A decade-old plan to connect Fountain Street South with the Bob McMullen Linear Trail in Preston will likely never happen now that the rare Charitable Research Reserve has broken off discussions with the city over concerns about the project.
After years of public consultation and study, the City of Cambridge wrapped up its Municipal Class Environmental Assessment (EA) to establish a new trail and pedestrian bridge between Blair and Preston through land owned by rare. The Region of Waterloo funded the $260,000 EA.
The bridge and trail was expected to provide a major off-road connection to downtown Preston as well as a connection to the the Highway 401 pedestrian bridge linking Cambridge to Kitchener and the Doon area on the Walter Bean Grand River Trail.
"Unfortunately the rare Charitable Reserve landowners are no longer interested in reviewing the possibility of further property discussions," said Jamie Croft, manager of infrastructure engineering with the city during a presentation Tuesday.
Their primary concerns are trespassing off the trail, vandalism and destruction to other parts of the property "in an ecologically sensitive confluence area of the Grand and Speed rivers."
Croft was there with Tricia Radburn, of consultants on the EA, RJ Burnside, to detail the preferred trail route, which takes a northern, straight line path through rare's property next to Fountain Street South.
He said several mitigation measures were addressed during the EA study, including plantings to discourage pedestrians from travelling off trail.
Options on the table Tuesday for council to consider were filing the EA as is, cancelling the filing or further expanding the EA to include the Fountain Street corridor.
Croft explained there is no obligation for council to move forward with the project once the EA is filed. He recommended against not filing the EA since it wouldn't document all of the extensive ecological, archaeological and consultation work that was part of it.
Expanding the EA would take the trail further down Fountain Street South to explore impacts to 33 lot frontages and would include options to go through private property to a new bridge route. That option, however, was screened out years ago due to elevated costs and social impacts, Croft said.
The Region of Waterloo doesn't support an expanded study and wouldn't fund it.
Staff recommended posting the draft EA file for the required 30 day public review period.
Once that has passed, the city can enter the detailed design phase of the project but would need an amicable property agreement with rare.
Croft said the project is essentially paused until those discussions can happen.
But based on what the charitable reserve's executive director Stephanie Sobek-Swant told council, they won't happen.
She has been promised the project won't go ahead without rare's consent and has asked that any future budgeting for the project stop.
"We are aware that this is disappointing to staff but we remain firm that this development project cannot occur on or near environmentally sensitive land that is under rare's owner and stewardship and we will not surrender our owner and stewardship to the city now or in the future," she said.
The organization opposes the concept because it goes against rare's conservation objectives despite agreeing with the active transportation mandate behind it, she said.
Sobek-Swant said rare would be happy to continue discussions around other options that don't put nature at risk. The proposed footbridge is excessive, she said.
Asked what those options might be, Sobek-Swant said a deeper dive needs to happen around options further upstream including city owned property between 309 and 315 Fountain Street, near where the proposed LRT bridge would fly over the Speed River.
She said rare doesn't want to have the "spectre of expropriation" over its head now or in the future in urging council to consider another direction.
"We're not selling any rare lands for development projects, period," she said. "I think we need that certainty."
Jason Collison, who has lived in the area for decades, said the justification for the bridge connection isn't warranted and he doesn't support the estimated $5 million construction cost for the trail. The consequences for rare and the community to shorten the distance around the route that's there now by "10 minutes" are not worth it, he said.
Despite staff's recommendation, the council vote on the option to withdraw the EA and not file passed with a vote of 8-1 with only Coun. Adam Cooper voting against it.
