough to build high-rises like in Oshawa.

“It’s like a tyke hockey player being expected to play with a Junior A team,” he said. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

The province has just updated its growth plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe, which was first developed in 2006.

A decade ago, Peterborough was selected as an up-and-coming community that could be expected to grow rapidly. That designation has stuck, even if the high growth hasn’t quite materialized.

Nonetheless, the province still thinks Peterborough should build homes in a way that avoids urban sprawl.

But a new city staff report, reviewed by councillors Monday night, says Peterborough loves its single-family houses.

The report states that if the city held out for high-rises, it would drive up the cost of a single-family house and also drive away developers.

Coun. Andrew Beamer said this would have “troubling” ramifications for Peterborough and its growing subdivisions full of singlefamily houses.

Beamer also pointed out that the province is also expecting cities to build ‘complete streets’ – sidewalks on both sides, and cycling lanes – on the local taxpayer’s dime.

“It’s legislated, but it hinders our priorities,” he said. “And we get the bill. It’s troublesome, what the province is asking us to do.”

Coun. Dean Pappas said he was equally unhappy that the province expects the city to meet higher targets of intensification without offering any grants to go along with it. “I think it’s shameful,” he said. Coun. Gary Baldwin asked city staff whether the city would be penalized if it doesn’t meet these new growth targets.

Brad Appleby, a planner for the city, said the province hasn’t said whether there would be ramifications if Peterborough didn’t meet the targets.

In Barrie, he said, the province stepped in and made a plan specific to that area when there was debate about growth happening quite rapidly in the areas surrounding the city.

“But we don’t really have the same kinds of issues, in Peterborough,” Appleby said. “We don’t face the same level of growth as Barrie, or the same level of competition.”

Meanwhile, Mayor Daryl Bennett pointed out that city staff is being consulted by the province about their new targets. Staff will speak up, he said.

“We’re saying, ‘Look, we see what you want us to do – but these are the parts of the plan we’ll have difficulty with,’” Bennett said. “Hopefully, provincial officials will listen.”

The planning meeting was dominated by this topic Monday night, although councillors also approved a plan to rezone a series of vacant industrial properties in Major Bennett Industrial Park to allow smaller buildings.

They’ve been zoned for larger buildings such as warehouses and yet staff says there is more interest lately in erecting smaller buildings on those lots.