Comprehensive Zoning By-law passes

The Town of Pelham's new Comprehensive Zoning By-Law, approved in August of 2022, has come into effect following an appeal process.

On August 30, 2022, Council passed the new Comprehensive Zoning By-law, which resulted from a thorough public consultation process and extensive work by Town staff. In late September 2022, the By-law was appealed by a local property owner, and as a result, the Comprehensive Zoning By-law could not come into force while the appeal was pending. The Ontario Land Tribunal approved the order on Monday, April 3, 2023, with the result that the Comprehensive Zoning By-law is deemed to have come into force on August 30, 2022, except as it relates to the owner's lands that had appealed.

The Comprehensive Zoning By-law regulates the use of land throughout the Town of Pelham in accordance with Section 34 of the Planning Act. The Comprehensive Zoning By-law has been updated to conform to the Town Official Plan, Region of Niagara Official Plan and Provincial legislation. The effect of the Comprehensive Zoning By-law will be improved development parameters that help create a more attractive, prosperous and livable community.

"With fundamental shifts in the focus of the provincial, regional, and local policy framework since the previous 1987 zoning by-law," said director of community planning and development Barbara Wiens. "Pelham has worked with public consultation, staff and Council to align the Comprehensive Zoning By-law with the current planning policy framework at all levels of government."

The Comprehensive Zoning By-law is a hybrid, using contextual zoning primarily in the Town's greenfield areas and conventional zoning in the more built-up areas and rural agricultural areas of Pelham. The new Zoning By-law reflects the Town's unique community structure, encompassing well-developed and complete urban communities, existing development areas, new greenfield opportunities, a village, a hamlet, and diverse rural and agricultural land use.