{"id":10444,"date":"2015-04-22T17:27:48","date_gmt":"2015-04-22T21:27:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=10444"},"modified":"2015-04-22T17:27:48","modified_gmt":"2015-04-22T21:27:48","slug":"redevelopment-will-bring-parks-naturalization-to-water-courses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/redevelopment-will-bring-parks-naturalization-to-water-courses\/","title":{"rendered":"Redevelopment will bring parks, \u201cnaturalization\u201d to water courses"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

If the redevelopment of Highland Gate Golf Course ultimately moves forward as presented, it will bring approximately 50 acres of trails and green space into the community fold.<\/p>\n

This was the message delivered at last week\u2019s public open house, which attracted hundreds of residents not just from the Highland Gate community, but Aurorans from all corners of the Town.<\/p>\n

According to Mark Schollen, landscape architect retained by the partners to redevelop the course, approximately half of the 100 acre site will be up for parks and recreation, including a central park area of about 20 acres.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we started to design the plan, we looked at all the recreational amenities around the area to get an idea of what was missing so that we could build those components into our plan,\u201d he said. \u201cAs part of that process, we also spoke to representatives of the Town of Aurora to get an idea of what they thought was missing as well. We have developed a plan that includes many amenities that won\u2019t be found elsewhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

While trails can be found across Aurora, the proposed redevelopment will help bridge a few gaps as far as off-road transportation is concerned. Approximately eight kilometres of trails \u2013 over half of which will be off roads \u2013 is included in the planning envelope.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt will realise the plan of including a connected trail system from Bathurst Street to Yonge Street that will link transit and provide a larger trail network for residents [town-wide] to get to Sheppard\u2019s Bush, shopping on Yonge Street, and the like,\u201d said Mr. Schollen.<\/p>\n

Outside of the realm of parks and recreation, the partnership has been working with the Lake Simcoe Region Conservation Area (LSRCA) to improve surrounding watercourses in the area. To achieve their infill goal of building nearly 150 homes on the existing golf course lands, a number of ponds will have to be filled up and this, said Mr. Schollen, was something welcomed by the LSRCA.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was done primarily as an aspiration of the LSRC as a means to improve fish habitat,\u201d he said. \u201cRight now those ponds are contained by weirs and those weirs are barriers to fishing upstream and downstream.\u201d<\/p>\n

This view was bolstered by Mayor Geoff Dawe, chair of the LSRCA, who said there was a \u201cconservation goal to re-channelize that area\u201d near Sunrise Assisted Living to address issues particularly surrounding a nearby pond, where excessive sedimentation has resulted in flooding of surrounding properties. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey want to see those ponds removed and water courses naturalized and protected and allowed to run free flowing without having to go through a pond, and you have the problems associated with that,\u201d said Cheryl Shindruk, Vice President of Geranium Corporation, underscoring the Mayor\u2019s point about sedimentation. \u201c[These problems also include] the change of temperature. Water courses that feed those ponds will be protected. There will be buffers established on either side of the course so the habitat for small critters and fish habitat, more importantly, is maintained and protected.\u201d<\/p>\n

While some residents raised concerns about trails coming through the lands, particularly half of which will be on sidewalks, they also questioned the wisdom of filling in some of the ponds. While the residents conceded the ponds in question were not \u201cnatural\u201d, many having been built by the course owners in the interwar years, they had become \u201cnaturalised\u201d in the intervening decades, providing habitat for ducks, birds, frogs, and other creatures. <\/p>\n

Others didn\u2019t see the parkland dedication slated for the development as a generous gesture.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt sounds very nice you have us 28 acres of parks, we appreciate that, but how much of this park is because you can\u2019t build a house,\u201d said one woman, pointing to area wetlands. \u201cYou want maximum profit for your organization and that is the truth.\u201d
\nNot so, according to Ms. Shindruk.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of the green space to be conveyed to the Town is not buildable, some of it is buildable,\u201d she said. \u201cIn order to satisfy our parkland dedication requirements by the Planning Act, we have to convey land that is otherwise buildable and we have exceeded that requirement.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If the redevelopment of Highland Gate Golf Course ultimately moves forward as presented, it will bring approximately 50 acres of trails and green space into the community fold.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-2Is","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-13 15:18:08","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10444"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10444\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}