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Pickering Airport (Transport Canada/GTAA, Proposed)

mrxbombastic said:
this is how we've lost so much of our Grade A farming land in Ontario, Literally some of the best and most fertile land on the continent.

food security, local agriculture and sustainable city development go hand in hand.
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There's lots of Grade A farmland in Southwestern Ontario that's under no development pressure whatsoever. "Food security" is hardly an issue; especially when you consider that "skyscraper farms" are on the horizon.
 
If anyone is interested in a quick overview of Ontario's farmland, its classes, and where they're located - here is a map from Neptis. If a picture is worth a thousand words, a map is worth a million. And TBH I don't care all that much if current farms remain as farms, just so long as they're not paved over. A secondary succession forest can easily go back to farmland, a city not so much (except maybe in Detroit).

Edited to make image much smaller.
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Transportfan said:
There's lots of Grade A farmland in Southwestern Ontario that's under no development pressure whatsoever. "Food security" is hardly an issue; especially when you consider that "skyscraper farms" are on the horizon.
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and we are quite fortunate to have that in this region. But that fortunate bounty of good land down the 401 is no reason to legitimize unnecessary fringe urban development. Yes, skyscraper farming is a new technology which could frankly revolutionize our food system but until we are dotted with them through the city and their local productivity matches the loss of farmland, there is no reason to sprawl.
 
Admiral Beez said:
I assume the Pickering airport is dead tomorrow?

http://www.yorkregion.com/news-stor...als-ndp-markham-stouffville-election-meeting/
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Like an zombie in a B-Rated horror movie, it always comes back to life, even after you think you killed it.

I never expected them to get close to building the airport, even with the 407 extension running through the area. It's still a very rural area, they would probably spend billions just upgrading the infrastructure like roads, water, sewage and power alone just to support the airports needs.
 
Food security is something that our local universities in UofT, Ryerson, Guelph have been making a big deal out of over the past few years, many new graduates in the planning departments are specialized in the topic of food security. I trust that in a few years time Toronto will be full of professionals that can determine whether it is 'safe' to farm near a metropolis to a much better degree than anyone of us here can.

Now whether we listen to expert opinion over to developer money is a whole other story.
 
put it this way, A developer bought a golf course with 300 acres for $412 million. The province is selling 1,000 acres. Now this land isn't quite as prime, and is mostly employment lands, not residential, but it will raise quite a bit of cash.
 
innsertnamehere said:
put it this way, A developer bought a golf course with 300 acres for $412 million. The province is selling 1,000 acres. Now this land isn't quite as prime, and is mostly employment lands, not residential, but it will raise quite a bit of cash.
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Awesome. This is a wonderful windfall that hopefully puts a huge dent in funding the transit needs in this province!!
 
pstogios said:
Awesome. This is a wonderful windfall that hopefully puts a huge dent in funding the transit needs in this province!!
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still a continuing case of govt following the "burning the furniture to heat the house" model of transit investment in ontario but in this case its acceptable to some extent because I dont suspect the land was generating much revenue for the govt anyways. The planning remains a nightmare but that is a discussion for another thread.....
 
mrxbombastic said:
still a continuing case of govt following the "burning the furniture to heat the house" model of transit investment in ontario but in this case its acceptable to some extent because I dont suspect the land was generating much revenue for the govt anyways. The planning remains a nightmare but that is a discussion for another thread.....
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Does the Seaton Lands have another thread?
 
mrxbombastic said:
still a continuing case of govt following the "burning the furniture to heat the house" model of transit investment in ontario but in this case its acceptable to some extent because I dont suspect the land was generating much revenue for the govt anyways. The planning remains a nightmare but that is a discussion for another thread.....
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I liken it more to selling that spare couch in the basement so you can buy the new lawnmower you need. Selling assets for infrastructure is way more justifiable than selling assets to pay the bills.
 
gweed123 said:
I liken it more to selling that spare couch in the basement so you can buy the new lawnmower you need. Selling assets for infrastructure is way more justifiable than selling assets to pay the bills.
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You can get new lawnmower money for old couches, I gotta get on kijiji.
 
I thought I'd bump this thread due to new developments. Looks like Pickering is now backing the airport, and is asking the Feds for an expedited decision. The timing could work well, especially with the Feds wanting to establish a new Infrastructure Bank, and VIA looking at restoring passenger service to Peterborough, which would run right past the proposed airport. I don't know the issue well so I'd love to hear people's thoughts on this.

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