Industrial development will make 400 corridor unrecognizable – White

By Meade Helman AWARE News Network October 4 2013
Slightly more than 50 people attended the Board of Trade sponsored Mayor’s breakfast. The first speaker was the town engineer, Arup Mukherjee and Bradford West Gwillimbury Mayor Doug White was the keynote speaker.

The town engineer started off with an overview of the plan for rebuilding Holland Street. The basic plan is to take Holland street from Professor Day to Dissette down to one lane in each direction with dedicated left turn lanes and parking areas. Mr Mukherjee said that this would improve traffic capacity more than the current 4 lane situation. The area would also be more pedestrian friendly with enhanced pedestrian crossings and expanded sidewalks with benches and trees. The Barrie/John Street intersection would be converted to a roundabout.
There was no discussion of costs or how the project would be funded.
The Mayor then expounded on the importance of the Holland Street reconstruction and the importance of the grant program giving relief from development to businesses for expanding locally. He also talked about the 5th line interchange and the “Employment Lands” on the 400. He said that in 5 years we wouldn’t recognize the 400 corridor due to industrial development. While he said financing these projects were challenging, there was no discussion of the funding for the 100s of millions in projected expenditures.
EDITORIAL COMMENTS: The mayor had pledged to renew the downtown core, in his first election as mayor 7 years ago. It is still a ways off.
At the last election the mayor pledged the “Employment Lands” development would begin in 2012 with Toromont taking the lead. That never happened. The elephant in the room is that it is going to cost $350 mil for infrastructure and $54 mil for the 5th line interchange (Town projections) with no financing plan is sight. The town already has over $50 mil in long term debt. There is a glut of industrial land in Simcoe County, why would they choose Bradford with our high taxes and even higher development charges?