GGE 5833

Regulatory Literature Search

and Case Study II

Tianyu Liu
#3424397

October 15, 2014

Dept. of GGE
University of New Brunswick



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1. INTRODUCTION
As we discussed previously in the regulatory literature research, the city of Brandon, over its long
history, developed a sound land administration system. To develop a land, the developer has to
go through a set of specified processes. In this paper, we are going to further examine these
procedures by reviewing an example of a development in the said city.
1660 - 34th Street Area development project, as one of the biggest developing project in the city
of Brandon, is chose as our example. This project started from 2009 and its still not quite finished
yet. Figure 1 illustrated the whole project and different development phases of this project.

Figure1166034thStreetProjectOverview
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As we noticed, this project was divided into 12 sub-projects. This is a common practise when big
projects are carried out, since small projects are more manageable and easier to finance. More
importantly, most municipalities, like the City of Brandon, has clearly defined a valid period of
each application. For example, after a subdivision plan is approved, the actual subdivision work
has to be done within one year, otherwise, the developer has to re-apply the subdivision again
since the previous permit is considered to be invalid after one year. Similar regulations also
govern building permits, development permits etc. Details can be find in Regulatory Literature
Search paper I composed last month.
From Google Earth satellite images, as shown in Figure 2, we can clearly see the development
during last few decade, and the situation of 2009 when the 1660 34
th
Street project started.


Figure2166034thStreetArea:UpperLeft:2014,UpperRight:2011,BottomLeft:2009,BottomRight:2006
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Due to lack of public access information, we have to take different phases/ stages in this big
project as examples for different land development processes.
2. ZONING BY-LAW AMENDMENT
A zoning by-law amendment is a process where parts of the zoning by-lay are added, altered, or
deleted. Developers may wish to apply a zoning by-lay amendment only when they wish to make
any change on the citys existing zoning plan. Since many cities grow rapidly in recent years,
zoning by-law amendment becomes one of the most common land development applications all
over Canada.
As is shown in Figure 2. The original zoning for the site was A, which means Agricultural Zone. But
the purpose of this development project is to turn the parcel into a residential neighborhood.
Thus, its obvious that a zoning by-law amendment is required in our case.
As we discussed previously in regulatory literature search section, this application involves
following steps:
1. Apply with application package applicant
2. Pre-Application Review (also sometimes called first-reading) the City of Brandon
3. Application Updating applicant
4. Public Hearing hosted by the City of Brandon
5. Decision making the City of Brandon
6. (if the decision has been challenged) Second public hearing hosted by the City of
Brandon
7. (if second public hearing takes place) Final Decision making the City of Brandon
Phase 3, Stage 3 is selected to illustrate this process in a real-world context (Figure 3).
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Figure3Phase3,Stage3Rezoning
The application package (Appendix A) was made up by 5 Documents (4 categories, order may
different than the achieved document in Appendix A):
1> Application Form:
This form was designed for recording purposes of the application and some fundamental
legal information, such as property owner name, applicant name, location of the
property etc.
It also has a Planning Dept. Use Only box at the bottom which is used for the government
to manage the application internally.
2> Letter of Intent:
This letter from application to the citys Planning Dept. verbally described the purpose of
this application and provides a general idea of what is involved.
3> Site Plan:
Its a plan showing the proposed result of zoning amendment and subdivision, which
assumed dwellings drafted. This plan is usually surveyed and drafted by a professional
survey firm, in our case, its called G.D. Newton and Associated Inc.
4> Other Plans or Documents:
Since 1660 34
th
Street project was divided into 12 manageable sub-projects, two overall
plans showing the whole 1660 34
th
street project was also submitted, one for dwellings
and the other for roads and traffics.
We may noticed that these documents are somehow more or less different then the citys
requirements, which are:
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Letter of Intent
Site Plan
Elevation Plan
Application Fee
Status of Title
Letter of Authorization
The difference is due to:
1> Status of Title is usually needed, however, in the 1660 - 34th Street Area development
project, the title is submitted to the Planning Dept. when the whole project is filed. There
is no need for duplicated submission.
2> Application Fee went through the governments internal computer system.
3> Elevation Plan isnt always necessary. It only applicable to those sites with dramatic
elevation changes.
4> Letter of Authorization is only applicable when the owner of the land and the applicant
are different persons.
After the application was submitted to the city (Planning Committee in Planning and Building
Safety Department), the Planning Dept. did a first reading. The 1
st
reading report is in Figure 4
Below. In our case, this report didnt point out any specific thing need to be improved. As a result,
the applicant now can step to the next stage public hearing without doing modification to their
plan.
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Figure41stReadingReport
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To inform the public about the hearing, a notice and a map showing affected area will be
prepared by the Citys Planning Dept. This package (details see Appendix B) will be mailed to
owners of property located within 100 meters of the proposed re-zoning land, and the notice is
also posted online. The notice encouraged every people to come to the hearing, especially people
living close by. It also educate people their rights and how to address objection etc.
After the hearing, a minute will be composed, recording everything discussed by attendants. The
city planning committees meeting will also be taken down to the minute. Appendix C is the
minutes for the Phase 3 Stage 3 project we discussed.
A formal report summarizing the hearing and the planning committees meeting is also provided
as shown in Appendix D. Since no objection was addressed both in the hearing and in planning
committees meeting. The project goes into the final decision phase. After the second and third
reading by the planning committee in Planning and Building Safety Dept., they approved this re-
zoning application. The final approve report can be found in Appendix E.
The total cost, as we discussed in regulatory literature search paper, is 2650 CAD. It takes 5
month in total to walk through the whole process and reach the final decision.
3. SUBDIVISION
After the Re-Zoning application approved, now the developer start to apply for a subdivision. A
subdivision is a process where a property is legally split into two or more properties.
To obtain a subdivision approval, the city also requires an application package from the applicant,
which contains similar documents as the Zoning By-Law Amendment application. The only
difference is that a DWG drafting file should also be submitted electronically, clearly showing the
intention of subdivision and agreeing with the layer rules set by the city.
Now we take Phase 3, Stage 2 sub-project as an example. We will only focus on the application
package, since the rest of the documents and processes are almost the same as Zoning By-Law
Amendment (situation may be different if the subdivision plan is rejected by the city, which rarely
happens).
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Appendix F is the application package for the Subdivision. Compare the subdivision package with
the re-zoning package, we found they are quite alike, except subdivision application went a bit
more technical and detailed. Total number of Lots created will be explicitly defined, and also the
number of lots in each category (Detached, Semi Detached, Multi-family etc). The key municipal
services, sewage, water and drainage systems each parcel can enjoy needs to be defined too.
The DWG file is generally drafted by a professional survey firm. Each layer named by a number,
represents a physical feature. The layers color, line weight and many other properties must
follow a set of clearly defined rules. For example, layer named 34, represents the Utility Right of
Way. It must use 0.1 weight line and the color is red. This coding system is defined by the city,
aiming to provide the city a way to manage these data from different sources.
I tried to contact G.D. Newton and Associates Ltd, who did the survey and drafting work for this
development project, asking whether if they can provide me some insight information regards to
the related regulations or example works, but I still havent hear them back yet.
After the application is approved, the developer often hire the same survey firm to post the
subdivision plan. The reason is that the same company can easily trace back the control points
they used previously, thus, it saves the budget a great deal. However, in our plan, the developer
switched to another survey company to post the subdivision. Pins and bars were put into the
ground and re-measurements were brought back to the office. Based on the re-measurements,
the subdivision plan was drafted again with the real field data. This new plan, signed by a
Manitoba Land Surveyor will be send to the land title office alone with the subdivision approve.
The plan would be registered and made available to others who wish to use.
I brought this plan form Manitoba Land Title office (Appendix G). The plan number is 55758 and
approved in May 2014. Until here, the subdivision process is done.
4. BUILDING PERMIT
To apply for a building permit/ development permit/ demolition permit, the applicant needs to
have the following documents ready:
Site plan
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Construction Plan
Surveyors Certificate
Heating & Ventilation plan
Lot Grading
Engineer Stamped Drawing for roof and floor systems complete with shop drawings
Unfortunately, since building information is considered to be high privacy related information, I
cannot find any actual cases online. I also tried to contact people who may have the package.
However, no one agrees to share the info.




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Appendix A

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Appendix B

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Appendix C

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Appendix D

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Appendix E

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Appendix F


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Appendix G

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Reference:
1. Z-02-14-B. (2014). Retrieved October 13, 2014, from http://
http://brandon.ca/attachments/article/1497/Submitted%20Documents%20%28Z-02-14-
B%29.pdf
2. Secord, J. M. (2014). Regulatory Literature Search and Case Study. Retrieved from:
http://www.unb.ca/
3. Amendment to Zoning By-law. (2014). Retrieved September 20, 2001, from
http://brandon.ca/images/pdf/developmentServices/planning/applicationForms/Zoning
%20Application.pdf
4. Zoning Amendment: 1660 - 34th Street (Phase 3 Stage 2) (Z-03-13-B) (Ward 7). (2014).
Retrieved October 15, 2014, from http://brandon.ca/departments/planning-
department/planning-department/previous-applications/455-zoning-amendment-1660-
34th-street-phase-3-stage-2-z-03-13-b-ward-7
5. Subdivision (Public Road): 1660 - 34th Street (Phase 3 Stage 1) (4500-13-543) (Ward 7).
(2014). Retrieved October 15, 2014, from http://brandon.ca/departments/planning-
department/planning-department/previous-applications/322-subdivision-public-road-
1660-34th-street-phase-3-stage-1-4500-13-543-ward-7
6. Application for Subdivision. (2014). Retrieved September 20, 2001, from
http://brandon.ca/attachments/article/46/Subdivision%20-%20Handout%20(Form).pdf
7. Liu, T. (2014). Regulatory Literature Search. Retrieved September 21, 2014, from http:
//www.unb.ca