By Roy Wood, Special to the Times Chronicle
Osoyoos council has OK’d a frontage rule exemption for a concrete products company seeking to subdivide its property in the town’s west-side industrial park.
Osoyoos Aggregates and Ready-Mix occupies the roughly triangular-shaped parcel at the far northwestern end of the Highway 3 Osoyoos Industrial Park.
According to a report presented to council on October 14 by planner Chris Garrish, the company applied in August to subdivide the roughly four-hectare lot into two approximately equal lots.
According to maps and photos accompanying the report, the subdivision seems to separate the two entities, Osoyoos Ready-Mix onto parcel A and Osoyoos Aggregates onto parcel B.
Map and photo showing proposed subdivision which appears to separate the two entities, Osoyoos Ready-Mix onto parcel A and Osoyoos Aggregates onto parcel B.
Town of Osoyoos images
However, the application runs afoul of a provision of the Local Government Act, which requires that a minimum of 10 per cent of the perimeter of any property must front onto a road. Just under five per cent of Lot A’s perimeter fronts on 115th Street.
The provincial legislation gives local government the right to grant exemptions to the requirement.
In the analysis section of his report, Garrish pointed out that the main purpose of the 10 per cent frontage requirement is “to ensure safe, accessible, serviceable, and orderly development patterns while preventing inefficient, unmanageable parcel layouts.”
An underlying concern is that narrow frontage properties may present access challenges for emergency services or lead to conflict between property owners.
Garrish noted the town’s “Panhandle Policy,” which provides guidance for allowing narrow-frontage parcels when there is no alternative subdivision possible or no possibility of a new road being created to eliminate the need for the narrow frontage.
In summary, Garrish listed reasons in favour of granting the exemption:
- The proposed usable frontage for Lot A remains more than 20 metres;
- The fire department hasn’t expressed concerns about access to the property for emergency vehicles;
- Town operations staff haven’t flagged any issues around provision of services;
- It appears unlikely the frontage will adversely affect neighbouring properties; and
- There are no future road plans that would be affected by the frontage.
Town of Osoyoos image
Following Garrish’s presentation, Councillor Jim King received confirmation that the current two access roads to the site would be the same once the subdivision was completed. Council then voted unanimously to grant the exemption.
Osoyoos Aggregates and Ready Mix currently share a website describing the services of both operations: a sand, gravel, and other earth-related services; and a pre-mixed concrete supplier.
Queries to the company as to why the property was potentially being turned into a subdivision and what this means for the business going forward were left unanswered at press time.
