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January
1998 Newsletter
Ray
of Sunshine in a Sad, Gloomy Process
From One of Our "Front Line" Correspondents
Those
of us who are involved in the Region's 'Impact Assessment
and Design Process' for the proposed North/South Expressway
are grappling to come to terms with whether we feel right
being involved in this process at all. It is truly becoming
more and more difficult to sit through meetings where the
details of the design and location of the proposed road
within the valley are discussed. If anything, participation
in this process has only served to reinforce the frustratingly
obvious fact that this valley is no place for a road!
You
can imagine my great surprise to hear a consultant agree
with the FRHV view. A workshop was recently held by the
Region to discuss the 'visual impacts' that the expressway
will have where it will cut through the Niagara escarpment
and descend into the valley. The director of the consulting
project team, Carolyn Woodland of Hough Woodland Naylor
Dance, spent a good deal of her presentation time describing
the special qualities of this portion of the Red Hill Valley
system which many of us have come to know so well and love
so much! What a switch from all of the other rather sterile,
technical presentations we have had to sit through in this
process.
The
process of evaluating visual impacts is quite an interesting
one. Ms. Woodland and her team spent a good deal of time
in the field photographing the area at key vista points,
and generally getting a feel for the special qualities of
this stretch of escarpment. The landscape here was described
as being 'rich' and of much higher value than originally
evaluated by the Niagara Escarpment Commission in 1976.
The 20-plus years of regeneration have contributed significantly
to the quality of this landscape.
You
can just imagine how heartening it was for me to be sitting
in the audience listening to this presentation. Here was
an 'expert' from outside who not only recognized what we
all know, but was more than willing to express, in a very
emotional manner, her belief that this is an incredibly
special landscape. During a break in the meeting, I approached
Ms. Woodland and asked her, for the sake of my sanity, to
tell me whether she has dealt with any other community in
this province that has plans to build a road through such
a significant stretch of urban green space. She was very
frank with me, and said that, no, she had not come across
any other community with such plans. In fact, her experience
was quite the contrary – communities in other parts
of Ontario are battling to save their valley ecosystems.
She
mentioned the Rouge River Valley as one example. All efforts
are being made to eliminate existing roads and prevent any
new roads along the length of this important valley system.
She also described the Don Valley system, and how the Task
Force to Bring Back the Don is now struggling to rectify
the expressway mistake made in the past. All in all, Ms.
Woodland seemed quite dismayed that in this day and age,
a government has plans to pursue such a project and destroy
such a high quality landscape.
Although
the views of one consultant clearly will not stop this project,
they certainly helped to reinforce my belief that we are
fighting this project for all of the right reasons. It is
truly amazing how sources of inspiration can turn up in
the most unlikely places.
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