[URBAN NOTE] "Rouge National Urban Park Stalled"

[rfmcdonald]

Torontoist's Kat Eschner writes about the jurisdictional issues hindering an enlargement of Rouge National Urban Park, on the eastern frontier of Toronto.

Kathleen Wynne isn’t the only Ontario politician critical of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s environmental record. Liberal cabinet minister Brad Duguid says the Conservatives are failing Torontonians on an issue close to home, and it could jeopardize what was supposed to be a crown jewel in northeastern Toronto.

On his last visit, the prime minister told Toronto the government was expanding plans for the country’s first urban national park, located in northeast Scarborough. But Duguid, MPP for Scarborough Centre, told Torontoist that the provincial government isn’t currently willing to move forward with the planned park.

Harper announced that the Government of Canada will contribute an additional 21 square kilometres of land to Rouge National Urban Park, which increases the size of the park by approximately one third. But that’s only if the provincial and federal governments can sort a dispute over environmental protections, and the park ever gets built.

Although the federal government is donating new land, the province said this spring that it isn’t willing to hand over any parkland until an agreement on environmental protections is reached.