Sprawl developers have convinced Premier Doug Ford and his government to open the Greenbelt to factories and subdivisions. His “Open for Business” Bill 66 proposes to allow “job creating” developments essentially anywhere on the Greenbelt and other sensitive land and water protection areas and repudiates his promise not to touch the Greenbelt, which was made during the last election.

Make no mistake, the only people who would make money from this attack are sprawl developers. The rest of us will face more gridlock, lost farmland, polluted water and higher property taxes.

The Ontario government is now saying it needs the Greenbelt, source water protection areas, the Oak Ridges Moraine and the Lake Simcoe watershed for new employment generating businesses and housing.

Inconveniently for them, the facts paint a different picture. Let’s break it down.

Firstly, we have lots of land available to develop in our cities. The Neptis Foundation and the Ministry of Municipal Affairs have demonstrated that there is over 125,000 hectares (greater than the size of Mississauga and Toronto combined) of developable land within existing urban boundaries.

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That is more than enough land to develop for our needs past 2031 without needing to expand city boundaries or pave over an inch of the Greenbelt. If sprawl developers get their way, and willy-nilly expansions of city boundaries and incursions into the Greenbelt are adopted, we can expect to see the rest of the prime farmland and natural areas around our cities gobbled up.

Secondly, building within cities makes more sense than on distant farmland. Subways, light rail transit (LRTs), bus routes, bike lanes and walking trails need relatively compact settlements to be viable. Creating new GO Train stations in cornfields, away from where people actually live, makes people ever more reliant on cars, with long commute times and gridlock as the result.

Low density sprawl also means longer sewer and water pipes, more school bus routes, and more municipal roads and highways. Denser cities have lower taxes because more people share these services. Unleashing even more sprawl in places like Vaughan will make existing residents’ high taxes even higher.

Finally, despite sprawl developers’ claims, there is actually no house, condo or business land shortage at all. October 2018 data from Altus Group shows that there were 16,283 houses and condos for sale in the GTA, up 30 per cent from last year.

In addition, recent sales data shows price increases of detached homes lags that of condos, semis and townhomes, showing demand is stronger for more affordable housing types. In fact, many municipalities have been searching for uses for employment lands that remain undeveloped.

Sprawl developers, and their friends in government, want the world of the 1970s where they can buyup cheap farmland, build expansive subdivisions and factories, and dump all of the social, economic and environmental costs of their profit-taking on the backs of taxpayers and residents.

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If they succeed in convincing the Ontario government to do their bidding, we can look forward to more sprawl, more gridlocked highways, less productivity, less farmland and natural areas, more expensive food, higher taxes and a lower quality of life.

My bet is that Ontario residents won’t accept this bleak future and that their fury will force the Ontario government to make the Greenbelt bigger, not blow holes in it.

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