Kincardine Council was able to hear a delegation that focused on potential infill development for more housing within the municipality.
Staff worked with BuildingIN, which is a federal grant opportunity that helps municipalities investigate solutions to deal with housing shortages.
Rosaline Hill, who is the Principal Architect, Senior Planner, Development Consultant for RJH Architecture & Planning says that infill housing is the best way to create homes without sprawling out to accommodate population growth, starting with filling in open areas near the downtown core.
“When we think about new housing, there are three options. And for municipalities across Canada, there are three options: out, in, or up,” she explained to council on Wednesday. “In Kincardine, you’ll be focusing on [building] out or in, because you’re not really looking to go up.”
While concerns for infill development tend to revolve around changing the character of the downtown area with increased housing volume, there is a gradual approach to making sure that it’s just right.
“It never drops on you all at once, it comes incrementally over time. One year, you might get a couple buildings, another year, another building… a few years later another building,” Hill explained.
The presentation also shared a map of where infill housing units could be placed within the Municipality of Kincardine, but Hill shared that it wasn’t necessary to build in all of those areas, and that any of the areas highlighted could potentially be the perfect setting for multi-unit infill houses.
“A majority of homes in a neighbourhood typically stay exactly as they are, so that the homes and lifestyles that already exist in Kincardine’s older neighbourhoods, should the neighbourhood intensify, most of those home are really unaffected by this kind of change.”
Hill shared some of the criteria that her firm uses for finding a possible site for a multi-unit building.
Qualifying areas must be within low-rise residential areas, in older neighbourhoods, not in an environmentally sensitive area such as a floodplain, be serviced by municipal water, storm, and sanitary sewers, and not have a heritage designation.
The BuildingIN program helps municipalities to address housing challenges with scalable solutions, with the approach of adding multi-unit, low-rise developments into existing neighbourhoods.
Council received the report for information.
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