It’s not over! It is now more important than ever for you, as a resident in our neighbourhood, to make your views known to City Council. Thursday September 19 @ 7 pm is the date of the public hearing to determine the fate of the 388 Machleary Street development site.
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NOCA has done its best to represent the views of residents who participated in our community meetings in 2017, 2018 and our survey in March/April 2019. Your input has informed our position. NOCA opposes the precedent-setting changes required in Nanaimo’s community and neighbourhood plans and zoning bylaw to enable the Molnar Group’s proposed 175 unit development (in three 4 – 5 storey apartment-style buildings and 15 town homes) to proceed. NOCA’s position is:
- The land use designation for the 388 Machleary site must not be changed from “neighbourhood” to “corridor” to allow density that is 9 times that of the surrounding neighbourhood and 3 times what the majority of survey respondents supported and the maximum the current OCP supports.
- We support rezoning the site for residential use, as opposed to the current “Community Service” use.
- We support a moderate increase in density for the site, in comparison to that of the surrounding neighbourhood. NOCA has suggested a mix of duplex, four-plex, town homes and cluster housing to a maximum of 58 dwellings on the site. According to our survey results, there might be support for up to 75 units on the site.
- We believe the Official Community Plan and Old City Neighbourhood Concept Plan (and the processes that led to those plans) must be respected in the scale of changes made to permit residential use on the site.
- NOCA welcomes more people living in the Old City. However, the addition of 175 “families” on this one site is problematic in terms of traffic flow on roads meant for local traffic and overflow/on-street parking from the development. These will adversely affect the day-to-day movement of the entire surrounding street blocks between Fitzwilliam and Albert Streets.
- We question the entire process that allows a change of this magnitude to be initiated by a developer and facilitated by City Staff (and potentially, Mayor and Council) without an official review and conversation about the vision for this site and the neighbourhood as a whole.
- NOCA will be asking City Council to either: reject the amendments brought forward by the Molnar Group and not pass 3rd reading; OR put the development proposal on hold and enter into a community engagement process with the neighbourhood to define what is appropriate for this property; OR put the development proposal on hold until the OCP review (to begin in late Fall 2019) is completed and the level of density desirable for the site is determined.
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What do YOU want to say to Mayor and Council? You have your chance at the Public Hearing on September 19. Make your voice heard!
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