Review board orders Halifax to allow new building in Beaver Bank despite concerns of overcrowding

A Beaver Bank apartment building will go ahead after a provincial regulatory body overturned a decision by Halifax councillors concerned about heavy traffic and overcrowded schools in an area that's seeing major development.

Halifax's North West Community Council approved the four-storey building with 46 units during a meeting Tuesday, after Nova Scotia's Utility and Review Board (UARB) ordered them to do so in July.

"It's disappointing," area councillor Lisa Blackburn said Wednesday, adding this is the third time the UARB has overturned one of their community council's decisions.

"They don't understand the overall effect of all of these developments that are taking place in Beaver Bank."

Councillors rejected the project in January, despite staff's recommendation that the proposal fit all the municipal planning rules for the area including size, compatibility with nearby properties, traffic, community amenities and storm water control.

It is set to go in on Beaver Bank Road near the corner of Windgate Drive in Lower Sackville.

Blackburn said it's her job to take a "30,000-foot look" at what's going on locally, and the reality is that traffic has been an issue for years on the Beaver Bank Road, which is the only way in and out of the community. 

Those traffic issues, as well as overcrowding at local schools, are now being exacerbated as hundreds of units are currently being built in the new Carriagewood Estates subdivision and three other apartment buildings nearby, Blackburn said. Those projects can go ahead without council approval since they fit current zoning and bylaw rules.

"We don't have the infrastructure for what we've got being built," Blackburn said.

"It's not the first time we've been at loggerheads with the Utility and Review Board — probably won't be the last."

Developers Augustus Ghosn of AG Property Holdings Limited, and Boston, Jeremy and Mark Ghosn of 4378018 Nova Scotia Limited, appealed the community council's rejection to the UARB. In their decision, the UARB said councillors' dismissal did not "reasonably comply" with the intent of the planning strategy, and allowed the appeal.

While Blackburn said she has emails from the Halifax Regional Centre for Education confirming that portable classrooms are being installed in at least two area schools this fall to handle a growing number of students, it's unclear whether the UARB had this information.

The UARB decision said they agreed with the developer's characterization that school overcrowding was "anecdotal." It said there was "no objective evidence" that children expected to live in the development could not be adequately accommodated in the existing public schools

HRM did not "actively oppose" the appeal, the UARB decision said, as they did not file any evidence, and only pointed to the existing staff report.

"I'd be interested to find out more about the [UARB) process and just how they go about making their decisions," Blackburn said.

Residents opposed development at board

Lyle Mailman lives near the development site, and was one of two residents to bring concerns about the Beaver Bank Road development to the UARB during a hearing on the issue in May.

He said it's "frustrating for everybody" that municipal planning doesn't recognize public opposition to a development. More than 100 people came out to a January public hearing when the council rejected the development, Mailman said, with the vast majority raising concerns.

"If you drive up the Beaver Bank Road, it's gone to absolute trash," Mailman said. "We got one way in, one way out — what are we going to do?"

1, 2 bedrooms expected

Blackburn said residents have seen no movement on a long-discussed plan to build a Beaver Bank bypass to ease traffic issues.

But the city's major wildfire and floods have "taught us how dangerous that situation is," Blackburn said.

The new building will be on a 6,342 square-metre site that's now vacant. There will be one- and two-bedroom units, with a mix of underground and surface parking.