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Embankment Protest

Sep 2, 02:27 AM

Originally published in :The Bulletin”:http://www.thebulletin.ca/cbulletin/content.jsp?sid=18935816031773660333211741912&ctid=1000148&cnid=1001468

Local activists have won their bid to tear down the St. Lawrence Neighbourhood’s newest barrier—a “Berlin Wall” type barrier that surprised residents earlier this summer.

The controversy surrounds a planned eight-meter long signal station and two-story wall, which were to be built directly behind a residential co-op. According to GO Transit, the structures will be relocated.

Residents of Cathedral Court Co-op, located at Jarvis St. and The Esplanade, led the battle.

According to co-op resident Jeffrey Nower, the first he heard of the construction was when HDI workers “bulldozed a tree out back” on June 15.

Construction began less than a meter from the patios and balconies of the co-op. The trees and bushes shielding the Co-op from the rail tracks were completely removed. In their place was a half-finished two-story aluminum barrier.

“It’s like the Berlin Wall,” complained Carol Auld, a 10-year resident of the co-op. “When workmen started to appear, I got really upset,” says Auld.

Members of Cathedral Court contacted GO Transit the same day. They received a phone message response a week later from Hopper stating construction had already begun. Construction halted after the co-op got a lawyer to contact Hopper.

The construction work is part of a seven-year project by GO Transit to increase rider capacity from 40 million to 80 million. The project runs from the Don River to Strachan Ave. and is a joint venture of the engineering firms Hatch Mott MacDonald, Delcan and IBI, or HDI, which are consulting with GO Transit in the construction.

Co-op residents persuaded GO Transit to relocate after a July 17 meeting with HDI-GO Transit deputy program manager David Hopper. The meeting followed the complaints and the threat of legal action from the co-op.

“We’re trying to be a good neighbour,” said Hopper.

Hopper apologized for a breakdown in communication, saying that HDI engineers took neighbours into consideration “in a very general way, but not in a specific way.”

Cathedral Court board director Andrew White says they were informed of the project, but the scope was never discussed. The map used by the engineers only showed Go property. They didn’t know a residential building was directly beside the planned signal station location.

Hopper said the St. Lawrence Neighbourhood Association and residences affected by the construction plans were contacted by GO transit, but said in the case of Cathedral Court, “there was just a miscommunication.”

Hopper said Cathedral Court’s manager, Nagula Rajah, was contacted, but the “scope of the project may not have been explained…. They didn’t actively pursue it; we didn’t actively pursue it. Neither party thought it was as big issue.”

Members of other co-ops attending the July 17 meeting say they were contacted about Go Transit’s construction plans.

Co-op residents say they understand the need for renovation along the railway. Some of the fences and barriers date to the 1920’s and the rail lines haven’t seen a major overhaul since the 1970’s.

“It’s an essential service but there’s got to be a way to do this that would mitigate the impact on the co-op. It doesn’t need to be three feet from our backyards,” one resident commented.

Residents said the removed vegetation was also home to badgers, foxes and red-winged blackbirds, as well as a resting ground for migrating monarch butterflies.

The wall, which originally would have reached the second-story of the three-story co-op, will be replaced with a more naturalized sloping wall with vegetation. The signal station, which is housed in a one-story, 8-metre long aluminum bungalow, will be moved to the south side of the tracks, in the shadow of the Gardiner expressway.

Elsewhere along the line, GO and HDI said they will make separate arrangements with residences affected by the construction. Hopper said GO will cover the cost of construction and tree planting on their property, but it will be up to neighbouring residents to replace smaller bushes and plants. Hopper says a landscape architect will visit sites later in the summer to determine the most suitable replacement vegetation.

GO Transit and HDI plan to meet with residents again Sept. 18. Work will begin in the fall but major construction at the Cathedral Court co-op site and elsewhere won’t begin until summer 2008.

posted by: Michael Lehan

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