City staff members are still looking for public input on the new draft zoning bylaw being developed for Greater Sudbury.
A public meeting is happening June 1, at 5:30 p.m. during the regular planning meeting of city council at Tom Davies Square. Public consultations were held across the city in February and the June 1 meeting will be the last chance the public has to comment on changes to city bylaws being proposed by city staff.
The intent is to reduce the number of bylaws in place and to streamline the process by which new residential or commercial usages are permitted in various sections of the city, including the outlying areas.
Art Potvin, manager of the city’s development services, said he had been receiving input from city councillors and the public as a new draft zoning bylaw was being developed. Potvin said he hoped city council would approve the new bylaw by late summer.
One issue that has been brought up by citizens has been the siting of rooming and boarding houses —potentially for students — in medium density housing zones nearby residential areas in the city.
“The draft bylaw that was printed at the beginning of May would have allowed rooming houses and boarding houses in all R3, R3-1 and R4 (medium density) zones,” Potvin said. “Under our existing bylaw, (rooming and boarding houses) are only permitted in the downtown of Sudbury, the C-8 zone, and in certain site specific zones.
“There is a need for student housing. That came up a few years ago. We were looking for what opportunities there are for this kind of housing than just the downtown. We thought, (put them in) medium density residential, where we allow apartments.”
But Potvin said staff members changed their mind about the proposed bylaw regarding rooming and boarding houses, after attending meetings and listening to concerns from the public.
“We heard what the issues are. What we will now recommend to the planning committee is that we allow them in the downtown, the new C-6 zone (formerly C-8), and in the R3, R3-1 and R4 zones, where those zones abut primary arterial roads (i.e. the Kingsway) and certain major corridors.”
These would be properties that butt against Lasalle Boulevard between Notre Dame Avenue and Falconbridge Highway, Regent Street between Paris Street and Lorne Street, and Barrydowne Road between the Kingsway and Lasalle Boulevard.
Potvin said there are a lot of illegal student rooming and boarding houses in New Sudbury.
“We have a lot of problems in the past few years of students filling up single-family homes, purchased by outside interests, and then filling them with students, quite often in unsafe conditions, that do not meet minimum fire safety standards,” he said.
But scaling down the opportunity for more student housing across the city is not necessarily a good thing, Potvin added.
“We are the northeastern Ontario centre for higher learning but we don’t want the students? I don’t think that is the answer. We want to create some opportunities for student housing but not in established neighbourhoods.”
Denis de Laplante, a retired realtor, claimed victory as the public consultations unfolded. He said he and his neighbours were concerned over the possibility of student housing being allowed near their New Sudbury neighbourhood, in the Montrose Avenue area.
He said pressure from citizens forced city planning staff to back off from allowing rooming and boarding houses being approved in multiple residential zones areas, that are adjacent to established residential neighbourhoods. He has been working with his New Sudbury neighbours in a group called Citizens Against Rooming and Boarding (CARB).
The group alerted citizens, through a door-to-door campaign, to the possibility that 1,000 students could be housed beside the neighbourhood. De Laplante said the area has 289 housing units approved which, if each contained three bedrooms, could accommodate almost 1,000 students.
“One thousand students in a good neighbourhood like this are 1,000 too many when you consider the partying that will go on, the garbage strewn around, the noise, the disturbances, not to mention the increase in traffic and parking problems,” he added.
“The issue is the introduction of rooming and boarding houses into a residential area. This a commercial use and always has been.”
But Potvin, said there is little likelihood student housing would be permitted in the area, when there is a predominance of single family homes there and the developer — Dalron — does not have a history of building student housing.
The second option staff are proposing is the status quo.
Once de Laplante heard this change was to be posted May 21 on the city’s website, he said this meant victory.
Potvin said until a new draft bylaw is approved by city council, it has no legal status. That could take until the late summer, he said.
