This month’s planning meeting was delayed a day for the Thanksgiving holiday, which may have been a good thing because all of the projects were so big that council could use that extra day to prepare. This week at council, they discussed the work so far on another heritage conservation district, the first version of the newest Official Plan Amendment, a decision for one side of Clair and a new project for another. Here’s the recap…
Planning Meeting of City Council – October 15, 2025
It was a busy night at city council, one that started in the late afternoon.
First up was the draft plan and guidelines for the Downtown Guelph Heritage Conservation District. This was a battle between two furies: one, most obviously, being heritage protection and the second being the ongoing concerns about the impact of heritage designations on individual property owners. The consultants working on the project aimed to assure council that there’s flexibility in the plan, and that they’ve been working to quell any anxiety about the financial and logistical pressure of designation, but they were confident that the proposed plan threaded the needle and will allow change while preserving the core’s character.
Enter the one delegate on the matter, Christopher Bisson who was once a mortgage broker in Guelph. He said that he was neither in favour of the HCD nor was he against it, but he did have concerns about unintended consequences coming from the plan, and that the City was diving headfirst into creating a whole HCD because they’re racing against the clock and the deletion of the heritage registry in a little over a year.
Amongst the councillors the schism continued with Dan Gibson raising similar concerns to Bisson while Ward 5 rep Cathy Downer noted that living in an HCD is not an impediment from her experience living in one for years. While noting his concern that some policies and guidelines might end up being cumbersome to development, Mayor Cam Guthrie also observed that there’s a disconnect between the two potential outcomes being debated and that staff and council will need to sort that out before finalizing the heritage district plan. Council unanimously received the draft.
Next, council received the first phase of the new Official Plan amendment. The moves are mostly administrative, making sure that the OP lines up with recent legislative changes from the Ontario government, and new master plans approved by council. Staff walked council through the affected areas like parks, heritage, transportation, and the environment and they outlined some of the biggest changes that they’re working on, which mostly means new definitions for things like “employment area” and “build heritage resource”.
After that, council got into planning applications starting with the statutory planning meeting for two planned subdivisions on Clair Road West. On the north side of the future extension of Poppy Drive the developer wants high density that will push the present zoning from 150 units per hectare to 250 units per hectare, and on the south side there will be low density residential and open space, which is actually a decrease in planned density. Andrea Sinclair from MHBC Planning, representing the property owner Mattamy, said that though this block falls just slightly outside the intensification area at Clair/Gordon, it’s still ideal given its location and surround amenities.
Some on council had their doubts though because it felt like Mattamy might be overloading the site with density. Councillor Phil Allt took special exception to Mattamy’s phrasing that they were seeking “minor relief” from the density restrictions while Councillor Christine Billings noted that established homes on the north side of Clair were expecting to be facing a commercial or office block when they were first bought years ago and not apartment towers as high as 14-storeys. The loss of that employment land was also a concern, and all these worries combined were enough to get two councillors to vote against receipt of the draft plan.
Next, a rare sign bylaw variance for a new gas station sign on Southgate Drive. Staff had mixed feelings about the proposal and recommended to approve only one of the three requested exemptions. Liz Resch from Country Signs explained though that this was a purely commercial area, so no one’s sleep was going to be disturbed with a big new Petro Canada sign, and they already sought and received approval for it at the Ministry of Transportation Ontario. Council rejected the staff recommendation and then voted to approve all the requested exemptions.
Finally, one month after it came to council the first time, a decision was rendered about the proposed redevelopment of 1 Clair Road East. Oz Kemal from MHBC Planning delegated on behalf of the plaza’s owners saying that the development will actually bring more commercial space to the property (discounting the movie theatre which is technically recreation), and that they were maximizing access while offering something that would also be pedestrian friendly. If you’re still concerned about losing your favourite movie theatre though, Kemal said that the Galaxy Cinema will only leave its current site if they “choose to close.”
Timelines? Still nothing firm. When asked, Kemal said that they’re not yet thinking about phasing, and they have no preconceived plan for how they might proceed with redevelopment, they just wanted the changes to be approved so that they could be ready, but First Capital REIT, the owners of the plaza, are apparently in no rush to push anyone out.
Council approved the recommendation to amend the land use designation, which means that First Capital has their approvals, but there was still a doubt about the woonerfs, or living street. The original Dutch concept is proposed to be used here as a north/south connection, but Councillor Ken Yee Chew wanted some assurance that the future woonerf would not become a through road for traffic looking to avoid more congested arteries.
Chew proposed an amendment to the main motion that would restrict that north/south road through the property to service and emergency vehicles only until the City can do a more complete traffic study once Poppy Drive and the South End Community Centre are complete. That amendment ended up failing as some on council felt it was overly restrictive and outside of what the planning department can do under its authority, but a motion was approved to provide the community feedback about woonerf concerns through the site plan approval process.
The meeting wrapped up with Guthrie paying tribute to Deputy CAO Jayne Holmes, who is moving on from the City of Guelph although no one said to what. Still, it’s worth noting that Guelph has now turned over 75 per cent of its executive team in the last 18 months.
Click here to see the complete recap of the meeting.
Guelph Politico 