A development proposed for St. Albert's northwest corner got two small votes of confidence Monday when city council approved two decisions aimed at reducing the roadblocks faced by the Avenir development.
The first decision exempts the Avenir land that borders Carrot Creek from a study the city will undertake to find a desirable location for industrial development. Council also endorsed a request to reduce a landfill setback as soon as Alberta Environment provides a remediation certificate.
Both decisions are key to providing clarity, said Avenir project director David Bromley.
"If we hadn't got these decisions tonight we were walking. We were finished," he said.
The industrial land study isn't expected to be done until late 2011. The proponents of Avenir have been pursuing their development since spring 2009 and weren't prepared to wait another year, Bromley said.
Bromley has been calling for a more streamlined process since one month after first publicizing the project in May 2009. He's appeared before council twice this year asking that the process be sped up.
Bromley said in an interview that he's been working very hard to attract partners but it's been difficult.
"When you don't have clarity from the city side it really destroys your efforts," he said. "Getting this clarity was very, very important to us."
For councillors, the real decision-making will begin April 26 when a public hearing is scheduled to hear details from Avenir proponents. The hearing will also include the proponents of the St. Albert Sports Village, a development proposed for land adjacent to the Avenir project.
The projects require an amendment to the municipal development plan to change the land use from its current designation as future study area, a tag the city used to "park" annexed lands that were thought to have potential for industrial development. Avenir proponents will seek to have their land designated as residential while the proponents of the sports village will seek to have theirs split between industrial and commercial.
One issue standing in the way of the Avenir/SAS development is a landfill on the sports village site that the city's environment department insists needs clearance from Alberta Environment before a development can proceed.
Councillors are looking forward to April 26.
"I think a lot of us just want to get the information on the table, get the development procedure back on track, so we can evaluate it and make a decision," said Coun. Cam MacKay.
Mayor Nolan Crouse was the only one to vote against exempting Avenir land from the industrial land study, arguing that council should wait until all the information comes forward at the upcoming public hearing.
Partnership
Bromley announced to council Monday that Avenir will partner with technology giant Cisco Systems.
Bromley had little detail about what the partnership would bring to the development or to St. Albert but said the partnership was official and would proceed with two pillars.
"The first pillar is to make this an off-site location for Fort McMurray," Bromley said. "We would be able to bring in administrative and engineering and technical staff that could work from this location."
Cisco will also provide technology to make Avenir a "smart and connected" community, he said.
He's trying to schedule a May workshop for the company to share its ideas with a sampling of local stakeholders.
"We're going to have this workshop with them where it will become a much clearer picture as what they see they can do in this community," he said.
