Saturday, April 26, 2025

Yesterday, there was a public meeting about the proposed Waterfront hotel site. Ward says the community gave a lot of feedback on the proposal including concerns about the height, density.

“There are two 35-storey towers proposed with a six-storey podium between them. Our by-law calls for eight storeys here and a three storey podium near Brant Street,” said Ward. “[The community] also advocated for more green space close to Spencer Smith Park.”

Ward says the city’s staff will continue to process the development application and come back with a recommendation in April.

Ward 6 Rural Broadband Project

Ward says there are two projects in Ward 6. Bell is heading one of the projects and standard broadband is heading the other which aims to provide high-speed internet to rural areas.

“The applicant has now filed all the required papers with the various agencies which will approve it in parallel,” said Ward. “So, we have got the Niagara Escarpment Commission, Conservation Halton, Region of Halton and the city issuing a permit…we’re hoping to have that live and connected by July 2022.”

Transit Operating Shortfalls

The federal government has announced plans to introduce legislation to invest up to $750 million to support municipalities with transit operating shortfalls, but the funding it conditional on the province matching it.

Ward says she is hoping the province will match it because the transit system in Burlington has seen a decline in revenues because of low ridership. She says the closures due to the pandemic is one of the reasons people have stopped using transit.

“Our transit system is recovering very quickly, which we are grateful for due to some of the changes that were made just before the pandemic,” said Ward. “We have offered free transit for seniors which brought us to a 49 per cent increase in seniors ridership.”