Earthwatch: Environmental and conservation news

Escarpment hotspot

by Wendy Francis

Late last year, the Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) issued a decision that paves the way for the largest single development on the Niagara Escarpment since 1975. Castle Glen Developments wants to build more than 1,600 residential units and 300 hotel units, as well as commercial and retail space, and up to three golf courses within the Town of Blue Mountain in Grey County on a 620-hectare tract that spills over the brow of the escarpment.

Located just southeast of Blue Mountain near Collingwood, the area to be developed forms part of the UNESCO World Biosphere Reserve designated zone. The area is more than 70 percent forested, is the source for the headwaters of Silver Creek (the most productive salmon-and trout-spawning river in Georgian Bay) and Black Ash Creek, has two provincially significant wetlands and a significant Area of Natural and Scientific Interest (ANSI), and contains two at-risk species: the hart’s tongue fern and the butternut tree. The Ontario Greenbelt Alliance (of which Ontario Nature is a founding member) has named the area as one of the Top 10 Greenbelt Hotspots under threat from poorly planned development that could destroy significant natural features.

Because initial approvals were granted for Castle Glen’s proposal before the Niagara Escarpment Plan (NEP) came into effect, the proponents have argued that they are “grandfathered” and exempt from the provisions of the NEP.

The Town of Blue Mountain adopted an amendment to its official plan to permit the development to proceed. The Niagara Escarpment Commission voiced a number of concerns, as did a variety of conservation organizations, particularly the Blue Mountain Watershed Trust Foundation.

In December 2006, the OMB decided that the policies contained in the Castle Glen Official Plan are sufficient to protect the natural heritage features of the part of the site that overlaps the escarpment, and that they conform to the NEP and the Grey County Official Plan.

Members of the Blue Mountain Watershed Trust Foundation are appealing to Premier McGuinty and Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing John Gerretsen to implement a minister’s zoning order under the Planning Act. The minister has wide discretion to override municipal planning decisions, in this case reversing the town’s decision to approve the amendment to its official plan. “We are not optimistic that he will or can do it,” says Don Kerr, a director of the Blue Mountain Watershed Trust Foundation, “but we want to raise the issue in the highest places.”

Readers of ON Nature who wish to support this effort can visit Ontario Nature’s home page, where an action alert provides directions for quickly and easily producing a letter asking the premier and the minister to prevent damage to the escarpment’s unique features.