LETTER

The City can protect Boucher Forest 

As someone who walks in the Boucher Forest regularly, sharing it with dog walkers and hikers, parents and little kids marvelling at every outcrop or scraggly pine, I support strongly the calls by others, your newspaper, and the Boucher Forest Foundation to protect all of the Forest.  Your editorial on this subject last week was bang-on.

It may be true that 38% is privately owned by a developer, but any development requires city approval and permissions. All City Council has to do is direct city management not to approve  projects on this unbuilt land, adjacent to protected forest.  Once the developer sees no development will be approved here, he may be open to a land swap or even a land grant to the city which would keep the developer’s name for posterity. 

But this requires Councillors not waiting until the requests are upon them.  City Council apparently believes we face a climate emergency – preserving green space, habitat, and old growth are recognized ways to combat climate degeneration.  Let’s get to it!

Andy Black, 

Aylmer nord