Farmland conversion and landfill sites

[panamaniac]

If it's not being acquired for this project, I wonder if the powers that be know that we were passed over for want of industrial land? Kitchener, in particular, has lost many opportunities over the years because it did not have land available (and was content to see projects go elsewhere in the Region).

[ac3r]

Where did the whole rumour about it being for EVs even start? Reddit? Some Facebook comment thread? Twitter? Everyone seemed to jump on this speculation without any evidence that is what it was going to be for. Even Doug Ford said this isn't what it was about.

From what I can tell - and while they could indeed to something related to automotive industry (the horror, eh?) since we have lots of skilled workers involved in this industry already - they have only been trying to create a large parcel of new industrial and business lands. Which, unfortunately, we seem to be on course for fucking that up and derailing it like we do with many things here out of spite for the Conservative government and so called "sprawl".

[bravado]

There's not many other uses for 700 acres of land allocated at the same time other than absurd mega-hospitals and new automotive manufacturing. It's a pretty normal leap. But now we're in the dark again without knowing what this is for and who is demanding it.

[ac3r]

I imagine the idea was that they'd zone the 700 acres in a way such that multiple industries and businesses could operate from the area, not that all 700 would be zoned and handed over to one single entity to operate something large from...no?

A new industrial and business zone that was 700 acres in size could allow for the development of countless new operations that could provide thousands upon thousands of new jobs for people in our region and millions of dollars in economic benefits, with only communist ideologues and farmers objecting to positive things like that. At least that's what I had been assuming...even with the speculation of something related to automobiles, I wasn't expecting that to take up all 700 acres because that's a lot for one company, at least for a region our size. I kind of thought this was going to be a huge area of the region they say okay you can build stuff here, then they build streets, infrastructure etc and then let the market decide what they want to use it for.

[panamaniac]

There's not many other uses for 700 acres of land allocated at the same time other than absurd mega-hospitals and new automotive manufacturing. It's a pretty normal leap. But now we're in the dark again without knowing what this is for and who is demanding it.

A 700 acre industrial park housing a range of companies would not be unusual.  It need not be acquired for specific companies, but to have land available for the future.  I can't see a hospital having anything to do with it.

[bravado]

I meant that the region has plenty of zoned industrial land scattered over the 3 cities, a single 700 acre plot handled under unexplained expropriations is unusual and led me to believe that it was a mega project like auto manufacturing. And the hospital comment was in reference to the ridiculously large KW hospital plan. Otherwise, there aren't many other mega-projects we get around here and throwing out a lot of public faith in the countryside line for a normal industrial park is a bad political trade.

[ijmorlan]

I meant that the region has plenty of zoned industrial land scattered over the 3 cities, a single 700 acre plot handled under unexplained expropriations is unusual and led me to believe that it was a mega project like auto manufacturing. And the hospital comment was in reference to the ridiculously large KW hospital plan. Otherwise, there aren't many other mega-projects we get around here and throwing out a lot of public faith in the countryside line for a normal industrial park is a bad political trade.

Right, if the idea is to zone the whole thing as industrial and then subdivide it into many plots, then there is no need for a single big plot. If somebody wants 10 acres of industrial land they can buy that much land almost anywhere. That makes it even dumber to expropriate.

[westwardloo]

There is no way that they want to expropriate 700 acres to subdivide it into small industrial plots. If that was the case, they would just rezone the land north of the 7/8 into industrial lands and have developers purchase the land slowly themselves. This is to attract a major manufacturing tenant. The Region feels that they lost out on major manufacturing investments in the past because we do not have a large site ready. I am surprised that honda feels like Alliston can absorb 1000+ new manufacturing jobs, but I am sure the province will make them open up a lot of agricultural land around the community for more housing. There has been major rumblings of Toyota wanting to set up a EV plant in North America I am sure that Toyota Canada is working hard to secure the factory, but if we don't offer suitable site or similar investments that Honda is getting they could easily set up shop in one of the States.

[danbrotherston]

There is no way that they want to expropriate 700 acres to subdivide it into small industrial plots. If that was the case, they would just rezone the land north of the 7/8 into industrial lands and have developers purchase the land slowly themselves. This is to attract a major manufacturing tenant. The Region feels that they lost out on major manufacturing investments in the past because we do not have a large site ready. I am surprised that honda feels like Alliston can absorb 1000+ new manufacturing jobs, but I am sure the province will make them open up a lot of agricultural land around the community for more housing. There has been major rumblings of Toyota wanting to set up a EV plant in North America I am sure that Toyota Canada is working hard to secure the factory, but if we don't offer suitable site or similar investments that Honda is getting they could easily set up shop in one of the States.

You're definitely right, this isn't a case of "we need small plots"...there are tons of small plots (there are also big plots mind you) available.

But I'm sure that Honda doesn't care...I'm sure that Honda feels they can force the issue...people will either commute (they commute just as far INTO Toronto), or more housing will get developed.

But this whole "lets compete" between cities is to our detriment. We need collaboration and co-operation between cities, not a battle to see which city can prostrate ourselves the hardest in front of corporations.

And honestly, if the land grab is happening on the "hope someone will notice us" that is just as bad...maybe it's not as bad as an actual backroom deal, but in terms of pandering to corporations, just as bad in my eye. Although I'm sure I'll get a dislike as usual for my questioning of capitalism here.

[ac3r]

Collaboration and co-operation is not how it works. Why would multiple cities with competing interests collaborate? That doesn't make sense. Nothing in the western world is set up to work that way - at all. Different cities and regions have different goals, aspirations, cultures and so on. They all have different things that offer unique qualities, whether it's contributions from higher tier education or different skilled trades/employment being based here. Why would we expect London, Stratford, Barrie, Sudbury or whatever to be on board with the choices we make here? It IS a battle because the cities all want to become the best places they can possibly be, the same way nations all compete to become the best nations they can be. If we didn't do this, we wouldn't have managed to brand the region as this hotbed for technology and innovation. Kingston could have done that instead, having Google and Shopify set up shop there. But we made the effort to make this place an appealing region to come operate out of and we benefited from it.

We tried the whole "let's all collaborate and co-operate" thing in the 20th century and it didn't work too well. In fact, it kind of resulted in some of the darkest periods of human history. Competition is actually a very good thing for being beings. We are literally hardwired to compete with one another whether it's arm wrestling some random dude, expanding and growing economics and wealth, or researching technological breakthroughs for technological and scientific innovation. It keeps us on edge, always striving forward and willing to punch above our own weight.

[SF22]

Well, it's apparently not going to be an EV plant. Does that put us back to square one on speculating the end result? https://www.therecord.com/news/waterloo-...c505f.html

[Rainrider22]

Its not EV related to Honda....

[ac3r]

Well, it's apparently not going to be an EV plant. Does that put us back to square one on speculating the end result? https://www.therecord.com/news/waterloo-...c505f.html

I think we should just treat it based on what we know: that the region wants to take a large 700 acre plot of land and invite people to use it, whether that means a single large company or numerous ones. I still can't figure out where the whole "it's for a huge EV plant or maybe EV batteries" thing even came from, it just sort of appeared on social media one day and then it spiralled out of control with all sorts of speculation and conspiracy theories about secretive backhand deals. Even the claim that it was going to be expropriated had no basis in reality from what I can tell, because the region has repeatedly said it planned to buy the land (whether or not they were planning to pay a fair price is irrelevant). It sort of made some sense given we sort of have experience with automotive industry here, but there was nothing specific ever said and anytime I ask online where this began, nobody seems to have a concrete answer.

At first I thought...okay, maybe it is for EVs? Maybe that's good? But now that it is known that it was never about that all along, I'm thinking maybe they just wanted to set aside a large swath of land that can be utilized over the next century to diversify our economy, by inviting in numerous different businesses to operate here. That makes a lot more sense when you think about it. The Bramm Yards project is similar in that the City of Kitchener has that modest plot of land directly downtown and a desire to utilize it in such a way that there can be a diversity of important businesses that operate there.

And when it comes to EVs...ehhhh. Established names like Tesla and General Motors are struggling with their EV segments with abysmal sales hitting them rather hard. A quick look at the stock price of newer companies like NIO, LCID, FRSN, RIVN, GOEV and countless more also demonstrate that EVs are, ultimately, still pieces of shit that very few people want. They're barely selling and these companies are barely able to keep the lights on. If we have the choice between handing 700 acres over to a large company or taking 700 acres, zoning it to be utilized for various uses and then letting the market demands dictate how they are used then the latter is probably the superior choice.

But with the way this has played out thanks to all this seemingly made up rhetoric about EV and coercing farmers off their land, we may have shot ourselves in the foot anyway. We are very talented at that.

[SF22]

Its not EV related to Honda....

Apparently the site isn't suited for any EV work, because it requires a mass amount of water that this location doesn't have access to, according to the article. I am not an expert in water management or car manufacturing, so I'm taking this article pretty much at face value.

[ijmorlan]

Collaboration and co-operation is not how it works.

Every international organization’s existence disproves this statement.

Whenever various groups have common interests, it may make sense for them to collaborate and co-operate, and pretending that collaboration and co-operation mean communism (if I understand your cryptic reference correctly), just makes you sound like a crazy person.