BRENDA O’FARRELL
The 1510 West

Fairview Forest, the subject that was once described by a Pointe Claire resident as having been placed under a “gag order,” could be the topic of public consultations as the city’s council last week, in a rare show of conciliation, adopted a motion to consider the future of privately owned green spaces.

The question of when those public consultations will be held and what form they would take are still not know, however. In fact, this lack of detail prompted one member of council, councillor Claude Cousineau, to vote against the motion.

The latest resolution calls to “re-establish a clear approach to consider the future of private green spaces through public participation in a consultation process.” It comes after a motion put forward by Pointe Claire Mayor Tim Thomas at a special meeting of council last month calling for public consultations on green spaces, including Fairview Forest, was soundly defeated.

Describing the support for the new motion as a “watershed moment,” Thomas said: “It shows a willingness to adapt and move forward.”

Proposed by councillor Eric Stork, the move mandates the city’s administration to draft a report for council that outlines how recent provincial legislation, including Bill 39, which gives municipalities new powers to protect green spaces, wetlands and natural habitats; and Bill 22, which provides municipal councils wider latitude to expropriate land, with new guidelines limiting costs. The report will also include details of housing densification requirements expected to be imposed on Pointe Claire by the pending update of the regional planning code, specifically in areas that are serviced by public transit lines like the new REM light rail line that borders the 43-acres Fairview Forest by the Fairview shopping mall.

This report is to be delivered to council by Feb. 1, 2025. With this information, council would then put together what the resolution calls “an action plan for public participation.” There is no timeline for when this public engagement would roll out.

Resident Geneviève Lussier, spokesperson for the Save Fairview Forest group, which has been advocating for the preservation of the woodland, asked council to also include details about how the regional planning code being put forward by the Communauté métropolitaine de Montréal stipulates how municipalities should protect 30 per cent of their territories as green space.

Several other residents greeted the willingness to publicly discuss the future of Fairview Forest with approval.

“It looks like you’ve made yourselves an opportunity and responded with some leadership to finally sort this out in a way you know citizens want,” said resident Ralph Stocek, who has publicly chastised council in the past for failing to work together and fuelling a climate of discord.

Although Stocek described the motion as “a real step in leadership and compromise,” he expressed a reservation to council.

“It is our city’s role, our city’s administration, the city councillors role to determine our future, not a private corporation, even if they do own the land,” Stocek said, referring to Cadillac Fairview, which owns the Fairview Forest.

Last month, Thomas put forward a motion to hold two additional public consultation meetings – one on green spaces, including Fairview Forest, and one on the height of buildings in the parking lot area at the Fairview Pointe Claire shopping centre, which the owner of the property, Cadillac Fairview, has proposed to redevelop.

Thomas said the city’s consultation process to date has failed to broach the topic of what residents would like to see happen with the forest next to the shopping mall, the last large undeveloped tract of land in the city. It has also failed to allow citizens to have input on the height of residential buildings in the centre of the city, a topic that has created concern among residents since Cadillac Fairview unveiled its plans for what has been touted to be the “downtown of the West Island,” with the construction of a 20-storey seniors complex and two 25-storey apartment buildings between the mall and the new REM train line. The towers would be more than twice the height of any other building in the city.