Town plans to sell road allowance
Developer wants to add unopened road to its property west of Hastings
For sale soon, a stretch of road to nowhere.
Trent Hills Council decided on Tuesday to start the legal process to declare as surplus a section of unopened road allowance at the end of Silver Heights Drive, just west of Hastings.
Once the bylaw declaring it surplus has passed, probably at the next meeting, the municipality will officially offer it to adjacent landowners. It expects Rice Lake Properties Corporation of Roseneath, which owns the land to the north, will want to purchase the allowance. It has already paid an application fee and $5,000 to cover the town’s costs.
Planner Cameron Law said the 720 metres of road allowance covers 3.76 acres and the usual price is $12,500 per acre, for a projected price of $47,000.
Law’s report to council said Rice Lake Properties has been acquiring several small lots in the area near Baxter Road and is expected to come forward with development plan at some point.
“Over the past year, the applicant has been reaching out to landowners in the area to purchase the lots, which have not been developed due to a lack of frontage on municipal roads,” Law wrote. “Several cottages were constructed on these lots between 1948-1960 but have long been abandoned.”
At a public hearing on changes to property on Baxter Road, Law said the small lots were originally sold as garden plots for city dwellers, but some later had structures built on them. In some cases lots were combined making them large enough to legally have cottages built.
Law said the portion of unassumed roadway “may have been installed by cottage owners privately decades ago, as it does appear to have been filled in and stamped down. The road has been travelled by neighbours for leisure but is currently not used to access any properties.”
Law told Councillor Dennis Savery that someone at sometime placed large rocks across the trail to prevent ATVs from using the path.
Depending on Rice Lake Properties eventual development plans, the roadway could revert to the municipality as an upgraded road, or be retained as a private laneway, Law wrote in his report.
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