My Point of View: Is Wortley Village the right place for luxury condos? Part 2

[The following continues a series of short thoughts about the development process as it pertains to an empty lot at the corner of Wortley Rd. and Bruce St. in Old South, London]

Yesterday I mentioned I am not only in favour of some kind of retail/residential development at the corner of Wortley and Bruce St. Wortley Village but envisioned, in past years, ‘a three-story U-shaped building with an inner courtyard/cafe seating area.’

Who wouldn’t want to retire to a nice apartment, for example, one or two stories above a lovely coffee shop or at least close to the corner of coffee and hardware at Wortley and Craig, one block north?

I know I would - some day.

However, I wouldn’t live in the building that is being proposed at present.

In an email from Wendy McCaul, another Village resident, I learned that a proposal was on the table that did not find favour with many others, if any, except for a few in a city planning department and the developer.

Wendy wrote:

There is a meeting tomorrow morning, Feb. 6, at the Landon library put on by the Old South Community Organization, to let the community know more about this proposal and hopefully to fight it - the owner of A Village Tail said that they've been very hush-hush about it, perhaps thinking they can just blindside people w/ it??

I guess this was a last-minute meeting due to the short notice of the proposal.  I intend to spread the word to other tenants in my building, though, and help out w/ whatever can be done to hopefully stop it from happening.

Though I missed the next day’s meeting my curiosity was piqued, and when Wendy sent a link to a London Free Press story on Feb. 8 about the proposed building and people’s reaction to it (33 comments in all) I tuned in more carefully.

She also sent a link to a Feb. 8 afternoon meeting to discuss the following ‘minor’ variances (a City Hall term, I believe):

2:00 p.m - A.019/10 - 162 Wortley Road - Hampton Group Inc.

Request to construct a residential/commercial building with a rear yard setback of 1.5m whereas 6.6m is required;

a lot coverage of 82% whereas 70% maximum is permitted (it was noted at a later date that 82 needed to be changed to 92 per cent);

a building height of 13.4m whereas 12m maximum is permitted;

and 36 parking spaces whereas 44 are required.

As I said at the outset, I would say yes to some form of development where a muddy parking lot now sits, but, to answer the question ‘is Wortley Village the right place for luxury condos,’ I would heartily say no, not as it stands at this time.

A subsequent meeting at City Hall on Feb. 17 related to the ‘minor’ variances and design features cemented my feelings into place.

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Thank you to two readers who left comments at Part 1.

I would encourage new readers to scroll down to them now.

If you have questions or information about the development process, please feel free to drop me a line.

Be aware I may add your thoughts to the story.

Please click here to read Part 3.

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