Collingwood, ON

When I meet new people who are considering a move to Collingwood and area, I like to give them what I call my "cook's tour." What people see driving through or visiting on vacation merely scratches the surface and never meets the core of what a town is really all about.

On just such a tour last week, I drove my clients past our water treatment plant. They thought this was a rather odd thing for me to show off and then, when I told them that Collingwood had one of the safest and best water supplies in the world, I saw them snicker to one another. I'm sure they were thinking that I was in full sales pitch mode. But then I explained.

Collingwood's Water Works was established way back in 1889 and later became a public utility in 1912. With our water supply coming from Georgian Bay, our old water treatment plants was basically comprised of a settlement process and chemical disinfection prior to pumping in to our water distribution system. That system worked for a very long time and likely because Georgian Bay is known to contain some of the purest water in the world.

Nonetheless, water borne parasites are endemic and in 1996, the town was gripped by an illness called cryptosporidium believed to potentially originate in water. The leaders of the day didn't want to take any chances and so a decision was made to build a state-of-the-art water treatment facility which was completed in 1998.

This plant uses ZeeWeed® membrane technology from a company called Zenon which utilizes ultra filtration methods to process the raw water without the use of chemicals for coagulation. Today, our Water Treatment Plant is the International training centre for Zenon Membrane water treatment facilities. To date, over 1500 people from cities around the world have visited our plant to look at the ZeeWeed® technology.

In the most recent Ministry of Environment inspection that examined every aspect o the water filtration plant and system, Collingwood scored a perfect 100 per cent. While I would hope every system in Ontario would need to meet a 100% score, the reality is that only about 200 of 710 water systems in Ontario receive a perfect score. That's only about 28% and that scares the heck out of me!

So, now you might understand why I like to show off our water treatment plant. And yes, we do have one of the best and safest water supplies in the world. Yet another reason to move to Collingwood!

Nothing fires up debate in our fair town of Collingwood better than a plan to tear down a heritage building. Every time the issue arises, entrenched camps form with flaring tempers, passionate appeals and political hand wringing. There have often been lines drawn in the sand: tear it down or, fix it and leave it. Neither seems right to me.

In the last few years, the issue has come up over and over again as the town struggles with the impact of enormous growth pressures. Many of the properties are public assets such as old schools and the question of maintenance, restoration falls to municipal shoulders.

Some people look at an old building and see an unsafe, derelict and ugly structure that is better torn down and replaced by something more modern and functional. Others see a piece of our cultural heritage that tells the story of our people and our town. Both sides can agree that when it's gone, it's gone forever.

One such property under threat at present is the old Connaught school on Napier Street which is also known as the Contact Centre or Collingwood Fitness Centre. This town owned structure is one of the last turn-of-the-century institutional buildings left and it features architecture that is never duplicated today. But it's more than that. If the walls could talk, it would peal with the laughter of children who arrived by horse and buggy rather than by bus. It would speak of foreboding teachers who comforted and protected children during two world wars and the great depression.

As a town owned fitness centre, this building has deteriorated due to a lack of maintenance and likely from the effects of humidity related to the indoor therapeutic pool. It has not been remotely self-sufficient and is heavily subsidized by tax dollars for the relatively few people who make use of the facility. On the other hand, it is an important public asset and there is a plan under foot to replace it with a more modern facility in a different location. Bu then what happens to the building?

The Collingwood heritage committee is looking at developing a statement of cultural heritage value for the property; potentially a first step in having it designated as a heritage site. I can see the battle lines being drawn already.

I am firmly on the side of protecting our heritage assets and believe that there are ways to satisfy all parties. Creative adaptive re-uses can be found for our heritage buildings that preserve and renew the structures at the same time giving them new life and new use. Let's hope everyone is starting to think about options for this building; not drawing firm lines in the sand.

Our daily lives are dramatically impacted by the liveability of the community we live in. Access to transit, our civic spaces, community amenities and the form of new development around us impact us the way building heights, trees and sidewalks more obviously do.

The Town of Collingwood is undertaking the development of an Urban Design Standards. Not guidelines but, actual and enforceable standards. They will direct the way new commercial, industrial, and multi-unit development will look and function in Collingwood.

According to a presentation made to council in December, the purpose of the Project is to develop urban design standards that will:

1. direct new development that is guided by the community's Official Plan, Council policy,
various policy documents and past community participation processes;
2. improve livability within the community;
3. ensure a high quality of design and function within, and adjacent to, new commercial
industrial, and multi-unit residential development;
4. reduce environmental impacts associated with new commercial, industrial, and multi-unit
residential development; and,
5. streamline the development application review process by providing clear and easily understood direction on urban design.

These have all been significant topics of interest in Collingwood over the last few years as the pace of growth has eclipsed anything we've seen before. People worry about traffic, trees, pollution and parking. We argue passionately in this town about signage, about environmental impacts, about preserving heritage and about aesthetics. People want liveable spaces that have a small town feel but urban amenities and most of all, locals don't want to look like "Anytown, Canada."

All of these issues and dozens more are being visited in the development of the new standards. Community Planner, Robert Voigt is the lead on this project and as part of his consultative process, he has put up an excellent blog I would encourage everyone to read and react to. There is a link on the left side of the page under "Documents" with his December 1, 2008 presentation to council. It's well worth it to click on that click and have a look at the dozens of photo's on the last many pages showing examples of what we have and what is possible.

As the original chairperson of Collingwood's Vision 2020 project, I'm excited about the way Robert thinks and hope his ideas will gather storm and support.

The local real estate market followed national trends by posting the lowest number of monthly sales in over a decade. The 46 sales reported in the Georgian Triangle last month represents a drop of 59% over January, 2008 and is lower than December 2008's 53 sales.

One interesting and slightly surprising trend is that, for the first time since March, 2008, the number of new listings for the month was lower than in the previous year. For the fourth month in a row, there was a tiny uptick in consumer confidence being reported and, the North American governments have both passed stimulus budgets this month. Could it be that potential sellers are hanging on expecting some improvements this spring?

The following information was obtained from the MLS® statistics provided by the Georgian Triangle Real Estate Board. The first number is for January 2009 with January 2008 results in brackets:

Total Number of Sales in all areas reported: 46 (111)
Total # of Listings in all areas reported: 437 (454 )
# Active Listings as of January 31: 1714

Single Family Residential Only
(Data is limited to Collingwood, Clearview, Grey Highlands, Meaford, Blue Mountains and Wasaga Beach areas only):

# of Sales: 25 (69 )
Average Sale Price: $290,483 ($312,779 )
Sales-to-Listings Ratio: 12% (33% )
# Condo Sales: 8 (19 )
# Farms Sold: 1
# Vacant Land Sold: 0
# Commercial Sold: 0

In a nutshell: It's a tough time to sell but it's a great time to buy. Limited competition, lots of choice, a buyers market and most of all - low interest rates!

Although it's now February, people are still asking about prices in our various neighbourhoods in the Georgian Triangle. So, in the spirit of wrapping up the 2008 statistics, here is a chart showing the change in the average sale prices between 2007 and 2008 by area:

Please do remember that average sale prices can be skewed significantly by a few really high or low sales so they are not necessarily a fair representation of prices however, they do show the general trends by area.

Interestingly but not surprisingly, both Collingwood and Wasaga Beach registered an increase in values; even when I tried eliminating sales under $100,000 and over $1 million. More rural areas such as Grey Highlands and Clearview showed the greatest declines.

Right now, we sure are seeing buyers being very reluctant to jump in despite great prices and mortgage rates. Consumer confidence is not high but I have noticed a real uptick in showing activity of late.