Shenkman/Cavanagh have submitted a revised Plan of Subdivision to the City of Ottawa for a major mixed use development on their land at 195 Huntmar Drive. The new plans will be presented at a public meeting scheduled for January 10.
The property at 195 Huntmar is an oddly-shaped parcel of land that extends west from Huntmar Drive around the existing police station, and north to Palladium. The existing community of Fairwinds is directly to the south. The 135.7-acre (54.9 hectare) property is mostly farm fields, brush and trees.
The new plan being presented on January 10 is a significant update to the original plan submitted back in September 2016. The development needs a number of city approvals before it can go ahead including a zoning bylaw amendment, amendment to the official plan and approval for the plan of subdivision.
Here’s a side-by-side comparison showing what’s changed since 2016.
| Old plan (2016) | Revised plan (2017) |
Total: 1099-1169 housing units |
Total: 671 units |
| A 6-acre neighbourhood commercial block fronting Huntmar | About 10 acres of mixed-use commercial to the west of the future North-South arterial |
| Three 5-acre automotive parks | Four 5-acre automotive parks |
| A large 27.6-acre district park on the west side of the property, to be handed over to the City of Ottawa. | A 14.8-acre (6 hectare) district park relocated to the east side of the property, along Huntmar |
| n/a | Land for a new public high school, adjacent to the district park. |
| A 7-acre stormwater management facility that would be located on Ministry of Transportation land north of the subdivision. | Still part of the plan, but moved slightly south. |
| n/a | A small neighbourhood park in the middle of the residential area. |
The alignment of the North-South arterial and Palladium Drive has also changed. A road would connect this neighbourhood to Stittsville Main (via Jackson Trails).
These maps show the previous plan (top) compared to the new plan (bottom). You can click on either map to zoom in.
These maps and a one-page summary of changes are all we have to go on until the public meeting. It’s on Wednesday, January 10, 2018 at the Goulbourn Recreation Complex (Hall A) located at 1500 Shea Road. There’s an open house at 6:30pm and a presentation at 7:00pm.
For more information you can also contact the planning lead, Louise Sweet, at 613-580-2424 x27586.
I really hope we can sway a change from the car dealerships to some other form of commercial businesses. Do we need any more dealerships in that area? What about more restaurants or small businesses? It is also disappointing to see the park size be cut in a half. While the high school would be nice, saving space for one does not mean it will be built, it seems in Ontario. I think we also need more adult recreational services – ball diamonds for instance because in the Jackson Trail, Bryanston Gate, and FairWinds area we have added a lot of adults but not any additional sports facilities for leagues to use that cater to adults (at least that I can remember). Has any Stittsville development in the past 10+ years provided adult rec facilities?
Hi Ian,
I’m not sure if you’ve tried them, but Goulburn Rec centre offers adult sports eg. Basketball, badminton, volleyball etc on different nights of the week. Not many ball diamonds though in the newer areas, and one that close to the highway might be attractive to west-enders.
Interesting proposal. Overall a decrease in dwellings and undeveloped area, and an increase in car dealerships. There has been a couple of reserved areas for schools in Fairwinds, and the public board doesn’t seem to want them. I think one of the Fairwinds ones was eventually bought by the Catholic board, and there’s one in Fairwinds west still waiting for a school board that bids 5 years before development. It’s just cut down trees evenly graded, full of weeds, rodents, ticks, and insects. It will look like that for a minimum of 5 years, so I’m not sure if there’s a need for another waste of space. I say keep the trees and make it into a hike trail.
Also isn’t there supposed to be an arterial road going from palladium to Hazelden?
Hello Everyone,
I am the project manager for this development and I want to provide some additional information.
We did not include a school site in the original plan of subdivision. The Ottawa Carleton District School Board exercised its authority to require us to reserve a site for a high school and the revised plan reflects that request.
In keeping with the direction from the City in “building better suburbs” the district park site and the high school site are located beside each other so that the district park can benefit from school elements and the school can benefit from district park elements.
If the high school site is released the district park will get bigger so that the broader community will not lose any facilities or elements that were proposed to be on located on the school site.
With respect to commercial/employment uses the car dealership next to the storm pond is just an example – it really is a 5-acre block for employment uses. The revised plan allows for 11.35 acres for neighbhourhood commercial on the west side of the N/S arterial – the proximity to the residential allows for more walking and cycling to those neighbourhood amenities which we believe is a real improvement over the original.
If you have any further questions I am glad to respond.
Thanks for your interest.
Peter Hume
Peter, thanks for providing the additional context. I’ve seen a lot of interest from the community in this proposal and I hope there’s a good turn-out on Wednesday night. I’m curious about the proposed density for both the commercial areas and the residential areas. I would have expected a higher density development, based on the Kanata West Concept Plan as well as the potential proximity to a future LRT station. Can you provide some more info background about the proposed density & how you ended up at this configuration?
Hi Glen,
Glad to provide more background on the plan changes.
MTO requirements with respect to intersection changes and pond location and the School Board requirements for a new public high school location were main drivers of the plan change. Given the layout of the property locating the 2-major community wide facilities, adjusting the road network and moving the storm pond did not leave the team a significant number of residential location options. Given the limited options the team felt that our residential uses should be compatible with the existing development and existing community fabric in the residential area. We did take the opportunity to move the road network to more urban grid pattern and placed our commercial uses along the arterial roadway between the residential development and the higher volume roadway. But we didn’t want to be out of sync with the abutting Fairwinds community fabric when it came to residential development.
Hope to see you tomorrow.
Regards,
Peter
I would also expect higher density given the city is continually pushing for increased density vs expanding the urban boundary. I’m not sure why “higher density” is not “compatible” with existing development. We need “mixed use” communities throughout ottawa.
Agree.
I should have mentioned in my post that the proposed density with townhomes & singles exceeds the city’s minimum required density of 34 units per hectare. I believe the planning consultant (Miguel Tremblay from Fotenn) said this configuration is 50 units/hectare but I can’t find it in my notes.
I would like to see more roundabouts instead of traffic signals.
Me too!
At least two more in this version of the plan.
Great to see Mr Hume weighing in here. Adds some credibility to the discussion. As a long time Stittsville resident I have been emotional about the dramatic transition from village to generic suburb. What still bothers me is the way trees are removed with impunity long before any real progress is made in the development. Granted there is a process for building mass subdivision neighbourhoods….but when I drive through Jackson trails, Maple Grove, Westridge south etc., I can’t help remember what brought me to Stittsville. It was the green spaces and the physical separation from Kanata that drew me in. I’m not blaming builders. All of us residents did not do enough to resist all of this when we had the opportunity. I think we just have to hang on for the ride. hopefully it ends soon.