Grids 2 and more - Hamilton intensifies

NRU
Sept. 27, 2017
By Dominik Matusik

Hamilton staff is reviewing the city's growth management strategy at the same time it undertakes its comprehensive review to guide the city's growth until 2041.

In 2006, Hamilton council adopted GRIDS, an integrated strategy for guiding growth to 2031. Now, staff is looking at creating GRIDS 2, with an outlook towards 2041. Hamilton planning director Steve Robichaud told NRU that a major focus going forward will be working towards conformity with new provincial growth, density, and intensification targets.

"With the provincial plan review, we have to do an update to our municipal plan review," he says. "With the updates to the Greenbelt Plan and Places to Grow, we're working our way through those conformity exercises, making those updates. So those will be major initiatives that will be moving forward in 2018 and 2019."

Meanwhile, Hamilton planners are preoccupied with a number of zoning projects, primarily related to the city's zoning by-law consolidation.

"We're updating our zoning by-law on a chapter-by-chapter basis," Robichaud says. "We did the rural zoning in 2014- 2015. We did the zoning on the LRT corridor last year. Now we're coming forward with the commercial and mixed-use area [zoning]... And then, assuming that council adopts the new commercial mixed-use zoning in October, we'll be moving full force with developing new residential zoning regulations."

Robichaud anticipates the new residential zoning will be complete by early 2019. Staff is also developing a number of secondary plans. Most notably, planners are undertaking a review of the Downtown Hamilton Secondary Plan.

"We have to bring it in line with the provincial urban growth centres and some of those other provincial requirements," Robichaud says. "As well as [provide] a little bit more direction and guidance as it relates to tall buildings. There's been a lot more interest and applications for taller buildings and the current secondary plan didn't envision taller buildings. So that has been part of that update process, as well as providing tall building guidelines. [We are] looking at having discussions around the principle of Section 37 and bonusing, as well as making sure that we've been aligning some of the infrastructure planning work to facilitate those redevelopment opportunities within the downtown."

The city has facilitated a number of redevelopment projects of its own. Of note is the West Harbour redevelopment, for which the city is currently seeking requests of interest, although there are still outstanding OMB appeals to the council-approved draft plan of subdivision and zoning by-law amendments.

Additionally, a redevelopment is underway of the Eastgate Square Shopping Centre in Stoney Creek- through the Centennial Secondary Plan—which will soon be served by the new Confederation GO Train station as well as by the eastern terminus of the LRT corridor. Robichaud says that the city receives, on average, 1,000 development applications each year, a number which has stayed fairly consistent over the last five years. While there has been an increase in the number of high-density and high-rise applications, these are concentrated in the downtown core. Development outside of the core has been less dense, including a considerable number of single-family homes.

Staff presented a report to planning committee September 5, outlining growth trends over the last 10 years under the original GRIDS plan. Background work for GRIDS 2 is currently underway, with staff anticipating bringing forward amendments to Hamilton's official plans in spring 2018.