Planning committee gave the all-clear Thursday to a nine-storey, 119-unit apartment building on Oblats Avenue despite opposition from community members who felt misled by an increase in height at the eleventh hour.
City staff had recommended approval for amendments to both the official plan and zoning bylaws for Greystone Village to permit buildings as high as nine storeys in the complex just off Main Street in Old Ottawa East. The Regional Group had originally gotten clearance for a six-storey apartment building on the site at 10 Oblats Ave. a few years ago, but members of the community feared the revised plan for an additional three storeys would crowd the nearby Deschâtelets building.
A crowd of concerned residents turned out at the planning committee on Thursday wearing shirts that read “respect approved plans.”
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For Ginger Bertrand, some of her earliest childhood memories in Ottawa are centred around healthcare. “I grew up across the street from what was originally the General Hospital,” she explains,
Barrhaven Coun. Jan Harder, chair of the planning committee, argued that without Regional Group’s investment in the neighbourhood, infrastructure projects such as the redevelopment of Main Street and even the newly complete Flora Footbridge connecting Old Ottawa East across the Rideau Canal wouldn’t have gone forward for a lack of intensification in the area.
Despite calls to vote down city staff’s recommendation from Capital Coun. Shawn Menard and a dissenting vote from Kitchissippi Coun. Jeff Leiper, the motion to approve Regional Group’s plans passed 8-1.
Elsewhere Thursday, planning committee also approved plans for two towers of six and nine storeys at 716 and 770 Brookfield Rd. The mixed-use development, aimed at Carleton University students, will contain 832 residential units as well as commercial space.
