Brenton Street residents oppose proposed 170-unit development

People who live near a proposed development in south-end Halifax are banding together to voice their opposition to the plan.

WM Fares Group wants to construct a 17-storey building on Brenton Street, a one-way street off Spring Garden Road.

The development would butt right up against the back of another WM Fares building, the Trillium on South Park Street.

"We were quite shocked at the size of the building — 170 units," said Debbie Toogood, who lives in the Trillium.

"We're 84 in our building, which is quite a large building." 

The proposed "Brenton Place" would use almost 90 per cent of the lot, putting the building right to the sidewalk along the street and right up to the property line in some spots.

Those who live across the street in the Charterhouse Condos are worried about the loss of sunshine from the shadows the development will cast.

They are also concerned about the parking situation. The new building only plans to have 92 parking spaces.

"We already have our front door blocked all the time," said Caroline Caskey, a condo owner in Charterhouse.

"[The street] is very narrow, and in fact, last winter with all that snow, it was one of the last ones to be plowed."

Homeowners in the adjacent neighbourhood of Schmidtville are also upset.

'Greed gone mad'

The Friends of Schmidtville group is now trying to get a heritage district designation for the area, bordered by Clyde Street, Wright Avenue, South Park and Queen streets..

"They're eating away at the edges of Schmidtville," said Larry Haiven, a member of the Schmidtville group.

"It's already half the size what it was historically and the idea is to just deteriorate the ambience of the place. It's greed gone mad." 

Schmidtville proponents think the Brenton Street development should be put on hold until the heritage designation for the neighbourhood is completed.

That could take up to a year.

WM Fares has a pre-application for Brenton Place before the city's design review committee.

That's an informal stage of the process. Once a formal application is made, the committee can accept the proposal, approve it with conditions, or reject it.

Decisions of the design review committee can be appealed to regional council.