Guelph-Eramosa council has approved a site plan for a new flour mill near Guelph, almost a year after hosting a public meeting on the matter.
“It seems like we’ve been doing this forever,” councillor Doug Breen said on?Feb. 16. “Unfortunately it’s taken this long to get there.”
LVB Milling Ltd. has proposed a flour mill on a 16.2 acre land-locked, triangular piece of property southeast of the intersection of Marden Road and County Road 39, and directly east of the Guelph Junction Railroad.
At a March 23, 2009 public meeting, representatives from the farming community – including the Wellington Federation of Agriculture, Ontario Wheat Producers Marketing Board and Ontario Agri-Food Technologies – offered their support to the mill proposal.
Last June, Guelph-Eramosa council passed the necessary zoning bylaw, just days after county council okayed an official plan amendment to allow the mill proposal to move forward.
But it has taken some time for LVB Milling to address the concerns of several agencies who are allowed to comment, including Guelph, the Grand River Conservation Authority and the county planning department – as well as neighbouring business GE Canada.
Last week township planning consultant Lana Phillips said all issues have been satisfied and she recommended approval of the site plan.
Breen wondered who is responsible for a trail corridor on the site plan.
Phillips replied the corridor is included as “sort of a protection” – just in case the property should switch hands – to show the intent of installing a trail in that location. She confirmed Breen’s suggestion the trail would become the responsibility of the township, county and city once the mill driveway was completed.
“It’s obviously a good thing,” Breen said of the mill proposal. “We need to get this thing built.”
Council unanimously approved a resolution supporting the LVB Milling site plan drawings as well as a site plan agreement with LVB, Ontario Hydro (due to a hydro corridor in the area), Edith Neumann (owner of the larger 27.3 acre property) and Toronto Dominion Bank.
The proposal
The LVB proposal includes the mill itself, an office and warehouse building, grain elevator, eight silos, a truck scale and an on-site storm water management pond.
During the public meeting last March, LVB President Andreas Boersch explained about 25 trucks per day will access the property from the intersection of Woodlawn and Edinburgh Roads in Guelph, although 70% of the final product will exit the property via the existing Guelph Junction railway line.
He also said the “state-of-the-art” flour mill will employ about 25 to 30 people and process about 180,000 metric tonnes of wheat per year, a third of which will come from local farms.
