Which comes first, Nelson Landing or waterfront plan?
By Nelson Daily Editor
By Timothy Schafer, The Nelson Daily
With the Saturday afternoon public meeting on waterfront project Nelson Landing less than one day away, the question of the cart heading down the road before the horse was raised Thursday night at the workshop on the waterfront and downtown master plans, but it was left unanswered.
The City had hired IBI Group of Vancouver to amass and draft a waterfront and downtown master plan, intended to provide a vision for City Hall to link the downtown with the waterfront, and intensify land use by incorporating mixed uses (commercial, residential, industrial, public open space).
But with a proposed 193-unit housing development — containing a hotel (110 units), small conference centre and 26 commercial units on a 12.5-acre parcel of land — heading down through the application process, one man in attendance Thursday night at the Prestige Lakeside Resort for the workshop asked the obvious question.
“Is there any consideration given to the timeline and the completion of your work, and this application for rezoning and development for the Nelson Landing development?” asked Donovan Carter.
IBI’s associate director and the lead on the City’s consulting project, Stuart Jones, said the whole waterfront and downtown master plan process was conceived some time back, with the calendar charted for it months ago.
But he did admit the possibility of the rezoning process for Nelson Landing presented an interesting problem.
“The thing we want to make sure we do, as quickly as possible, is chart a course for the revision of the waterfront so that development can get fed into this process,” he said.
“So what you are saying is that the course will be charted after all of the development is completed?” Carter countered. “And so, therefore, the charted course becomes irrelevant because everything is done?”
“Is there a possibility of having a moratorium on any development until this thing is completed?” asked another workshop attendee, Howie Ross.
Any developer has the right to bring an application forward to council for a project, said city manager Kevin Cormack.
“And council has the ability to slow down the rezoning process,” said City senior planner Dave Wahn. “If they, in their wisdom, want to slow it down until the results of this process are completed, they have every right to do that.
“But we are not there yet to say. That is an option that council can do, not put a moratorium in place, but slow down the process.”
“So there is no obligation to get it done in a timely manner?” Ross asked.
“No,” said Wahn.
“Because that is what we were told during the Kutenai Landing process, that there was an obligation if a developer put in a proposal, there is an obligation for the City to go ahead and put that through in a timely manner,” Ross replied.
The City is working in a timely manner, Wahn said, but if council wanted to take a step back and ask for more information to see how the situation pans out, they have every right to slow it down to do so.
“But it is our job to try and move things through so we are providing good service to the community and the applicant,” Wahn stated.
Carter also raised the questions of the plan not considering the high density area that would be created by Nelson Landing, the traffic it would send through a residential area and the draw of its small business district away from Baker Street and the downtown.
Jones said the questions were addressed in the process, but would be consolidated and summarized and posted on the City’s website at www.nelson.ca.
The workshop was intended to help the City’s Development Services and Sustainability Department define the issues for the two plans, as well as to give background information on the projects, with ideas, drawings and diagrams to be included.
For more information on the City’s downtown and waterfront master plans, please see http://www.nelson.ca/EN/main/services/planning-building-services/sustainability/sustainable-waterfront-and-downtown-master-plan.html.
