Norfolk councilors are giving some more time for the owner of a Robinson Street property to come up with an altered proposal to build an eight-storey building with a mix of retail units and residential apartments.
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The site includes 1.8 acres of vacant land – on the former American Can property — located along Queen Street North and Kars Street in Simcoe, neighboring some Norfolk County offices and the Provincial Offenses office.
An application for the proposed development was previously brought to Norfolk Council in 2020 and has since been revised.
But Norfolk planner Fabian Serra told councilors at a meeting on Tuesday he is recommending refusal of the required zoning changes for the development because information requested by staff from the applicant hasn’t been submitted and issues raised by the public and councilors haven’t been addressed .
One of those issues is parking. A total of 308 parking spaces are required for the building but the application includes just 235 spaces. Also, Serra said some engineering materials haven’t been included in the application.
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“It’s staff’s opinion the proposal is premature,” said Serra. “The proposed reduction in parking is too significant. We don’t have the strongest public transit system like other communities and Norfolk County is dependent on vehicles.”
Some of the concerns raised by residents include the height of the building, increased traffic, pedestrian safety, parking, compatibility with the surrounding area, privacy and the proposed uses of the building.
“I’ve asked for an update for the better part of the entire year,” said Serra. “I keep receiving the response of ‘We’re working on the material.’”
The application includes 152 units comprised of six office and retail units on the ground floor and 146 residential units on floors two through eight.
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David Igelman, a planner representing the property owner, requested council to give them more time to continue to work with county staff and “potentially make revisions to the proposal.”
“I think parking is the biggest concern and we will look to increase parking to the greatest extent possible,” said Igelman.
But when Mayor Amy Martin asked the applicant to put in writing that he wouldn’t appeal council’s decision to provide additional time to tweak the application, Igelman said his client would first like to discuss it with a lawyer.
Martin voted against the time extension.
“This planning file has been open since 2020 with a lack of response to our staff,” said Martin. “It’s very atypical that our staff would request to close a file based on lack of information. And we have the applicant and owner here today who doesn’t want to go on the record stating that they won’t be appealing.”
Council voted to refer the report back to staff and have the matter returned to them at a meeting in October.
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