Saturday November 3, 2024 | LANGFORD, BC [Posted 9:53 am | Updated 5:55 pm]
by Mary P Brooke | Island Social Trends
A mid-day open house about the City of Langford Phase 2 Official Community Plan (OCP) was well-attended yesterday.
Held in the gymnasium at Ruth King Elementary School, the three-hour Saturday drop-in event allowed for touring through dozens of display boards and chats with staff and members of council.
The refresh/rethink process about Langford’s OCP is guided primarily by adaptation to a central known factor of urban life in this city — population growth. The city’s population is expected to double within the next 25 years, from the current 50,000 up to 100,000.
That might be a smaller population than some other bigger cities in BC but for local residents, planners and community leaders the impacts of population growth have significant impacts including taxation, services, and livability.
Around the gym at the November 2 open house residents could affix sticky notes with comments onto information boards, chat with staff and elected officials, and share ideas among themselves. Kids could play with toys. There was coffee and treats.
The open house was an opportunity for residents to learn more about the “initially preferred options” from a broad range of deep and important topics in the realm of urban planning including structural and community amenities.
Who was there:
Members of council in attendance included Mayor Scott Goodmanson and Councillors Kimberley Guiry, Colby Harder, Mark Morley, Lillian Szpak, Mary Wagner and Keith Yacucha — all of whom answered many questions for residents.
Residents across the adult age range were there, with children along as well.
Senior staffers on hand included Darren Kiedyk, Braden Hutchins, Matthew Baldwin, Donnie Petrie, and Kate Balzer.
Urban planning consultant Brent Toderian was also there to chat with residents.
Online survey:
Whether residents attended the November 2 open house or not, everyone is invited to participate in a Phase 2 survey.
It’s an opportunity to respond in detail to ideas that were collected in Phase 1 public engagement this past spring and summer. The Phase 2 is now active online up to November 20, 2024.
Four parts to the online survey:
People are busy. It helps that the detailed Langford OCP Phase 2 survey is presented in four parts, Engage with each part on your own schedule:
- OCP Survey Part 1: Growth Through Urban Infill and Mobility Choice
- OCP Survey Part 2: High Quality City-Building & New City Centre Policy
- OCP Survey Part 3: Mixed Use and Choice of Use Centres, The “4Cs” of Growth Management, New Urban Hierarchy of Places & Urban Employment Lands
- OCP Survey Part 4: Achieving Complete Communities, Realizing Neighbourhood Scale Villages, Corner Convenience.”
Paper copies of the survey are also available at City Hall reception, ground floor unit #117 – 877 Goldstream Avenue.
The city encourages residents to sign up on LetsChatLangford.ca and follow the City on social media to be notified about the various engagement opportunities over the next many months.
Phase 1 got things rolling:
During Phase 1 of public engagement, the city identified community priorities and best practices in city-building.
The City has issued an Ideas Paper that includes community feedback and links these ideas to significant new concepts and methods for high-quality city-building. Throughout the document, these ideas are called “initially preferred options.”
Phase 2 gauges public support:
Phase 2 public engagement seeks to gauge public support and concerns at an early stage, allowing adjustments before finalizing the draft OCP.
Feedback on initial options will guide development of the ideas and comments for inclusion in the draft, which will be shared for further input in Phase 3.
“We’re carefully listening to and integrating community feedback in phases to develop a refreshed OCP for Langford. Responsible development and positive growth require active and continual community engagement,” says Langford Mayor Scott Goodmanson.
“Your input throughout the refresh process will form the foundation of the City’s planning decisions to ensure we remain a community that thrives,” says Goodmanson to the community.
Urban planner:
Urban infill or sprawl? Car dependency or mobility choice? “Any city can decide to transform its city-building, and make the many hard decisions for a better future. Langford, BC is creating a new Official Community Plan, and I’m advising them,” says Brent Toderian, who led a public input session back in January 2024 for Phase 1.
He encourages Langford residents to read the innovative Ideas Paper that builds on Phase 1 public consultation.
“The new survey will test public support for the bold and important new ideas,” says Toderian. He encourages people to be part of the new plan for their community.
This is 16 years later:
For the first time in 16 years, the City of Langford is updating and re-evaluating aspects of its Official Community Plan (OCP) to strategically meet the needs of residents.
This includes addressing major issues such as climate change, housing affordability, social equity, public health, and increasing infrastructure costs.
The effectiveness of Langford’s new OCP in creating opportunities to tackle these challenges will depend on where and how the city decides to grow. A key component that drives the refresh is the estimate of population growth: Langford presently has about 50,000 residents and is expected to double in size to 100,000 residents by 2050.
Phase 3:
Feedback from Phase 2 will help determine whether the current set of ideas should be developed further and included in the draft OCP.
That process will be undertaken (including further opportunity for community input) during Phase 3.
===== RELATED:
- Langford OCP Refresh Phase 2 includes Nov 2 open house (November 1, 2024)
- Royal Roads University west shore research open house (October 30, 2024)
- Huge turnout at Langford community fun day in Happy Valley (August 29, 2024)
- Alistair MacGregor attends Langford Community Fun Day (July 18, 2024)
- Langford Community Fun Day to launch master plan engagement (July 15, 2024)
- Opinion: Langford OCP refresh faces some challenges (January 26, 2024)
- Well-attended intro to Langford OCP refresh (January 24, 2024)
- Langford launches Facebook page & online community forum (June 21, 2023)
NEWS SECTIONS: LANGFORD | VANCOUVER ISLAND | ENVIRONMENT & SUSTAINABILITY | HOUSING