Helping shape the new urban vision: conservation authorities updating policies

NRU
July 30, 2014
By Leah Wong

As Ontario municipalities deal with challenges related to intensification, conservation authorities are updating policy documents to help shape that growth with a focus on water and natural resources.

The Toronto and Region Conservation Authority is in the final stages of preparing its Living Cities policy document, which is a consolidation of the 1994 Valley and Stream Corridor Management Program and other strategic documents.

“It’s a comprehensive update to reflect changes in legislation and to articulate our roles and responsibilities,” said TRCA development, planning and policy senior manager Laurie Nelson. “This document was really intended to reflect the breadth of issues, urban, urbanizing and rural within our jurisdiction,” Nelson added.

“It’s not all about protecting the natural eco systems, it’s about embedding ecological design into that new urban vision.”

Many municipalities within TRCA’s jurisdiction including Markham, Richmond Hill and Toronto are intensifying and considering redevelopment of their downtown centres. TRCA planning and development director Carolyn Woodland told NRU, it’s important to help municipalities manage water and natural resources as they intensify.

“We are so developed and urbanized, and there’s a lot of redevelopment, so we felt we also had to update the policies and guidelines around intensification,” said Woodland.

Living Cities includes research on stormwater management guidelines and low impact design technology. It also updates policies about water management, flooding hazards and management of runoff related to intensification in urban areas.

“We want to protect people, so as this development occurs we don’t have areas where flooding has increased,” said Woodland. “With all the climate change focus and severe storms we’re having, we’ve put a lot of emphasis on how to develop - or redevelop, really - in areas where flood remediation and flood hazard protection needs to be updated.”

Lake Simcoe Region Conservation Authority is undergoing a similar policy review. Planning and development director Rob Baldwin told NRU that while the existing watershed policy plan hasn’t undergone a significant review in at least 10 years, over the years there have been incremental changes.

Since the initial plan was written new policies were needed to address issues that have arisen as development has occurred across the region. For example, Baldwin said until two years ago there was no policy for the placement of fill, a hot button topic in the region. Through the review the authority is revising its fill policy.

In addition to addressing development concerns, both policy reviews will clarify the conservation authorities’ functions and lay out the framework for their roles. Previously this had been addressed in separate documents.