Developer to unveil Holmes Foundry lands plan at public session

A builder envisioning high rises, a hotel, parks, and commercial development on a former industrial site bordering Sarnia is inviting people to learn more.

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Southcoast Developments Ltd. and consultant Zelinka Priamo Ltd. are hosting a Microsoft Teams meeting Nov. 19, in which people can hear and ask questions about a development plan for the former Holmes Foundry lands in southeast Point Edward, south of Highway 402 and next to Sarnia’s Norm Perry Park.

People can register to participate in the 6 to 7:30 pm meeting by sending contact information to [email protected]year open house announcement says.

With about 1,900 residential units in the proposal — not including 130 hotel units and 250 in a “campus of care” that could include long-term care beds — building it could effectively double Point Edward’s population of about 2,000, village mayor Bev Hand said.

“You think about a development that size and what it would do,” she said, noting development would likely happen in phases. “So there’s lots to think about and a lot of planning.”

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The project proposal includes multiple three- and eight-storey buildings, four topping 20 stores, and one reaching 30 stores, a planning justification report shows.

It would require larger water and wastewater pipes servicing the site, a new pumping station, stormwater infrastructure upgrades, and turn-lane modifications on Exmouth Street, studies say.

Southcoast’s Tyler Pearson, who has ties to Sarnia-Lambtonhas talked about the 6.9-hectare (17-acre) property, purchased two years agoas a prime candidate for large development in Southwestern Ontario

No date has been set for council to consider an official plan amendment application to authorize the project, Hand said.

The virtual open house “is an unveiling of what (Pearson) is planning on doing,” Hand said. “We’ve heard bits and pieces but this is the unveiling of what they would be trying to accomplish.”

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An environmental assessment of the brownfield site is ongoing, a July update from S2S Environmental Inc. says, noting the process likely will continue until the end of 2025.

Planning for the project could proceed simultaneously, Hand said. “You make your plans, assuming that’s going to be completed.”

Chrysler closed the former foundry in the 1980s and sold the property, which sat vacant. After a long legal battle over ownership was settled in late 2017, the land was put back on the market.

The foundry was linked to hundreds of cases of occupational diseases — mostly lung cancer and other respiratory afflictions — due to worker exposure to asbestos and silica in the mid- and late 20th century.

Environmental cleanup after the foundry closed in 1988 cost Chrysler about $7 million.

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Contaminants such as volatile organic compounds, petroleum hydrocarbons fractions and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, found after drilling in 70 locations between February 2022 and March 2023, were in concentrations “well below the applicable (Ontario Environment Ministry) Table 3 standards, with some exceptions,” the S2S memo says.

Remaining contaminants “can be appropriately managed via a risk assessment remediation approach to satisfy the (ministry record of site condition) requirements,” the memo says.

But “further efforts are necessary to thoroughly assess, delineate, and quantify the environmental conditions,” it says, including more soil and groundwater data.

With files from Paul Morden
[email protected]
@tylerkula

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