Nelson Landing developer to get audience with council
By Nelson Daily Editor
By Timothy Schafer, The Nelson Daily
The developer of a project for Nelson’s east waterfront has requested a special audience with City council today to present two options on the proposal.
Dave Sorensen of Sorensen Fine Homes has asked for time (3:30 p.m. in council chambers) to present information on the two development concepts he has for the former Kootenay Forest Products land.
One proposal would put four houses with a strip of land between them and Red Sands Beach — one of the pieces of property which has inflamed passions in some sectors of the city — and the other does not include the four houses.
In an agenda sent out late last week, council has granted Sorensen’s request for a special meeting to deal with the next layer in his rezoning application for the project called Nelson Landing.
The meeting is open to the public, as is the following committee of the whole meeting at 7 p.m. in council chambers.
The project is a proposed 150-unit housing development — containing a hotel (110 units), small conference centre and 26 commercial units on a 12.5-acre parcel of land.
There would also be a marina included in the scope of the project, as well as public amenities such as a public waterfront walkway and public access to Red Sands Beach.
Sorensen has said in the past he has made changes to the plan — removing a single family home and triplex on either side of the beach — to give the popular Red Sands Beach and its users more space to breathe.
However, an eight-space parking lot and a 600-square-foot picnic building are expected to replace the two omitted structures. As well, four triplexes are to be built just below the beach, an area now zoned by the City for park and open use space — requiring a rezone decision by city council.
For more information on the project, see http://www.nelsonlanding.com/
Seeing red on Red Sands Beach
It is the inclusion of Red Sands Beach — the city’s unofficial, clothing-optional beach — that has kicked sand in the face of some of the city’s denizens.
There are two main things they believe in, the first of which is to refuse any rezoning of areas J and K (presently zoned as park and open space).
“Many Nelsonites would feel a tragic loss if this gets pushed through without proper public input,” Herb Couch, one of the organizers of the Save Red Sands movement, previously said.
“The citizens of Nelson have been excluded. We are suspicious because we’ve seen this before, where (the City) gets everything in order, then the public gets to see it and sort of rubberstamp it.”
He said the rezoning and development process for the East end of the city has hardly been open, transparent and democratic, with the City working behind closed doors with the developer, Sorensen Fine Homes, for the last two years.
