By David F. Rooney
City Council has approved a development permit for David Evans’ Mackenzie Village subdivision at 1750 Nichol Road pending his meeting five conditions.
The conditions are:
- The applicant is to provide a landscape estimate and security in the amount of 125% of the estimated value;
- The applicant is to provide light standard details for the strata road right of way and for the development area which are to be reviewed by staff to ensure they are sufficiently shielded to minimize impacts to surrounding land uses as per applicable Development Permit Area and OCP policies;
- The applicant is to provide garbage bin standard details to be reviewed by staff to ensure they are sufficiently bear/wildlife proof as per applicable OCP policies;
- The applicant is to provide an acceptable Section 219 Covenant to be registered on title, to which the City would be Party to, in order to restrict the basement storey for each of the proposed buildings from containing any habitable accommodation; and
- The applicant is to provide an updated Trail Network Plan showing the re-alignment of the commuter trail to the East side of the Phase 1 Strata Road Right of Way and the overall integration of the re-alignment with future development phases, which is to be reviewed by staff to ensure substantial compliance with the Master Development Agreement.
Mackenzie Village is an ambitious and far-sighted development in Arrow Heights that will, at build-out, see the construction of townhouses, apartments, condominiums and singe-family homes.
Phase 1 of the project will see construction of a mix of apartments and condos in seven low-rise buildings by Christmas this year. Phase 2, expected to be built in 2018 will consist of two mixed-use buildings facing Nichol Road. They will contain ground-floor neighbourhood retail spaces for restaurants, cafes, pubs and convenience stores with small, medium and large apartments on the upper floors.
Those first two phases will be followed by 10 additional phases by 2017. All of those planned residential phases include townhouses, apartments, condos and single-family homes. (You can watch this on the video below beginning at the 24:28 mark.)
Council has approved a new five-year partnership with the Chamber of Commerce. Under the agreement, the City will pay the Chamber $90,000 a year in return for marketing Revelstoke and providing information services. (You can watch this beginning at the 34:58-point on the video.)
In other business, Council decided to recommend to the Columbia Shuswap Regional District that it grant $125,000 to the Columbia Valley Skateboard Association (CVSA) and $160,000 to the Revelstoke Golf Club for their on-going projects. The grants would come from the CSRD’s Economic Opportunity Fund. Please click here to read a report to Council about this issue.
The CVSA is building a professionally designed skateboard facility at Kovach Park (Click here and here to read two recent stories about this project). The Golf Course is seeking the funding for improvements that will make it more sustainable. (You can see Council’s discussion of this on the video below starting at the 38-minute mark.)
In other news Council heard a report from Mike Thomas, director of Engineering and Development, on why the Big Eddy Waterworks project will see the construction of two reservoirs and a third well.
“Benefits to having a second reservoir include the ability to maintain a reservoir while keeping fire protection and emergency storage,” Thomas said in his report to Council. “The existing reservoir does have a leak about half way up the concrete wall, but otherwise appears to be in reasonable condition. This will need to be repaired in the near future. Meeting fire flow requirements is an obvious benefit of the second reservoir, and in choosing a smaller reservoir design, this has the added ability to more easily manage chlorine residual in the system, particularly during periods of lower consumption.” (You can watch this beginning at the 43:30-mark on the video below.)
In other news, Earl Hunt of BC Timber Sales appeared before Council to tell Mayor McKee and the Councillors that “increased Douglas-fir beetle activity was detected in the Mount Macpherson area in the summer of 2016.” This means that the beetle infestation will have to be suppressed by cutting affected trees, he said. Please click here to watch his Powerpoint presentation. (You can also watch Hunt’s presentation beginning at the 3:20 point on the video below.)
McKee told Council that a potentially accident occurred earlier Tuesday when a logging truck’s load of trees hit the railway overpass over Victoria Road. This was, he said, indicative of a hidden danger. He said he would meet with the RCMP and Downie Timber to prevent a much more serious accident in the future. (You can watch that at the two-minute mark on the video below.)
And lastly, Mayor McKee welcomed Nicole Fricot, the City’s new director of Community Economic Development. (You can watch that at the 40-second mark on the video below.)
