Council wraps up discussion on Regional Plan
Posted Dec 11, 2013 07:39:27 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
It took two marathon sessions over two weeks, including six hours of debate yesterday, but Halifax council has finally wrapped up talks around HRM’s regional plan.
It comes after extensive review of the five year old plan.
Council made its way through 29 recommendations that make up the building blocks of HRM’s future.
One issue that took up a considerable amount of time was the definition of suburban and regional center in respect to growth targets.
Councillor Linda Mosher tabled a motion to have a staff report done to look at those definitions.
“I’m not looking at greatly enhancing the boundary but when something is literally across the street and we’re looking at meeting targets, in my opinion those meeting targets,” she says. “We want people to be on a bus route, we want to be able to go on our new trails, and we want people to be able to walk across the street to get their groceries.”
She says as it’s defined now, growth targets in suburban areas are artificially inflated, making it seem like HRM isn’t meeting certain targets.
Councillors approved this motion along with all amendments made to the regional plan and staff will come back to council in the New Year with a polished version.
