Strengthening Manitoba's Capital Region
General Principles and Policy Directions

— A Public Discussion Paper —

Appendix A - Discussion of Words and Terms

A number of words and phrases are used in this discussion paper and also often come up in general discussions of planning and land use matters in Manitoba and elsewhere. A number of these words and phrases do not have well understood definitions or in some cases, have numerous definitions. Some too, have debatable meanings or are phrases that tend to instill certain reactions or emotions. It was thought therefore, that a discussion of words and phrases might be useful. Some of the following are 'definitions', while others contain some additional background:

Association of Regional Municipalities (ARM): An association of municipalities which bordered on Winnipeg and at one time had some or all of their lands under the planning control of the City (known as the Winnipeg Additional Zone). Those municipalities still meet regularly but the Additional Zone was abolished a number of years ago.

Brownfields: A phrase first used in the USA in connection with abandoned, idled or under-used industrial and commercial facilities, where redevelopment was complicated by potential environmental contaminants. Brownfields were typically situated in or near urban centres and include abandoned factories, gas stations, oil storage and refining facilities, chemical storage and manufacturing, dry cleaners and other businesses that dealt with potentially polluting or dangerous substances. Over time, the term has evolved, so that it now is often used to also include any formerly built areas which are now abandoned or vacant, usually in or near the inner city of urban centres.

Capital Region: A geographical area currently defined by the provincial government as including 16 municipalities including Manitoba's Capital City, Winnipeg, the RM of East St. Paul, RM of West St. Paul, RM of Rockwood, Town of Stonewall, RM of Rosser, RM of St. Andrews, City of Selkirk, RM of St. Clements, RM of Springfield, RM of Tache, RM of Ritchot, RM of Macdonald, RM of Cartier, RM of Headingley, and the RM of St. Francois Xavier (see Map C1 in Appendix C).

Capital Region Committee: Formed in 1989, it includes the mayors and reeves of the 16 Capital Region municipalities and the Ministers of Manitoba Local Government and Conservation. It is organized by the Provincial Government and meets 2 or 3 times a year to discuss issues of mutual interest.

Capital Region Review Panel: An independent panel appointed by the provincial government in 1998 to look into and make recommendations on Capital Region issues. It presented its final report in December of 1999.

City of Winnipeg Act: A provincial statute that outlines the operating 'rules' for the City of Winnipeg. Part 20 of that Act states the land planning rules for the City. They diverge from those found under The Planning Act, but the principles are generally the same. The City of Winnipeg Act originally came into force in 1972 and has been amended numerous times. It is currently under review by the provincial government.

COSDI (Consultation On Sustainable Development): Launched by the provincial government in 1997, the intent was to "undertake a multi-stakeholder consultation initiative to consider and make recommendations to government on how Manitoba can best implement Sustainable Development Principles and Guidelines into decision making, including environmental management, licensing, land use planning and regulatory processes." An 18 member "core group" was established to undertake the initiative. A 60 member advisory committee was established representing various stakeholder groups, organizations, associations etc. The final report was released to the government in June of 1999. An implementation strategy is currently being worked on.

Development Plans: Development Plans (and their implementing zoning by-laws, along with building by-laws) provide the basic land development "rules" by which municipalities, developers and the public operate. Development Plans are adopted as by-laws by municipalities and planning districts under The Planning Act in all of Manitoba except the City of Winnipeg. The City's Development Plan (Plan Winnipeg) is adopted under The City of Winnipeg Act. The adoption processes for the City and the other jurisdictions in Manitoba are similar but not identical.

Although written by municipalities or planning districts, all Development Plans must be approved by the provincial government. All 16 municipalities in the Capital Region, including the City of Winnipeg, have Development Plans in place. Under current legislation, all Development Plans are subject to review every five years. Local authorities also amend their Development Plans from time to time, and all such amendments also require provincial approval.

Development Plans are intended to set the medium to long term land development goals and policies for municipalities. While their policies can be quite specific and in some cases quite detailed, for the most part they are far more general than the rules adopted by a municipality under its zoning by-law. Development Plans include maps which designate areas for basic types of development, such as "Residential" or "Neighbourhood" or "Commercial", or "Agricultural", etc. Whereas the more specific zoning by-law will designate an area "R1 Single Family Dwelling Zone", or "C3 Highway Commercial Zone", for example. For each of the designated areas the Development Plan will then set development policies.

Greenfields: Open lands such as farm lands, wooded lands, fields and the like, located around or in urban centres. When originally coined, the phrase was meant to be used in association with "brownfields", and meant that they were generally considered safe (from an environmental perspective) to develop. However, like the word "brownfields", greenfields is a now a term often used to mean any open "undeveloped" area in or near urban centres which could potentially be developed for urban uses.

Liveable Cities or Liveable Communities: Intended to be integrated and diverse communities containing different housing types, shops, work places, schools, parks and cultural facilities. Liveable communities include walkable access to housing, jobs, daily needs and other activities and a range of economic levels, age groups and job types. Compact development, urban infill, integral placement of mixed-use buildings and mixed income neighbourhoods is also considered complimentary to transportation requirements. The environment is hoped to be of 'human scale', with attributes that invite positive interaction which compliment surrounding neighbourhoods.

Mayors and Reeves of the Capital Region: An association formed in 1999 and made up of the reeves and mayors of the Capital Region and with no provincial government involvement. Municipal Act: Similar to The City of Winnipeg Act in that it states the operating 'rules' for the other 200 municipalities in Manitoba. However, the planning rules for municipalities are laid out in The Planning Act. The Municipal Act is one of the oldest statutes in Manitoba dating back to the 1870s. It has been amended and readopted numerous times.

Municipalities: There are currently 201 incorporated municipalities in Manitoba. They include Cities, Towns, Villages, Rural Municipalities and Local Government Districts. The operating 'rules' for municipalities are primarily contained in The Municipal Act except for the City of Winnipeg, which is governed under The City of Winnipeg Act. Many other statutes also apply to municipalities, such as The Planning Act.

There are 3 types of municipality in the current Capital Region:

• Cities (of which there are two, Selkirk and Winnipeg),
• Towns (of which there is one, Stonewall), and
• Rural Municipalities of which there are 13.

The generic term 'municipality' is often used to include any of these 3 types of local jurisdictions. Rural Municipalities are often referred to as RMs.

Within the RMs there are a number of unincorporated villages or hamlets. For example:

• Oakbank, Dugald and Anola in the RM of Springfield;
• Stony Mountain in the RM of Rockwood;
• Lorette and Landmark in the RM of Tache;
• Oak Bluff, La Salle, Starbuck and Sanford in the RM of Macdonald;
• Ile des Chenes, Ste. Agathe and St. Adolphe in the RM of Ritchot,
• East Selkirk and Lockport in the RM of St. Clements;
• Elie in the RM of Cartier;
• Birds Hill in the RM of East St. Paul;
• and others,

These are all unincorporated hamlets/villages governed by their surrounding RMs.

Planning Districts: Planning districts are formed by Lieutenant-Governor's Order in Council under The Planning Act. They are formed when 2 or more neighbouring municipalities voluntarily decide to come together for planning purposes. There are currently 42 incorporated planning districts in Manitoba, three of which (involving 10 municipalities) are in the Capital Region. The three in the Capital Region are:

• The Selkirk and District Planning Area, formed in June 1977 - made up of the City of Selkirk, The Rural Municipality of St. Andrews, the Rural Municipality of St, Clements, and the Rural Municipality of West St. Paul.
• The South Interlake Planning District, formed in February 1979 - made up of the Town of Stonewall, the Town of Teulon, the Rural Municipality of Rockwood and the Rural Municipality of Rosser.
• The Macdonald-Ritchot Planning District, formed in December of 1983 - made up of the Rural Municipality of Macdonald and the Rural Municipality of Ritchot.

Planning districts are operated by a planning district board, made up of elected councilors, mayors and reeves of the member municipalities. They usually meet about once a month and the board normally consists of about 6 - 10 members.

The primary functions of a planning district are to:

• adopt and administer a development plan for its entire district,
• administer the zoning and building by-laws of the municipalities in the district (this usually means hiring a development officer, building inspector(s), and sometimes planners), and
• take on the approving authority function for subdivisions if thought to be practical.

Planning Act: A provincial statute which outlines the land development or land planning 'rules' for the Province, municipalities, developers and the public (except for the City of Winnipeg which is under different legislation - The City of Winnipeg Act). Under The Planning Act, the Province adopted and applies The Provincial Land Use Policies. This Act also gives municipalities authority to form into planning districts, adopt and administer development plans and zoning by-laws. Also under this statute the provincial government has adopted subdivision regulations.

The first Planning Act was adopted by the Province in 1916 (one of the first in Canada), several new versions have been adopted since then. The current Planning Act came into force in 1976. However, it has been amended numerous times since then. It is currently under review by the provincial government.

Prime Agricultural Land: Land which is suitable for growing almost all crops that the climate will allow. Generally, Classes 1, 2 and 3 land under the Canada Land Inventory for Agricultural Capability are considered 'prime agricultural land'. Much of the land in the Capital Region is considered 'prime agricultural land'.

Provincial Land Use Policies (PLUPs): The PLUPs were initially developed as a part of the Winnipeg Region Study (undertaken by the Provincial government between 1971 and 1975). The final Winnipeg Region Study summary report (1975) recommended a series of land use policies for the Winnipeg region. These policies were further developed by the province and used as interim development guidelines for all of Manitoba outside of Winnipeg, from 1978 until 1980. In November of 1980 they were adopted as a regulation under The Planning Act. They were extensively revised in 1994. They still apply to all of Manitoba except the City of Winnipeg. The PLUPs are currently under review by the provincial government.

It is believed Manitoba was the first province in Canada to adopt provincial land use policies. The policies are used to review municipal and planning district development plans. In other words, the provincial government uses the PLUPs to measure development plans as they are initially sent in, amended or as they come up for review, as they all do every 5 years. Generally, development plans are expected to contain policies that do not conflict with the PLUPs.

Regional Planning Advisory Committee (RPAC) for the Capital Region: Appointed in September 2001 by the provincial government and currently seeking public input on regional policies. The RPAC is the author of this discussion paper (see Appendix B for profiles of the RPAC members).

Rural Residential Development, also known as large lot residential development, Generally means: lots outside the built up area of an urban centre, developed for permanent residential purposes, and where the occupiers are expected to earn a living primarily from non-farm income. Such lots may be serviced or unserviced with piped sewer and/or water, and, generally range in size from between 15,000 square feet (about a third of an acre, or 1394 square metres) to about 10 acres (4 hectares) in area each.

Smart Growth or Smart Growth Strategy: A planning concept which has been adopted by a number of jurisdictions across North America. Smart Growth tends to adopt some or all of the following policies:

• supporting and enhancing existing communities (rather than creating or allowing the evolution of new communities);
• preserving natural resources, natural areas and farm land;
• saving the taxpayers from the premature extension or unnecessary creation of new infrastructure to support sprawl;
• re-developing 'brownfields' before developing new 'greenfields'; and
• revising zoning and other regulations which impede re-development of older areas and older buildings, etc.
• 'live near work' or 'mixed use' neighbourhood strategies.

In the U.S. (Maryland for example), Smart Growth is implemented mainly through some form of State-funded incentives. Critics of 'smart growth' assert that it is merely a new name for good planning.

Subdivision Approving Authority: Two of the three planning districts (the Selkirk Planning District and the South Interlake Planning District) in the Capital Region are subdivision approving authorities for all subdivision applications in their districts. The City of Winnipeg is also the approving authority for subdivisions in its jurisdiction. The provincial government (Manitoba Local Government) is the approving authority for subdivisions for the other 7 municipalities in the Capital Region. Under The Planning Act any planning district can request approving authority status from the provincial government.

Sustainable Development: Generally, it means environmentally sound development which can be sustained in the long term. The term intends that we must protect the environment from degradation in order to develop economically; that meeting the needs of today should not sacrifice the ability of future generations to meet their own needs; and, that we must take into account the long term effects of our economic decisions.

Urban Centre: This term has different meanings to different people. Many people would consider an urban centre to be only a large metropolitan centre like Winnipeg, or perhaps smaller centres such as Brandon or Selkirk. However, the provincial government generally considers an urban centre to be any close grouping of 25 or more residences, with a recognized place name, and some form of commercial services. This would include any incorporated city, town or village, unincorporated village district, and may include hamlets and other unincorporated centres.

Urban Sprawl: There are numerous definitions of so-called urban sprawl. One of the more common ones is: low density growth (usually residential and commercial development) occurring on the outer fringes of an urban centre. Urban Sprawl also often implies unplanned or haphazard and rapid development. In the Canadian context (and certainly in Manitoba's Capital Region) virtually all major cities and their surrounding areas have full planning programs in place. All development in the Capital Region takes place within the framework of provincially-approved Plans. And growth, both within Winnipeg and the rest of the Region, has by most standards, not been rapid. On the other hand, some would argue that any sprawl that does occur in the Winnipeg region is even more problematic than in faster growing areas, because the region is not really growing but is simply spreading out, thus becoming more inefficient and more costly to service.

Winnipeg Additional Zone: A belt of land outside and adjacent to the City of Winnipeg ranging in size from 8 - 11 km (5 - 7 miles) in width, established in 1961, in which the City of Winnipeg had land use planning authority and building control. It was considered by most parties involved to be an unsatisfactory method of fringe development control. Eventually the provincial government allowed municipalities and planning districts with adopted development plans to withdraw from the so-called 'Add Zone'. In 1991 it was abolished in its entirety.

Winnipeg Region Study: From 1971-75 a major provincial government initiative, the Winnipeg Region Study, was undertaken involving all or parts of 30 municipalities in the Winnipeg area. About 17 volumes of reports were completed, eventually leading to the adoption of The Provincial Land Use Policies in 1980.

Zoning By-law: A by-law adopted by a municipality under The Planning Act or The City of Winnipeg Act. Zoning by-laws provide detailed site and some building regulations, such as how far a building must be away from its lot lines, how tall a building can be, location and height of fences, the specific types of uses permitted in a specific zone (for example, single family dwellings are the main permitted use in most 'R1' Zones). A zoning by-law can only be adopted after a municipality has a development plan in place, and then the zoning by-law can not conflict with the development plan.

For more information contact capitalregion@gov.mb.ca

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