Register to force referendum on rezoning C.D.N. land gets only 2 signatures
A company proposing a housing development in Côte-des-Neiges has lost its bid to prevent the borough from rezoning the land it owns to industrial and commercial to thwart its project.
Linda Gyulai, Montreal Gazette
Borough Mayor Sue Montgomery and her Projet Montréal party majority on the borough council objected to the Bates Gardens four-storey condo project.	Pierre Obendrauf / The Gazette
A housing developer in Côte-des-Neiges has lost its bid to prevent the borough from rezoning the land it owns to industrial and commercial to block its project.
A register that the developer, Bates Gardens Limited Partnership, petitioned to have opened in an attempt to force a referendum on the zoning change for its Bates Rd. property failed to muster more than two signatures this week.
The register, which was held on Wednesday at the Côte-des-Neiges—Notre-Dame-de-Grâce borough office, required 131 signatures from eligible voters in the immediate neighbourhood to force a referendum.
The rezoning of the mostly vacant site at 3025 Bates is now confirmed, according to the procedure in such matters.
Borough Mayor Sue Montgomery and her Projet Montréal party majority on the borough council objected to the Bates Gardens four-storey condo project offering 170 family-size units at more than 10 per cent below market prices because the site is between the borough's public works yard and the railway tracks that run alongside Jean-Talon St.
Montgomery said last week the borough had no intention of moving its public works yard.
The rest of the neighbourhood is filled with low-rise apartment buildings.
"I wouldn't want my kids running around there," Montgomery said.
The developer's property was zoned residential in 2005 following the release of the city's urban plan. The urban plan called for the public works yard to be moved and redeveloped for housing.
Bates Garden Limited Partnership didn't require a zoning change for its housing project since the site already had the required zoning.
However, Catherine Doyle, a spokesperson for the developer, said last week that the borough rejected a request for a construction permit in early September. A few days later, a motion to rezone the property to industrial and commercial appeared on the agenda of a borough council meeting and was passed by the majority of council members.
The developer could not be reached for comment on Friday.
Provincial lobbying registry records show the owner of a property behind the developer's land and the public works yard began discussions with Montreal in 2018 concerning industrial and commercial uses of the site.
Last week, Doyle said the borough was stacking the odds against the developer by holding the register on a weekday several kilometres from the neighbourhood without much notice.
The borough contends its registers are always open for one day at the borough office on Décarie Blvd.
lgyulai@montrealgazette.com
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