It’s been six months since council turned down Kevin Fairweather’s application to rezone 2530 St. Paul to allow a duplex, instead of a single family home with an attached suite as presently zoned. The application is back on the table and a public hearing has been scheduled for May 9.
Several neighbours turned up at council, anxious to make themselves heard at this early stage, reiterating arguments they made against Fairweather’s development last year. Council, however, seems to have changed course on the matter.
The neighbours echoed each other’s concerns that there’s a problem on St. Paul and Fifth Avenue with parking, snow removal, and especially children’s safety in this area that gets a lot of pedestrian traffic to and from RSS and MacLean.
The neighbours pointed out that even the addition of the single family home on the adjacent lot — renovated by Fairweather last year and occupied in the fall — has increased on-street parking.
“Why can’t he build a single family home,” one neighbour said. “I think a duplex in our neighbourhood on that corner would be the biggest mistake,” she said, citing several accidents on the corner. “We don’t need any more congestion on that hill.” She went on to suggest that, if the duplex is built, she will attribute future accidents to it.
Another neighbour noted that two people have crashed into his parked truck after they lost control on the hill, and one took out his sun deck. “Don’t put the mighty dollar ahead of safety,” he said.
But safety was not ignored by council.
Coun. Kathy Wallace said: “There are safety concerns there.” On the other hand, she noted that the difference between a single family home and a duplex is only one parking space. Furthermore, winter parking is problematic right across Rossland as the steep streets get slick and narrow, and people park on the side of streets rather than shovel their driveways.
Coun. Jill Spearn said “I’m sure that public works will work with the neighbourhood to further their safety concerns and come up with solutions.”
Spearn paused to note she is “reluctant” about some of the small lot zoning recommended in the Official Community Plan and the Strategic Sustainability Plan. “We live in a rural community,” she said. “I don’t necessarily want small teenie lots, I like space.”
Junior Hamm, a carpenter and a neighbour to the proposed development with children who walk to school on St. Paul, raised a number of pertinent issues. Besides suggesting several traffic measures — no parking zones and closing a portion of Fifth Avenue to eliminate the risk and open up more off-street parking — he noted the importance of creating work in Rossland.
“This is an incredibly hard area to keep guys working year round,” he said. “For Kevin to try his hardest to keep guys working, it’s a pretty special thing.”
Coun. Kathy Moore pointed out, “had this gone through in the fall, several workers would have been employed all winter long.”
She added that “it’s just the neighbours who are opposed,” but overall the project has big benefits, particularly by diversifying Rossland’s housing stock with small, affordable homes.
Wallace concurred, pointing out that two owners on smaller lots can be preferable to one owner with a bigger investment.
Coun. Hanne Smith remained firmly in favour of the project, given “careful consideration of safety issues,” as did Coun. Andy Stradling who was absent during the vote last year.
Stradling suggested road reorganization, such as one-way streets, could address the safety issues he knows well from having lived in the neighbourhood.
He was confident: “There’s a win-win to be found.”