MidlandToday welcomes letters to the editor at [email protected]. Please include your daytime phone number and address (for verification of authorship, not publication). This letter concerns a recent column by Community Editor Andrew Philips regarding the future of Midland Bay Landing and subsequent letter by Jim Wilgar.
Dear Editor,
I think the plan for Midland Bay Landing, and the recently opened 'preview walk' are positive glimpses of a spectacular future for the former Unimin Lands. The combination of residential, retail and community assets, with waterfront access for everyone, is just what Midland needs.
I am a resident of Midland and appreciate the Development Board's direction to bring tax revenue and a wonderful draw to downtown and waterfront Midland.
Your denigration of developers is a cautionary tale, but no more than that. The Board, some of whom may not live in Midland, should be advised to do their due diligence in selecting partners, which I'm sure they are aware. Developers had a hand in Gravenhurst's picturesque waterfront, and Halifax's boardwalk, both of which are more than pleasant to walk on, and assets for their towns and the visitors who visit them and spend money there.
Midland is a Jewel already, but it deserves more than the scrubland that currently exists on the site. To put a park there would require more money being poured into the land to remediate the substrata, re-landscape the park and bring mature trees and plants to replace the poor samples that exist there now.
Taxpayers in Midland deserve the tax base that the plans will bring to offset the loss of Unimin and the money already spent to direct the development of the land to benefit everyone.
I hope you publish this as a counterpoint to those opposed to the current plan, and encourage the Town and the Development Board to continue to bring this vision to reality.
Terry Day
Midland
