The great blue fence of Oakville

A land dispute between property owners in Oakville has reached new heights as one of the landlords built a fence dividing the other’s parking lot in two. Business owners at the Bronte Village Mall are now complaining — saying it’s so inconvenient for customers and they’re losing money. But there is not much the town of Oakville can do about it.

A thin blue fence blocks off what would be a natural access from the Bronte Road side of the Bronte Village Mall  to the other end of the parking lot, forcing confused drivers to awkwardly backtrack out of the lot to enter the mall from Lakeshore —  others, to walk around it — and some to get creative.

Tom Appleton is a customer: “To get to the right end with my car theoretically, I’ve got to go right around Lakeshore Road and back in. It’s totally ridiculous and damaging the mall.”

Raymond Custom Cleaners owner Ruby Gill says sales have dropped 20 percent since the fence was erected in August: “My customers personally told me as long as the fence is there we are not coming back. If the fence will remain, I don’t think we can survive for long.”

Arshveer Kang is owner of the Bronte Village Smoke and Variety: “A lot of people don’t want to go around the lights and through the traffic, so that’s why they choose to go somewhere else instead of coming into this mall.”

Dena Boll is the owner of the British Treat Shoppe: “It’s been frustrating. A lot of customers coming in complaining.”

Not only is it damaging profits, British Treat Shoppe’s Dena Boll says the fence is a hazard — pointing to an incident where an ambulance was called to the mall: “The gurney had to come through my store because they couldn’t get down to the main doors to get in there, so it’s an issue.”

Other business owners are also warning about the potential dangers, but the Town of Oakville says this is a private property matter. And not only is this fence legally allowed to be here, but it also complies with the town’s fence bylaw.

The land blocked in by the fence is owned by Fineway Properties. V.P. Steve Rogul says, for 30 years the mall’s owner paid an undisclosed fee allowing cars to pass through. But when the contract expired, Rogul says the mall’s owner indicated they no longer required access over the land. So fineway put up a fence.

Some of the mall’s tenants say they’re landlord has told them they are fighting in court for the fence to come down.

The mall is owned by Goldmanco. We reached out to them for comment but have yet to hear back. Fineway Properties says their battle in court has to do with underground access to the property — not above ground — and that they plan on building a permanent fence within a couple of months.