{"id":23879,"date":"2019-05-31T12:57:29","date_gmt":"2019-05-31T16:57:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=23879"},"modified":"2019-05-31T12:57:38","modified_gmt":"2019-05-31T16:57:38","slug":"wildlife-park-could-be-ready-for-first-visitors-by-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wildlife-park-could-be-ready-for-first-visitors-by-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"Wildlife Park could be ready for first visitors by 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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

Aurora\u2019s long-gestating wildlife preserve could be ready to welcome its\nfirst visitors by 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Council is set to approve a further $1 million towards its completion\nthis week, which will see construction on Phase One of the Ivy Jay Nature\nReserve begin next month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This first phase will include the construction of three kilometres worth\nof at-grade trails, several raised boardwalks overtop of marshland, two lookout\nstations and one bridge. The estimated cost for Phase One is expected to be a\ntotal of $2.6 million.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cConstruction works within the wildlife park were intended to be phased\nin over a number of years, to be determined at the point of near completion, of\nthe detailed design phase,\u201d said Sarah Tienkamp, Aurora\u2019s Manager of Parks and\nFleet, in her report to Council. \u201cAccordingly, funding has been allocated for\n$1 million per year for a total of $5 million in the 10 Year Capital Plan 2017\n\u2013 2021. To date, Council has approved $2 million with $1 million allocated in\nboth the 2017 and 2018 Capital Budget. The funds allocated to the 2019 Capital\nBudget will provide a total budget of $3 million with an additional $2 million\nto be considered in the 2020 and 2021 Capital Budget.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Aurora Community Wildlife Park has been the subject of many names\nsince its inception, but has been guided by the same core vision originally\nproposed by Aurora-based landscape architect David Tomlinson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr. Tomlinson has been an active proponent of the wildlife park for over\ntwenty years, with Council endorsing his original proposal in 1998.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since that time, land has been required to make it a reality. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The parkland is a large swath of grasslands, marsh and wetlands\nbisecting two housing developments between Aurora\u2019s 2B and 2C developments, as\ncan be seen on the north side of Wellington Street East roughly between\nMavrinac Boulevard and Elyse Court near the Stronach Aurora Recreation Complex.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDavid Tomlinson had a vision for a community wildlife park after many\nyears of studying the flora and fauna of Aurora,\u201d said Ms. Tienkamp. \u201cHe\napproached the Town with the idea of establishing a community wildlife park\nand, in 1998, Council endorsed the proposal. Since then, land acquisition has\noccurred, development agreements negotiated, and many studies have been\ncompleted.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That, however, was just the beginning of a long and winding road which\nsaw Mr. Tomlinson\u2019s proposal dissected in detail by Council before it became\nbogged down with the Lake Simcoe Region Conservation Authority (LSRCA) on\nwhether the area should have online or offline ponds; an online pond being one\nconnected to a natural river, creek or stream.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn progressing through the detailed design process and consultation\nwith the LSRCA, it was noted by LSRCA that their policies do not support online\nponds within natural stream systems and floodplains. The detailed design for\nthe wetland component is in the process of being revised to reflect the\ncreation of offline ponds, with additional negotiation required with the LSRCA\nto address their policies and conditions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the Committee level last Tuesday, Council tentatively approved this\nyear\u2019s $1 million contribution to the plan, which was approved conditionally at\nbudget time. This decision is expected to be ratified at this week\u2019s Council\nmeeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During last week\u2019s discussion, Councillors requested the latest\niteration of the Wildlife Park design, which Ms. Tienkamp said \u201cclosely\nfollows\u201d Mr. Tomlinson\u2019s original plan for the park, with some realignment of\npathways due to on-site conditions. She assured Council, however, that they are\nfollowing Mr. Tomlinson\u2019s original vision. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Among those with questions was Councillor Wendy Gaertner who underscored\nthe sensitivity of the lands in question. Top of mind, she said, was allowing\nthe public access to the park but, at the same time, ensuring members of the\npublic don\u2019t wander through and disturb sensitive wildlife habitat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ms. Tienkamp responded that plans have trails meandering primarily\nthrough the eastern portion of the Park with some side trails allowing\nconnectivity to developments on the west side, all of which are on the\nperimeter of ponds, \u201cSet back as far as possible\u2026per David\u2019s vision.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are out for\ntender currently for the first phase, which is construction of the pathways and\nthe boardwalk component,\u201d she said. \u201cThat will be starting construction in June\nand we hope to have most of that construction done by the end of 2019. There\nmight be as little bit more carryover into 2020, and then in 2020 we hope to go\nout for the pond construction. Some of the pathways will be able to be accessed\nin 2020 by the public.\u201d<\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aurora\u2019s long-gestating wildlife preserve could be ready to welcome its first visitors by 2020.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_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},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23879","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\/p3D2k4-6d9","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-25 06:06:26","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\/23879","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=23879"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23879\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}