Greenbelt

On November 4th 2022 ERO 019-6216, a proposed amendment to the Greenbelt Act, was published. The Ontario government suggested removing or redesignating 7,400 acres of Greenbelt land to accommodate future growth and housing developments in the near term. In addition, the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing proposed that land in the Paris Galt Moraine be added to the Greenbelt Area. Some Urban River Valleys have been proposed to be added to the Greenbelt in a previous ERO (ERO 019-4485, March 24, 2022) and these same proposed additions have been carried through to this amendment, bringing the total area of the land which would be added to the Greenbelt up to 9,400 acres. The size of the Paris Galt Moraine addition on its own is not mentioned in this proposal. Some supporting material was provided by the government to show where lands are to be added and removed, however the specifics of these areas are not included. Information such as the area of each change as well as the land cover in these areas are not included. As such, I have assembled and analyzed open data from the Ontario Government and municipalities as well as from Esri imagery to create the map you see below. Explore it to find out where and what lands this proposal intends to change.

 Click here to view a full screen version of the map.

My original intention for producing this map was to know exactly the area occupied by these individual regions, by the combined regions being removed, redesignated, and added, and the area of landcovers within these regions. You can click on features in the above map to view areas of specific sections of landcover and individual regions. The below charts summarize this information.

Note that while it seems the same types and areas of lands being removed from the greenbelt are also being added under the proposed change, remember that the ones being added were already green spaces, while those removed will all be developed and therefore gone. We are destroying green space and there is truly no addition of agriculture or woodland. Also note that a large portion of what is being 'added' to the Greenbelt under the change is already environmentally protected. 

The exact areas of landcover by proposed greenbelt change can be found in the table below.