Skip to main content

Push to Protect

Engineering MA student exploring area
Thursday, December, 20, 2012 - 1:01:11 PM
Push is on to protect McMaster Forest
By Craig Campbell, Dundas Star News
There is apparently no existing plan to develop on a 115-acre woodland owned by McMaster University bordering Dundas, Ancaster and west Hamilton – but a group advising the university president wants to make sure it stays that way.
Wayne Terryberry, chair of the president’s advisory committee on Cootes Paradise, said the property also known as “McMaster Forest” on the east side of Louise Drive off Lower Lions Club Road in Ancaster connects to the Ancaster Creek watershed.
“It’s a pretty ecologically diverse area,” Terryberry said. “We’re hoping to make sure that area is conserved.”
The committee recently enjoyed a success when McMaster University announced plans to move ahead with a project to create the 30-metre buffer recommended by the Hamilton Conservation Authority between Ancaster Creek and an existing parking lot on the west campus.
While that change will remove some parking spaces from the west campus, there is some support for removing more pavement and re-naturalizing the former wetland.
But Terryberry said trying to ensure preservation of the existing open space and forest a little further west is the advisory committee’s new main focus.
“We have to create a case for it,” he said. “(We have to) show that it’s in the university’s best interests to conserve it rather than other potential uses.”
Helen Ayre, acting university secretary at McMaster, said she doesn’t know of any plans for the land.
“So far as I am aware, the land has been left essentially untouched since it was purchased,” Ayre said.
The majority of the site is apparently zoned for agriculture, and also regulated by the Niagara Escarpment Commission. Neither the City of Hamilton planning department, nor the NEC is aware of any development proposal or discussions.
Ken Whitbread, manager of the NEC, said the property is in the Niagara Escarpment Plan’s most restrictive land use designations.
“Urban development would be prohibited, as is the severing of lands,” Whitbread said. “Highest and best use could be one house on the property or forestry, conservation, park and open space uses. Passive recreational uses and sustainable forestry could also be permitted.”
Land Registry documents indicate McMaster University purchased the property in two sections – the first in the summer of 1964 from Calder Developments Limited for one dollar. The rest of the site was purchased in the summer of 1969 from the County of Wentworth.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Binkley's Pond, gone for parking

Jacob Binkley (1806-67), great grandson of Marx [Binkley], built the handsome stone house that still stands at 54 Sanders Blvd at the head of a ravine. The house was completed in 1847 and named Lakelet Vale, as it had a little spring-fed lake at the rear. Binkley's Pond, as it was known, was used for skating, fishing, and good times. It is now the Zone 6 parking lot at McMaster University on the west side of Cootes Drive. Loreen Jerome, The Way We Were "The House that Jacob Built" Ainslie Wood/Westdale Community Association of Resident Homeowners Inc. (AWWCA) http://www.awwca.ca/articles/ Skater's on Binkley's Pond circa 1917, now a McMaster parking lot
3 comments
Read more

Stairs Connect Us: Please Sign A Petition

A group of residents in the University Gardens neighbourhood are seeking improved connections for active transportation.  The neighbourhood sits on a plateau above McMaster's west campus parking lots. A path through a wooded section between Grant Boulevard and McMaster's parking lot "P" is the shortest and most direct route that connects hikers, and commuters walking or cycling, but it is on the side of a hill that becomes treacherous in winter. At the bottom of the hill, a concrete bridge spans the narrow Ancaster Creek that is the dividing line between Hamilton's Ward 13 (Dundas) and Ward one's Ainslie Woods North neighbourhood. SIGN THE PETITION HERE Existing stairs were removed by the Hamilton Conservation Authority (HCA) with no plans for replacement. Area residents have started a petition to request a replacement set of stairs and will use the petition as support when they go to the HCA Board meeting in early June. The text of the petition reads: The Ham...
Post a Comment
Read more

Where did the water go? Art action in Lot M Parking

West Campus Eco-Art Project  A walking activity and site activation on McMaster’s West Campus.  West Campus Eco-Art Project is a project that incorporates creative walking activities and an artistic site activation connected with the West Campus Redesign Initiative at McMaster University. The initiative provides opportunities for connecting with nature through an on-line informational video, walking excursions and creative activities that deepen knowledge and experience with place in all its complexities (social history, citizen science, ecology and diversity).  Focusing on the Coldwater creek valley on McMaster’s West Campus, participants will learn about the history and unique features of the area and will be invited to then engage with the site through observation, sketching and stencil-making. Stencils will be used to paint text and image on the parking lot asphalt to delineate a blue line that marks an historic water route.  The project is supported by the McMas...
Post a Comment
Read more