The City of Victoria is asking for the public’s input on proposed changes to neighbourhood boundaries.
Proposed changes include expanding the downtown by merging the small Harris Green area with downtown and adding a small section of Fernwood east of Cook.
The northern boundary of downtown would be extended to Bay Street from Chatham Street, while the northwestern section of Fairfield, bordered by Southgate Street to the south and Quadra to the east, would be added to downtown.
Thomas Guerrero, who has a passion for urban planning and blogs about the city from a pedestrian perspective at Sidewalking Victoria, said the current “bizarre” neighbourhood boundaries are mostly arbitrary lines that no longer make sense.
Guerrero said each neighbourhood has its own character — “whether it is the granola flavours of Fernwood or the North Face jackets of Fairfield,” as he writes on his blog — but there are many areas in the city that feel like they’re part of the wrong neighbourhood, noting parts of Fairfield and Burnside-Gorge feel more like downtown.
Moving the boundaries could improve residents’ connection to their neighbourhoods and their sense of community, he said.
“I think that becomes really important for people having that sort of community spirit and looking out for one another.”
In his own Oaklands neighbourhood, the village centre is currently split between Oaklands and Fernwood, Guerrero said. The proposed changes would move the centre into the Oaklands neighbourhood, something Guerrero has been suggesting.
There has been informal discussion about boundary adjustments for years, and council included the issue in the city’s strategic plan.
In addition to playing a role in forming identity, the neighbourhood borders have practical applications, said Mayor Lisa Helps.
When a building at Blanshard and Broughton — now Discovery Coffee — was up for rezoning years ago, residents in Fairfield were asked to officially comment, despite the location’s downtown feel, she said.
“It’s about transparency in public engagement, and making sure that the people who are most affected by a proposed land-use change are the ones that are providing official commentary rather than, you know, what the lines on an old map say,” Helps said.
Proposed changes would shrink the Fernwood neighbourhood, with residents in the northeast joining North Park and in the north joining Oaklands.
Kristin Atwood, co-chair of the Fernwood Community association’s land-use committee, said the northern boundary change appears to be supported by many, but there’s “a little bit more emotion” around the western boundary, which would move from Cook to Chambers Street.
Atwood said some neighbours are organizing themselves and petitioning to remain part of Fernwood.
“It just goes to show you how important your community is to your identity, right? It’s not something that we think about kind of really explicitly, but we obviously kind of incorporate this into our sense of ourselves,” she said.
The engagement survey is open until June 7. Results relevant to specific neighbourhoods will be shared with the neighbourhood associations and full results will be made public in September.
To see maps of the proposed boundary adjustments, and to provide feedback, go to: engage.victoria.ca.
If approved, the revised borders will be formally amended in 2022.
