I
live in Caledon, the largest municipality (physically) in the Greater
Toronto Area, and the one with (for now) the smallest population
(70,000, of which 25,000 is in the Town of Bolton, the pink area in the
SE corner of the municipality on the map above). The NE third of
Caledon is part of the Oak Ridges Moraine, the source of most of the
GTA's fresh water and oxygen (much of the Moraine area is tree-covered,
unlike the rest of the GTA). The Oak Ridges Moraine is partially
protected from further development, for now. Roughly the Western third
of Caledon is protected as part of the Niagara Escarpment, a rare and
fragile ecosystem designated a United Nations world biosphere reserve.
The two municipalities South of Caledon (Brampton and Mississauga) are
pro-growth communities (among the fastest-growing in Canada), and by
2021 every acre of these communities will have been developed (i.e. on
the map above, colour them solid pink).
The GTA is one of the
world's fastest-growing urban agglomerations. It accepts over half of
all new Canadian immigrants, and hence accounts for 80% of Ontario's
and 40% of all of Canada's net population growth. The GTA has a current
population of 6 million (half of Ontario's 12 million total). By 2031,
Ontario's population is projected to grow to 18 million (almost
entirely due to new immigration). By 2100, if immigration continues
unabated, Ontario's population will be nearly 50 million. The
provincial government, apparently for political reasons, is assuming
that the GTA's share of this growth will suddenly and inexplicably drop
from 80% to 60%, even though new immigrants have shown no interest in
living elsewhere in Ontario (like all immigrants, they tend to choose
to live with their fellow expatriates, at least until they get
established). So population forecasts for the GTA are deliberately
under-estimated and are far below projections. If 80% of new immigrants
continue to come to the GTA, its population will balloon to nearly 11
million (almost double its current size) by 2031, and, by 2100, to 36
million (six times its current size). And since suburban population
densities are much lower than urban densities, the GTA's physical built-up area will at least triple
by 2031 and increase by a factor of ten by 2100. No city planning
envisions, or is prepared to cope with, this astronomical growth. Just
imagine triple the pink (built up) area in the map above by 2031 and
ten times the pink area by 2100 (the entire area covered by the map,
and half as much again).
That's the future world, and the
current state of denial, in the GTA. We in Caledon are already facing
enormous pressure to accept far more people than the official plan
permits, even though two thirds of the municipality is governed by
Moraine and Escarpment regulations and is not supposed to be developed at all.
In fact, of the one third that is available for development, one third
is designated Greenbelt and the other two thirds is designated
Whitebelt (prime agricultural land, where development is officially
discouraged). So 'officially', no more of Caledon is supposed to be
developed. In spite of this, the Official Plan for Caledon envisions
its population growing from 70,000 to 110,000 by 2031. In other words,
of the nearly five million new GTA residents expected by 2031, Caledon,
the largest GTA community, is expected to accommodate only 40,000, or
1% of them. And even that 1% will have to be put on prime agricultural
land or greenbelt that is officially not supposed to be developed. Are
you getting a picture of a pressure cooker here?
The hapless
municipal government of Caledon, rank amateurs every one, are trying to
walk a fine line to please all the voters and the different government
authorities with their utterly conflicting demands. It's a recipe for
disaster. I can't help feeling that the same recipe is brewing all over
the world.
I've always been active in politics, and I believe
fervently that, especially on environmental matters, local politics is
the future. Despite that, I've washed my hands of our local political
situation -- I've given up, as there is no sensible answer to the
problems that are boiling up and now reaching a tipping point. Here's
why, despite the Moraine, Escarpment, Greenbelt and Whitebelt
regulations and restrictions, and the wish of many of our residents for
a zero-growth strategy, Caledon is inevitably going to be paved over
entirely, and long before the end of the century:
- Developers
rule, and own the politicians: Most of the undeveloped land in Caledon,
including that on the Moraine and Escarpment, is in the hands of rich
and powerful developers. They make their money (obscene amounts of it)
by bribing, funding and lobbying municipal and provincial politicians
to approve rezonings for development. Opponents of development, by
comparison, are weak and poor.
- Lawyers intimidate those who
would restrict growth: Idealistic politicians and activist citizens who
advocate zero growth strategies are attacked by well-paid lawyers who
threaten legal action for unreasonable restraint of trade against any
opponents of unrestricted development and growth, on behalf of their
clients, including developers, real estate speculators and rapacious
business organizations.
- Real estate agents want growth: Real
estate is one of the largest employers in Caledon and other
metropolitan 'fringe' areas. Agents get paid a percentage of market
value for each house listed or sold, and hence rely on growth and price
appreciation for their living. They lobby politicians actively, and
dominate many local business organizations. They were able to get a
large part of NE Caledon exempted from Moraine restrictions as an
'estate property development' area: as if large estates of land
clearcut and planted with lawns soaked in herbicides and pesticides are
somehow better for the Moraine's protection than more intensive
subdivisions. No one has investigated who paid whom for this outrageous
exemption that undermines everything the Moraine regulations stand for.
- Farmers are greedy: As I reported in a previous article,
most Caledon farms are subsistence -- their owners grow grains and
other extensive crops rather than vegetables, fruits and other
intensive crops. Many of them have turned down very profitable offers
from developers and real estate speculators, in the hope that as
population pressures increase, even more lucrative offers will be
forthcoming, as they have in every fringe area of Toronto in past. When
the provincial government introduced the Greenbelt and Whitebelt
strategy, these farmers were foaming at the mouth, and marched on the
provincial legislature in protest. Most Caledon farmers, seduced by the
promise of windfall profits on their land, have become merely real
estate speculators themselves.
- Business owners want growth: The
near-doubling of Caledon's population by 2031 is insufficient for the
Caledon Chamber of Commerce, which issued an expensive mailing to every
Caledon resident urging citizens and politicians to raise its target
population to at least 130,000 people by that year, arguing that
established and prospective Caledon businesses need such growth to be
viable.
- The construction industry wants materials: The Niagara
Escarpment is a favoured haunt for sand and gravel operators supplying
the voracious needs of the construction industry, and these operators
are also major employers in Caledon. They have argued furiously against
restrictions that prevent them from continually expanding operations,
and threatened legal action against municipalities that try to
introduce such restrictions.
- The property tax base requires
more taxpayers: Communities fund road maintenance and other essential
municipal services through property taxes. Communities like Caledon
with few taxpayers per square mile and per mile of roads and utilities
have to charge higher rates or neglect infrastructure. Worse, as
low-income new housing spills over into Caledon from adjacent
municipalities, new subdivisions have sprouted up that pay little tax
(property taxes are based on market value, and these new subdivisions
have some of the cheapest houses in the GTA) yet demand the same
services as every other residential development. And these new
subdivisions are mainly residential -- there is little employment
created in these communities, so there are few businesses to balance
the property tax load, and residents have to commute to other areas for
work, placing further burdens on the road system.
- The city and
region want more people accommodated: Understandably, Toronto and other
GTA communities cannot possibly accommodate the exploding demand for
new housing in the GTA, and want Caledon to accept more than the 1%
that it is currently committed to absorb.
- The provincial zoning
authority is dominated by pro-development forces: While municipalities
make their own plans, these plans can be overruled by appeal to the
provincial zoning authority called the Ontario Municipal Board. This
Board is heavily pro-development and almost always overrules any
rezoning denials and restrictions imposed by municipalities unless the
development proposal is really outrageous. This allows municipalities
to pander to anti-development forces and acquiesce to pro-development
forces at the same time: They introduce restrictions and refuse
rezoning knowing full well that these rulings will be reversed by the
OMB. They can tell citizens that "they tried" and developers "don't
worry, the OMB will approve your rezoning quickly".
- Many new
residents want to make a quick profit and move out: As one of the
cheapest areas in the GTA to buy entry-level homes, Caledon is becoming
home to a transient group of residents and voters who have no
commitment to the community and who are indifferent to its future. What
they want is for their first homes to appreciate quickly so they can
sell and move up to larger homes on larger lots in areas closer to the
workplaces they commute to. So they, too, are pro-development.
Caledon
is home to a substantial number of believers in sustainable communities
and opposed to untrammeled development. The Green Party does better
here than almost anywhere in Ontario (though it still gets a very small
proportion of total votes). Caledon has a substantial proportion of
executives living here (because of its physical beauty, proximity to
the city, and availability of large estate lots and properties), and
they too want to keep Caledon from being bulldozed to become the same
as the other depressing suburbs of the GTA. But the enlightened or
self-interested opponents of development are totally outnumbered and
outgunned by the developers, politicians, lawyers, real estate agents
and speculators, farmers, local business owners, construction
interests, tax-increase opponents, pro-growth advocates, new transient
residents and others who have a vested interest in seeing Caledon paved
over.
The environmental movement cannot hope to win when it is
always fighting a rear-guard, defensive and altruistic battle against
the rich, the powerful, and those who have a financial interest in
ever-more development. Caledon's story, its astonishing beauty and its
dubious future is a case in point.
The only way to stop development and create communities that are truly sustainable is to do simultaneously two things:
- Build grassroots local communities that are committed to sustainability and educated about the means to attain them.
These communities will embrace intentionality, natural enterprises,
zero population growth, zero net new development, buying local,
permaculture, respect for natural ecosystems, and other principles
critical to sustainability and anathema to the development industries.
- Get
governments to support sustainability by introducing, enforcing, and
sticking with regulations and restrictions on growth and development.
Ontario's government, to its credit, did introduce such regulations and
restrictions, but the heavy lobbying of the many pro-development forces
has weakened their resolve. As a result, they are now pressing GTA
fringe communities like Caledon to accept more residents and
development, and allowing their OMB to undermine municipal laws
designed to reinforce their regulations and restrictions. Worse, they
seem to be prepared to abandon their commitment to protection of
environmentally sensitive areas entirely as a political liability with
an election against the fiercely pro-development Conservatives just a
year away.
These two steps need to be undertaken
simultaneously -- neither works without the other. There are few
communities, to my knowledge, that have the enlightened population to
undertake the former and the enlightened political leadership to
undertake the latter. For awhile, Caledon looked like it might be the
exception, and a potential model for the province and the rest of the
world. But this now looks more and more doubtful. Other countries like
Sweden are miles ahead, and their model sustainable communities are
worthy models for the rest of us to study and emulate. But for many of
us, Sweden is too far away, and we urgently need local models of
successful sustainability to follow in our own countries.
So we
will have to start with step 1 above, building grassroots local
communities, and continue to fight the good fight against the forces of
unsustainability and against all odds (losing most of our battles)
until, at last, we get the enlightened and courageous political
leadership we need to reinforced these community-based initiatives. The
people I have met in STORM (Save the Oak Ridges Moraine coalition), the local Green party, Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation, Citizens' Environment Watch, the provincial Conservation Authorities, the Oak Ridges Moraine Foundation
and other champions of local sustainability all exemplify that spirit
of perseverance and patience, and I admire them enormously. I wish I
had their courage. Quixotic, perhaps, but it seems to be the only
option open to us. We do what we must. |
6:37:48 AM 
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