HomeDiagramsDatabaseMapsForum About
     

Go Back   SkyscraperPage Forum > Regional Sections > Canada > Ontario > Ottawa-Gatineau > Urban, Urban Design & Heritage Issues


Reply

 
Thread Tools Display Modes
     
     
  #101  
Old Posted May 5, 2011, 11:26 AM
reidjr reidjr is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2009
Posts: 1,237
Quote:
Originally Posted by McC View Post
this from a guy who thinks it should be okay to build 20+ storey buildings in people's backyards anywhere else in the city, no matter what the streets/infrastructure are like? nice reidjr, real nice.
I never said that streets etc should alwas be able to handle the increased traffic no matter where it is.As for building condos in people's back yards lets not get carried away no condo or office building is beeing built in anyones back yard you don't own every single of space meaning if there is land for sale acrosse the street you don't own that land. there.Back to my area if a developer came along and said we want to build 4 condos at 30 floors each as long as there are good enough roads i will have no issues with that even if it was right behind my house.If we have this mind set we should have no tall building what will happen is urban sprawl would be far far worse aslo in the core sure you would not have 30 floor buildings but you would have 6-10 buildings in areas now how is that better then one building.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #102  
Old Posted Jan 22, 2012, 8:56 PM
waterloowarrior's Avatar
waterloowarrior waterloowarrior is offline
National Capital Region
 
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: Eastern Ontario
Posts: 9,243
Recommended land use concept to be presented to the NCC Board on 25 Jan (Wednesday) http://www.canadascapital.gc.ca/site...web_agenda.pdf
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #103  
Old Posted Jan 25, 2012, 9:30 PM
kevinbottawa kevinbottawa is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: May 2010
Location: Toronto
Posts: 2,229
NCC proposes massive Greenbelt expansion

Great news for people who love greenspace.

Quote:
NCC proposes massive Greenbelt expansion
By Mohammed Adam, The Ottawa Citizen January 25, 2012 1:08 PM


OTTAWA — The National Capital Commission is proposing a massive expansion of the Greenbelt in a report presented Wednesday to the agency’s board.

The NCC wants to add 2,400 hectares to the existing Greenbelt.

In a news release the commission said that it believes the “Greenbelt is still relevant and continues to definitely pay dividends by safeguarding forests, fields, streams and wetlands and species, and by filtering our air, cleansing our water, and moving towards sustainable agriculture.”

The proposal offers a 50-year vision for the Greenbelt. Among the proposals, the NCC wants to:

• Enhance Natural Environment as the primary Greenbelt role in order to contribute to the sustainability and quality of life in Canada’s Capital Region.

• Expand natural areas within the Greenbelt by adding 2,400 hectares of lands adjacent to the Greenbelt.

• Promote Sustainable Agriculture practices and opportunities to provide economic returns now and for future generations.

• Dedicate 23 per cent or 770 hectares of former rural lands within the Greenbelt to Sustainable Agriculture for at total of about 5,800 hectares characterized by small-scale operations of varied crops and livestock. The agency says these would be community gardens, market gardens, pick-your-own operations, more and mixed livestock).

• Connect the Greenbelt to significant Ottawa natural features such as Carp Hills, South March Highlands and the Cumberland Forest and across the Ottawa River to protected lands within the City of Gatineau such as agricultural reserve lands, Gatineau Park and McLaurin Bay.

• Connect the Greenbelt Pathway and trails to the Capital Pathway Network to provide varied recreation destinations to experience landscapes, natural areas and farms.

• No new non-federal facilities will be permitted in the Greenbelt.

© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen
Read more: http://www.ottawacitizen.com/life/pr...#ixzz1kVYJQ5oz
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #104  
Old Posted Jan 26, 2012, 5:57 AM
Uhuniau Uhuniau is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 7,980
Quote:
Originally Posted by kevinbottawa View Post
Great news for people who love greenspace.
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/life/proposes+massive+Greenbelt+expansion/6050145/story.html#ixzz1kVYJQ5oz[/url]
Shitty news for people who even remotely like cities.

Sigh.

Will the goddamn green space fetish ever die?
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #105  
Old Posted Jan 26, 2012, 9:03 PM
eternallyme eternallyme is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2009
Posts: 5,243
Also bad news for landowners inside the Greenbelt.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #106  
Old Posted Jan 27, 2012, 12:00 AM
waterloowarrior's Avatar
waterloowarrior waterloowarrior is offline
National Capital Region
 
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: Eastern Ontario
Posts: 9,243
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #107  
Old Posted Jan 27, 2012, 4:51 AM
KHOOLE KHOOLE is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2010
Posts: 281
Green Belt does not have to be a belt

I was in the audience at the last NCC Board meeting.
I was impressed with Board member Adel Ayab who bluntly said that the Green Belt does not have to be a belt and told the CEO Marie Lemay and others that since the NCC does presently not have the $$$ to buy land that it has under study, it should contemplate selling some off so that it can have cash in their piggy bank. That didn't go well with Lemay. The term that Ayab used was that the NCC has to be "imaginative"
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #108  
Old Posted Jan 27, 2012, 2:54 PM
kevinbottawa kevinbottawa is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: May 2010
Location: Toronto
Posts: 2,229
I'm very optimistic about the future of Ottawa except when it comes to the NCC.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #109  
Old Posted Jan 27, 2012, 2:59 PM
reidjr reidjr is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2009
Posts: 1,237
Quote:
Originally Posted by kevinbottawa View Post
I'm very optimistic about the future of Ottawa except when it comes to the NCC.
I know some people have issues with the Ncc and yes its not perfect but if we were to do away with them Ottawa would have to take over all the work they do not only would the city have to hire alot more people they budget would have to increase big time.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #110  
Old Posted Jan 27, 2012, 5:29 PM
umbria27's Avatar
umbria27 umbria27 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: Ottawa
Posts: 287
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dado View Post
Thanks.

Just so everyone knows what we're talking about, here are a few Google Earth screens of the region west of Amsterdam, the western Ottawa region and the Rotterdam-The Hague region at approximately the same scale.

<snip>

Btw, the land uses near Westland and Lansingerland are greenhouses. If we've got all this prime agricultural land in the "centre" of our city, perhaps we should start farming it seriously rather than growing crops of corn and hay. What other city in North America (other than Detroit...) has such an opportunity to grow high value crops within its borders with enough labour nearby to make intensive agriculture viable?
This is a very good point. Those farms should be more than placeholders, protecting the land from development. They should be feeding the city.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #111  
Old Posted Jan 27, 2012, 5:33 PM
Ramako's Avatar
Ramako Ramako is offline
Moderator
 
Join Date: Nov 2008
Location: Toronto
Posts: 4,409
Quote:
Originally Posted by Uhuniau View Post
Shitty news for people who even remotely like cities.

Sigh.

Will the goddamn green space fetish ever die?
In Toronto, the greenbelt turned out to be a huge boon for city-lovers because it forced development to intensify upward rather than sprawl outward in suburbs.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #112  
Old Posted Jan 27, 2012, 5:51 PM
umbria27's Avatar
umbria27 umbria27 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: Ottawa
Posts: 287
Quote:
Originally Posted by Uhuniau View Post
Shitty news for people who even remotely like cities.

Sigh.

Will the goddamn green space fetish ever die?
I don't see what you seeing to object to in the Green space expansion. It seems to be based on sound concepts, identifying significant natural areas and connecting them with ecological corridors. This is different than just taking a protractor out and drawing concentric circles to define an artificial barrier. It's creating a barrier to development where there are natural areas worth protecting.

We don't have to choose between green space and cities. They reinforce each other. As other posters have noted, limiting the areas into which a city can sprawl puts pressure on developers to intensify where they are allowed to develop. Obviously this doesn't happen automatically. We have to defend those natural areas on one side and promote the intensification on the other.

The NCC seems to be slowly moving beyond the "belt" in greenbelt and if they can find the flexibility to sell some farmland near Bayshore to buy huge tracts of the Marlborough Forest or the South March Highlands, that's a good thing.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #113  
Old Posted Jan 27, 2012, 5:52 PM
Dado's Avatar
Dado Dado is offline
National Capital Region
 
Join Date: Jul 2007
Location: Ottawa, Canada
Posts: 2,521
Quote:
Originally Posted by Uhuniau View Post
Shitty news for people who even remotely like cities.

Sigh.

Will the goddamn green space fetish ever die?
Take a look at the map that waterloowarrior posted (or the one in the Citizen on Thursday).

A lot of the proposed additions to the Greenbelt will not have any effect on development potential whatsoever, like the great chunk north of Shirley's Bay and another pair of large parcels around Mer Bleue, since these are effectively undevelopable anyway (some are even already in provincial hands).

A further large chunk located in the southwest west of Hwy 416 around Fallowfield is somewhere, quite frankly, no one has any business contemplating development for the simple reason that it is nowhere near any existing or planned rapid transit corridors. Most of the rest of the additions are bits and pieces here and there, the only real exceptions being those south of the Airport near Leitrim (these last I have my doubts that they will actually end up being acquired).

In other words, for the most part, this will make not a fig of difference. It's not going to make anyone's commutes longer, it's not going to reduce development opportunities, and it's not "shitty news for people who even remotely like cities".

What actually is shitty is the fact that we keep adding farmland to the urban boundary and then developing the same old asphalt-and-grass-intensive segregated-use suburbia on top of it.
__________________
Ottawa's quasi-official motto: "It can't be done"
Ottawa's quasi-official ethos: "We have a process to follow"
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #114  
Old Posted Jan 27, 2012, 7:37 PM
KHOOLE KHOOLE is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2010
Posts: 281
Put fingers through the belt

I agree with Umbria's :
"The NCC seems to be slowly moving beyond the "belt" in greenbelt and if they can find the flexibility to sell some farmland near Bayshore to buy huge tracts of the Marlborough Forest or the South March Highlands, that's a good thing."
The NCC should get rid of Greber's mindset of a green belt to contain urbanization. That was an ideal concept 60 years ago that has since been proven wrong because Greber, as well as everyone else in the world, was not a clairvoyant and had no idea about how the world would turn out in our millennium. The same goes for the NCC today as it tries to plan for 2067.
What the NCC can do and should do though, is to identify and acquire the natural areas that would connect with the ecological corridors in eastern Ontario and western Quebec. The emphasis should no longer be Ottawa as a capital city but Ottawa as a national capital region. We are long past the concept of Sunday afternoon scenic drives on the Driveway beside the canal or to the island park midway on the Champlain Bridge.
The role of the NCC should also be to go beyond bicycle paths and to facilitate mobility within the area. The belt should be breached to facilitate transit and create neighbourhoods on a human scale. Small scale farming and gardening sounds good but so did Greber’s belt to contain the city. These areas should now accommodate outdoor activities in a natural setting.
NCC’s 2067 and Greenbelt plans should be “blue and green” to protect and use the waterways, their tributaries and adjoining ecological corridors surrounded by their natural features as well as their flora and fauna that mother nature has bestowed upon us.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #115  
Old Posted Jan 28, 2012, 12:09 AM
eternallyme eternallyme is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2009
Posts: 5,243
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ramako View Post
In Toronto, the greenbelt turned out to be a huge boon for city-lovers because it forced development to intensify upward rather than sprawl outward in suburbs.
Which, in turn, forces people to commute from places really far away like Barrie and Kitchener, or have to pay an arm and a leg for houses, more than almost any other non-coastal city.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #116  
Old Posted Jan 28, 2012, 9:01 PM
Uhuniau Uhuniau is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 7,980
Quote:
Originally Posted by KHOOLE View Post
Green Belt does not have to be a belt
Greenblobs?

Greenblots?

Greenblight!
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #117  
Old Posted Jan 28, 2012, 9:03 PM
Uhuniau Uhuniau is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 7,980
Quote:
Originally Posted by reidjr View Post
I know some people have issues with the Ncc and yes its not perfect but if we were to do away with them Ottawa would have to take over all the work they do not only would the city have to hire alot more people they budget would have to increase big time.
Most of the "work" the NCC does is pointless featherbedding.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #118  
Old Posted Jan 28, 2012, 9:04 PM
Uhuniau Uhuniau is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 7,980
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ramako View Post
In Toronto, the greenbelt turned out to be a huge boon for city-lovers because it forced development to intensify upward rather than sprawl outward in suburbs.
It has done no such thing.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #119  
Old Posted Jan 28, 2012, 9:12 PM
Uhuniau Uhuniau is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 7,980
Quote:
Originally Posted by umbria27 View Post
I don't see what you seeing to object to in the Green space expansion. It seems to be based on sound concepts, identifying significant natural areas
That's just it.

If the Greenbelt was about protecting significant natural areas, that would be one thing. But very little of the Greenbelt has any special natural significance. The vast majority of it is ecologically indistuinguishable from the places on the fringes of Orleans and Barrhaven and Kanata and Stittsville that are being ploughed under for residential and commercial sprawl (I'd add industrial to the list, but there ain't any).

Quote:
It's creating a barrier to development where there are natural areas worth protecting.
Bingo. Where there are natural areas worth protecting. What is so special about the cornfields that separate Barrhaven from Nepean?

Quote:
We don't have to choose between green space and cities. They reinforce each other.
No, they don't. The Greenbelt as constituted, and as made sacred by generations of unthinking greenspace fetishism, has accellerated and enhanced sprawl, made the sprawlurbs into unplaces, helped ensure they can't be retrofitted into anything urban, and added significantly to private and public costs in Ottawa.

The Greenbelt is an environmental and economic monstrosity.

Quote:
As other posters have noted, limiting the areas into which a city can sprawl puts pressure on developers to intensify where they are allowed to develop.
If that's the goal of the Brownbelt, it needs to be about 30 miles wide. It isn't. Intensification, to the pathetic extent it's happening at all, is economic pressure, not Brownbelt-induced. And if the city or province are serious about intensification, which they aren't, they would adopt (or allow) some more strenuous policies about land use, street layouts, use-segregation, and urban design. The Brownbelt only encourages more of the same suburban crap that Ottawa's been infested with since the baby boomers started popping out.

Quote:
The NCC seems to be slowly moving beyond the "belt" in greenbelt and if they can find the flexibility to sell some farmland near Bayshore
NOT SELL SACRED GREEN SPACE???!?!!?!!??
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #120  
Old Posted Jan 28, 2012, 9:14 PM
Uhuniau Uhuniau is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 7,980
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dado View Post
A lot of the proposed additions to the Greenbelt will not have any effect on development potential whatsoever, like the great chunk north of Shirley's Bay and another pair of large parcels around Mer Bleue, since these are effectively undevelopable anyway (some are even already in provincial hands).
In which case, the NCC should do the easiest thing: nothing.

Quote:
In other words, for the most part, this will make not a fig of difference. It's not going to make anyone's commutes longer, it's not going to reduce development opportunities, and it's not "shitty news for people who even remotely like cities".
Anything that promotes, preserves, and enhances Ottawa's green space fetish is shitty news for urbanists.

Quote:
What actually is shitty is the fact that we keep adding farmland to the urban boundary and then developing the same old asphalt-and-grass-intensive segregated-use suburbia on top of it.
Let's add lots of farmland to the urban boundary: the inconsequental, ecologically insignificant farmland currently tied up as "Greenbelt". And let anyone develop it who is willing to develop it in an urban, not a craptacular suburban, form.
Reply With Quote
     
     
This discussion thread continues

Use the page links to the lower-right to go to the next page for additional posts
 
 
Reply

Go Back   SkyscraperPage Forum > Regional Sections > Canada > Ontario > Ottawa-Gatineau > Urban, Urban Design & Heritage Issues
Forum Jump


Thread Tools
Display Modes

Forum Jump


All times are GMT. The time now is 11:14 AM.

     
SkyscraperPage.com - Archive - Privacy Statement - Top

Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.