The Cape Roger Curtis development saga has taken another bizarre twist. In 2004 the developers who had purchased the 630 acres at the south-western tip of Bowen Island applied for subdivision. Eventually their application was reviewed and the Approving Officer (AO) laid out a number of deficiencies, conditions and requirements. Subsequent to that rejection Continue reading ›
Tagged Cape Roger Curtis, Municipal HallLast week the Cape Roger Curtis (CRC) developers filed a subdivision application with the municipality. I haven’t seen it yet but I am very curious. As some of you may already know CRC is a 640-acre parcel of land on the southwest tip of Bowen. The developers who own it recently went to some lengths to have it considered for a very large comprehensive development. Since that proposal was turned down there has been some Continue reading ›
Tagged Cape Roger Curtis, Municipal Politics, Snug CoveMost communities fall into one of two camps. Either - we’re being overrun and need to enact policies that will curb undesirable development or – this town is dying, we need to attract some business. Bowen doesn’t really fit into either group. We’re considered in the wider world to be a suburb of metro Vancouver. Provincial and federal economic development initiatives deliberately exclude us and we’ve never had a very coherent strategy for attracting business so one could assume that we must be deliberately trying to discourage it. Continue reading ›
Tagged Add new tag, OCPOur Official Community Plan (OCP) update process is about to start. So I’ve been chatting with people who were involved in the process the last time around in 1992. Apparently things started off very well. Continue reading ›
Tagged OCPThe Cape Roger Curtis development was almost the biggest thing to ever hit our island. However, at their April 20 meeting our council rescinded the bylaw that would have made the Neighbourhood Plan (NP) possible. The developers will now choose whether to apply for a rezoning that fits within our Official Community Plan with up to 224 lots or apply for subdivision approval, which restricts development to lots that are a minimum of ten acres. This would result in the creation of somewhere between 40 and 58 lots, depending on who you listen to. Of course they could do nothing and let things die down for a while but nobody is betting on that.
Before moving on to more interesting things Continue reading ›
Tagged Cape Roger Curtis, OCPUrban sprawl is a fact of life and, while building up instead of out is today’s mantra, virtually all major cities continue to slowly eat up the surrounding countryside. Vancouver is a bit different. It has the U.S. border to the south, mountains to the north and ocean to the west. So, most of the sprawl has been to the east. However as commuting times to the valley increase the lure of potential profit to be found in developing our little island also increases.
Next Monday, April 20 our council will tell us whether they’ve decided to indulge the latest large scale suburban development scheme to hit Bowen or whether they are going to listen to the vast majority of Bowen Islanders and opt for a low-density development.
Tagged Cape Roger CurtisWhy CRC Can’t Hold 58 Lots
Cape Roger Curtis is currently zoned to allow for 10 acre lots but it must be subdivided, with the approval of the Approving Officer, who has the discretion to approve or reject the application on grounds set out in the Land Title Act, including (among other things) that it is not in the public interest.
An application to subdivide the land into 60 lots was made on September 7, 2004 but revised to 58 lots by the developers in September 2006 with few changes.
Tagged Cape Roger CurtisThis is not the editorial I had planned for this issue. I wrote quite a nice piece about how we should all try to control ourselves because we will have to look each other in the eye after this Sunday’s public information meeting where we will discuss the Cape Roger Curtis (CRC) development proposal. Then I went and picked up my mail. There was a nicely designed flyer from the people who support the CRC Neighbourhood Plan (NP) amendment to the Official Community Plan. I thought that I knew what to expect and wondered how they would try to sell 300 acres of park to people who already had 3,000 acres of open forest. The first part was beautifully predictable. I immediately read it as “yes, this project may destroy the island but it will happen so slowly that you will hardly notice it” and “we’ll give you $7 million for lots of good stuff … over the next 30 years”. I liked the way they spun those two points. It would be good material for the speakers who get up on Sunday to point out the flaws in the plan.
Tagged Cape Roger CurtisI know that I keep going on about the Cape Roger Curtis development proposal but this thing is getting bizarre. Council has said repeatedly that they want public feedback. So the citizens of Bowen Island rose up in an unprecedented unified voice that saw over 500 of us put our names to an ad in the newspaper insisting that this project is too large. Yet council is still contemplating “the most thorough public process in Bowen’s history.”
Tagged Cape Roger CurtisSo I went to a council meeting where they were going to talk about the Cape Roger Curtis proposal. I had written one of the reports that were being discussed so several people asked me to get up and speak during the time set aside for public comments. Remind me never to do that again; I was a bumbling idiot. I would like to try to explain here what I was trying to say there.
First of all I should try to clear up some misconceptions. Cape Roger Curtis (CRC) is a single building lot. It is over 600 acres but it is still just one lot. The owners have exactly the same rights as the rest of us have on our lots; they can build a house. But the people who purchased the lot in 2004 have no desire to build a house. They want to subdivide the property into a number of lots and sell them. In September of 2004 they applied to the Approving Officer for permission to subdivide the property into 60 parcels of ten acres each. The Approving Officer is a bureaucrat who is responsible for ensuring that the subdivision proposal not only conforms to existing laws and current conventions but also ensures that the subdivision is not contrary to the public interest. On top of that, the Approving Officer considers the “preserve and protect” mandate of the Islands Trust and the municipal council’s statement of public interest.
Tagged Cape Roger Curtis