Plans are forging ahead for a major industrial development along the southern edge of the community.
Halton Hills Council has approved a zoning bylaw amendment that will make way for the eight-building complex totalling almost two million square feet by BentallGreenOak Ltd. (BGO) on Eighth Line, just north of Steeles Avenue.
Plans include the construction of an east/west collector road that connects to Trafalgar Road, which will provide truck access for the BGO development and the employment lands to the south, where Prologis is also building a large-scale logistics complex.
During Monday’s council meeting, Mayor Ann Lawlor called the plan a “significant development” in the Town’s Premier Gateway Employment Area.
“It really is going to dominate the landscape and be quite a significant set of buildings in the gateway to our community. It’s massive,” she said.
BGO head of Canadian development Brad Caco shared similar sentiments on the “very large, very intense” scale of the plans and characterized the development as a “win-win-win for all involved.”
In response to a question from the mayor, he told council it’s a bit early in the process to have prospective tenants, but that BGO will be looking for a cross section of the uses permitted in the zoning bylaw.
The approved zoning allows for employment-related industrial businesses, including warehouses and manufacturing uses.
The collection of buildings on BGO’s property will have 352 loading docks.
The structures will have a maximum height of 17 metres, with permission to increase this to a limit of 33.5 metres for a frozen cold storage warehouse, if such a business was to become a tenant.
The development will be phased, with the Town anticipating a site plan application for the first two buildings in the near future. Through this process, the exact location and construction details of the east/west collector road will be finalized as well.
