Guelph-Eramosa has put the brakes on closing an unopened portion of Pasmore Street in Rockwood to ensure there are no legal ramifications.
In August council deemed the portion of Pasmore Street between Highway 7 and Division Street surplus and on Sept. 18 the township held a public meeting to hear from property owners who may be affected by the closure.
Clerk Amanda Knight wrote in a report the township received a request from an adjacent property owner to purchase the unopened road allowance.
“It has been communicated to the township that these portions of road allowance will form part of a comprehensive site plan to develop the commercial lands along Alma Street in Rockwood,” Knight said.
The lands along Alma Street are being developed by Vesterra Property Management Inc. into a new commercial space.
Vesterra president Robert Eilers has told the Advertiser there are five buildings planned for the site: two drive-thru-style restaurants, a grocery store, a two-storey building with retail and office space and a fifth building that could be a restaurant.
However, the land surrounds the Esso station on the north side of Alma Street. Station owner Muhammed Hanafy and his lawyer Peter Pickfield attended the public meeting on Sept. 18 and asked council to hold off on any decisions.
“Mr. Hanafy has owned the Esso station in Rockwood for about 11 years and one of the entrances he’s relied upon is through that access through that run of unopened road allowance,” Pickfield said.
“Gas stations need two entrances or else they can’t function.”
Pickfield said Hanafy has had discussions with Eilers about the need for two entrances.
“They’ve been amicable discussions, but they’ve been maybe a bit back and forth meandering discussions,” he said.
Pickfield explained Hanafy had also hired a land use planner and would like some time for further discussions with Eilers about the gas station entrances.
“There are fuel trucks that need to come into this facility and they need room to kind of get to it and there’s some complexities in making sure the design is proper … and to as recently as tonight Mr. Eilers has … provided a series of site plans and there just needs to be a further discussion,” Pickfield said.
Eilers said he has talked to Hanafy for two or three years, keeping him informed of progress.
“I have gone, I would say, above and beyond to try to illustrate the issues that he’s going to be dealing with at some point in the future and I’ve made multiple different proposals as to how to resolve these issues,” Eilers said. “Unfortunately, to this day I have not had anything that’s come back to me that said, ‘Okay, this is a preferred approach’ … or something along those lines.
“I’ve also indicated that I’m more than willing to work together so as to have the minimum amount of impact on his business …”
Eilers said he’s concerned about a delay because there is a tight window available for construction next spring.
“I’m happy to continue this conversation … but at some point we do need to be able to move forward with this proposal or we could lose that window,” Eilers said.
Pickfield asked for the stop up and closure decision to be deferred for 60 days.
“We’re going to enter into something that’s pretty focused to try to get to the bottom of it … but if council decides to simply move ahead tonight on this it does prejudice our client because … it will be a discussion, it will be a negotiation and if Mr. Eilers has knowledge that he has the access, that he’s going to be able to acquire the access, then that discussion loses some of its fairness,” Pickfield said.
“So what we’re suggesting is wait 60 days and … hopefully we will have it solved. But if you do it tonight I think it’s a fundamentally unfair situation for our client to try to resolve the issue.”
Councillor Corey Woods said the issue isn’t new.
“This isn‘t like … yesterday (they) figured out the road was going to be closed,” he said. “It’s been going on for a while.”
Pickfield said both sides are to blame for not having come to an agreement yet.
“I don’t see any disbenefit at this point in council waiting … for an opportunity for the planners to … try to resolve the issue,” he said.
White suggested a two-week deferral so council can seek legal advice.
“If there’s a potential that we do something that puts us in a legal conundrum I want to ensure we’re not doing it,” White said. “I’d hate for us to make a step and then for some reason, and maybe I’m being overly cautions here, but somehow that ends up in a legal scenario and it ties the whole thing up because I want to be able to move along.”
Council then deferred the decision to stop up and close the unopened portion of Pasmore Street.
