{"id":16619,"date":"2017-02-22T17:28:28","date_gmt":"2017-02-22T22:28:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=16619"},"modified":"2017-02-22T17:28:28","modified_gmt":"2017-02-22T22:28:28","slug":"up-for-sale-canadian-tire-proposes-dividing-old-store-into-three-units","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/up-for-sale-canadian-tire-proposes-dividing-old-store-into-three-units\/","title":{"rendered":"Up for sale, Canadian Tire proposes dividing old store into three units"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

From another big box store, to town houses, and even a condo, speculation has been rife over the future of the former Canadian Tire store in south Aurora since the retailer moved from Yonge Street to Bayview Avenue.
\nBut, a proposal to turn the store into three smaller stores and pave the way for a drive-thru and other uses on the property raised eyebrows in nearby neighbourhoods and around the Council table.
\nCouncil has delayed a decision on a zoning amendment application for the property filed by Canadian Tire after area residents spoke out about potential noise, traffic and property maintenance, among other concerns. The property in question is now up for sale and that potential change of status was something of a game changer.
\nThe deferral, which carried 5 \u2013 4, will allow Council more time to get answers on these remaining concerns of local homeowners, they argued.
\n\u201cI think it would be unwise to give any zoning changes before we know what the new owner is going to do with the property,\u201d said Councillor Wendy Gaertner, responding to comments from Councillor Michael Thompson that it might be a good idea for the purchasers of the property to come before Council with the same application.
\nCiting residents\u2019 worries over noise and light pollution, she added: \u201cAt the end of the day, we have to keep in mind we have residents backing onto the property. It really is a quality of life issue for these residents.\u201d
\nTuesday\u2019s Council meeting delivered elected officials \u201ca significant amount of information\u201d for the first time that needed to be digested before making a decision, argued Councillor Thompson.
\nAlso in favour of a deferral until the end of June was Mayor Geoff Dawe who said it was his \u201cunderstanding that Canadian Tire is essentially testing the water.\u201d
\nOthers, however, said the application was merely a change in commercial zoning already in place. Councillor Paul Pirri, for instance, said it would be a different story if whoever purchases the Canadian Tire land, which was formally under the ownership of Sterling Drugs, came forward with a plan for condominiums or townhouses.
\n\u201cWe\u2019re not talking about allowing for things that are outrageous,\u201d said Councillor Pirri. \u201cA lot of the same issues that have existed in the past will continue to exist: issues around garbage collection that existed when it was a Canadian Tire. That is not a new issue that is arising from these changes. What would be the ramifications of turning this down, as we have all sat around the table to say we are turning it down because the property owner is looking to sell, and we\u2019re not looking at the planning merits of this change? We\u2019re looking at the circumstances around the application, but we\u2019re not actually looking at the application itself.
\n\u201cI think we will have more of a discussion [if] someone buys this property and puts in more of a townhome complex or condos that are abutting Yonge Street. Definitely there is more work to be done and conversations to be had, but that is not what this is talking about.\u201d
\nCouncillor Sandra Humfryes said she agreed and Council should have made a decision on February 14. Aurora is growing, she said, and it is important to \u201cthink out of the box\u201d in terms of how to address growth. Councillor John Abel also offered a similar perspective.
\n\u201cI think the information is right here,\u201d he said. \u201cI really think our role is to try and promote business, try and encourage business, try and attract development. We\u2019re really trying to take a place that is currently empty at the south end of Town and attract some commercial investment\u2026allowing it to be divided into three big shops, which is what we see with Winners and other places. We had a good discussion, we did walk with the neighbours and those things have been addressed.
\n\u201cI think [deferral] sends the wrong message. We shouldn\u2019t be involved in what a property owner has to do except for the zoning and away they go. We\u2019re trying to encourage that. We get assessment and away we go. Should we feel uneasy because someone is putting a property up for sale? I don\u2019t think so. I think that is business. The concerns that were brought forward, the director said would be addressed with any site plan application because it is on record and those are our concerns.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From another big box store, to town houses, and even a condo, speculation has been rife over the future of the former Canadian Tire store in south Aurora since the retailer moved from Yonge Street to Bayview Avenue.
\nBut, a proposal to turn the store into three smaller stores and pave the way for a drive-thru and other uses on the property raised eyebrows in nearby neighbourhoods and around the Council table. <\/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-16619","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\/p3D2k4-4k3","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-14 09:05:59","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\/16619","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=16619"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16619\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16619"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16619"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16619"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}