A mixed-income housing development in Hamilton’s north end, in the works for more than a decade, is on hold amid an appeal from Canada’s largest railway company concerned with its size and location.
Canadian National (CN) filed an appeal with the city clerk’s office in September over the Jamesville project, which seeks to build 160 affordable units and just under 300 market-rate stacked townhouses.
The process is holding up the demolition of existing vacant townhomes and the impending building of the development earmarked for construction in 2023.
Of issue are lands bounded by James Street North, Strachan Street West, MacNab Street North and Ferrie Street West which the public freight entity claims are not far enough away from “an area of influence” around its rail yards.
“CN’s reasons for the appeal are centred on concerns of safety, odour, vibration, noise and whether the proposed sensitive land uses are appropriate for the Lands,” counsel for CN said in its appeal.
Ward 2 councillor Cameron Kroetsch said he found out about the matter while getting up to speed on his post following the fall election.
He says neighbours have been showing concern over the old CityHousing townhouses that have been sitting vacant since 2019.
He says the appeal surrounds shunting operations – the pushing or pulling of trains from one track to another – and was triggered when a developer put in an application to change the way the official plan was registered leading to some rezoning of the area.
His understanding is the change could precipitate “a lot denser” parcels of land.
‘We’re talking about multi-story buildings … if you’re at a one or two-storey building, the way that sound may or may not travel to you as opposed to where you might be at a higher building,” Kroetsch explained. “And will the shunting operations interfere with the livability of individuals who are living on some of the higher floors or not?”
The Jamesville development, to be operated by CityHousing Hamilton and Indwell, relies on government funding grants with strict timelines which could hinder financing should a resolution to the appeal take too much time.
Global News has reached out to the city as well as a spokesperson for Indwell but has yet to receive a reply as of the publishing of this post Thursday night.
Kroetsch says the next steps are to follow the appeal process as per the Ontario Land Tribunal, “take guidance from professionals,” and open a case management conference setting a date as early as possible.
“What I’ve heard so far is that we’re looking, at least in the best-case scenario, at something like the end of this year before there could be a date set for a hearing,” said Kroetsch.
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