Editor: Once again Canmore and the larger community needs to rally behind Canmore town council as it is forced to consider another application by the Lawrence Hill consortium to subdivide the narrow green space near Quarry Lake in the Peaks of Grassi.
The first application was unanimously defeated on Feb. 3rd, 2015. This time, the same applicants, again headed by Mr. Lawrence Hill, is tempting council by including seven perpetually affordable housing units in its application. The consortium does this in spite of the settlement agreement of 1998 reached through much time and effort of previous councillors.
It is interesting this same person, when working as the general manager for Three Sisters Communities /Alpine Homes in the early development of Lawrence Grassi Ridge, promoted the green spaces as protected areas.
There are important points that we ask to be considered at the public meeting on Nov. 24. These points include:
The rezoning will further intrude into the already narrow green space that acts as a wildlife corridor. Soon there may only be the powerline right-of-way to separate the Lawrence Grassi Ridge development from Quarry Lake. Thin buffers of tall pine trees when exposed to high winds and soil erosion usually fall down months later, which will diminish the wildlife corridor even more.
Traffic safety will be at a higher risk along Lawrence Grassi Ridge road. More vehicles will pass through the crowd of parked automobiles and mounds of snow in winter at the beginning portion of Lawrence Grassi Ridge. More traffic will pop over the steep hill at the beginning of Quarry Pines to discover even more people picking up their mail and depositing garbage in an unsafe area. This spot is already congested.
To allow this further development “spits in the eye” of Stanley A Milner, the founder of the Quarry Lake Heritage Foundation (2010). A sad note to a person who has given so much to Canmore.
A previous council spent copious amounts of time reaching the 1998 settlement agreement. This needs to be respected and the application rejected.
Garry and Dora Anderson,
Canmore
