Kitchener Heritage District at Risk at 22 Weber

A developer is challenging the legislation that protects the Civic Centre Heritage District at 22 Weber St W.

Friends of Olde Berlin Town needs your help to protect built heritage, neighbours’ rights, an established neighbourhood and to uphold local planning. Contributions to this campaign form one important source of funding to help pay for expert witnesses and other costs at the Ontario Land Tribunal.

In 2008, the Province, Region and City established the Civic Centre Heritage Conservation District within the Olde Berlin Town Neighbourhood with an area comprising less than a quarter of one percent (0.25%) of Kitchener’s land base. 

Today, a developer is appealing to the Ontario Land Tribunal (formerly Local Planning Appeal Tribunal and Ontario Municipal Board) to re-zone 22 Weber St W as follows:

Notes

1. The Civic Centre Heritage District Conservation Plan takes precedence over conflicting zoning. The Plan recommends alignment with the adjacent building most similar to the predominant setback on the street, in this case 7m and provides direction regarding shadowing and constraining buildings within a 45-degree angular plane from the rear property line.

2. Full development permissions of SGA zoning are only available to properties meeting lot width and area requirements.

Our Concerns

Kitchener’s Official Plan promises intensification with appropriate transitions from low-rise residences and conservation of existing neighbourhoods and built heritage. We maintain the developer’s proposal contravenes legislative intent and would:

  • block sunlight to nearby low-rise properties, businesses and homes

  • encroach on neighbours’ privacy

  • diminish neighbours’ enjoyment of their homes and workplaces

  • exacerbate wind tunnels on Weber, Roy and other streets

and harm the Heritage Conservation District:

  • detract from neighbourhood character 

  • overwhelm heritage properties

  • compromise a stable neighbourhood

  • set a dangerous precedent

We need your help to oppose the application at the Ontario Land Tribunal.

Please visit http://obtfriends.ca for more details, and help us pay for legal representation and expert witnesses by donating below.

About Friends of Olde Berlin Town

Friends of Olde Berlin Town is pursuing an equitable and inclusive community. We support compatible, inclusive development that permits existing neighbours to thrive and the heritage district to endure.

We support affordable housing, protecting our countryside, conserving architectural heritage and ensuring fairness in land-use legislation.

And we oppose the developer’s proposal for 22 Weber St W. We maintain it is inequitable to neighbours and destructive of the heritage district.