It was a bit of a surprise to some that there weren’t any delegations opposed to a rezoning application by Armel Corp. for a Costco-anchored commercial development when the proposal came to city council for the first time on June 5. Not surprisingly, though, some opposition is starting to emerge.
Some of the anti-big-box rhetoric in flyers being distributed by two women who live in the Whitelaw Road area seems misplaced. The city’s long Wal-Mart fight proved this. But the two women have understandable concerns about lots more traffic on two-lane Whitelaw Road, which links Highway 24 with the 32-acre site owned by Armel north of Paisley Road and west of Elmira Road.
And there’s another thing they point to that people should note. Namely, Armel’s request that the city not put a cap on the floor space of commercial development at the vacant site, which is next to a commercial development anchored by a big Zehrs. This request – which city planners are considering, but haven’t yet made any recommendations about – seems to go directly against the commercial policy set by council in 2005. That policy set caps on the amount of commercial floor space to go into four mixed-use “nodes” on the western, eastern, northern and southern ends of the city.
Silvercreek Guelph Developments Ltd., which wants to develop the former Lafarge quarry site, was told in 2008 it can’t put more than 245,000 square feet of retail space on its site, down from the 450,000 it originally sought. It has told council it’s concerned about Armel’s no-cap request.
To cap or not to cap? This could be the sleeper issue facing council as it deals with Armel and Costco, which wants to open a store as big as 158,000 square feet in the fall of 2013 on a site bordered on the west by farmers’ fields of Guelph/Eramosa Township.