Letters to the editor.... Former Seed House property is a disgrace

Dear editor, What a beautiful central park the Dominion Seed House property would have been! But look at it now. A brand new high school three short years ago and already the parking lot is littered with portables. I understand the final count will be 26. Then the far corner is sold to developers who obviously tried to cram as many houses as possible into as small an area as they could. The streets are very narrow and the houses are right on top of each other. Then came the pond at the other end of the property adjacent to Maple Ave. In the summer it is a weed-infested swamp, a breeding ground for mosquitoes, and in the winter a danger, especially with the mild winter we are having now, from thin ice. If that pond was on private property I am sure the owners would have been forced to erect a fence around it. It is a disgrace at the best of times. They say that there are signs telling us that it is Town property. The notices are six feet off the ground and someone should tell them small children can't read. Thank heavens for the volunteers who worked so hard to preserve a small piece of it for a park. Without them all would have been lost.

And then the final blow. That great big ugly warehouse called a Superstore. They put it on the property backwards to start with so that the loading dock faces Guelph St. So now we have huge transport trucks exiting onto Guelph St. right across the sidewalk where the high school folks walk to McDonald's in their lunch hour and after school. But they made it all okay by adding another traffic light on Guelph St. Wonderful. Now the kids can hold up traffic at two lights instead of just one, less than 100 yards apart, as they amble across the street. Look at the extra gas we will burn at $0.95 cents a litre stopping three times in as many blocks. What a legacy we are leaving for our children. I fear for their safety from trucks at one end and a cesspool at the other. But unfortunately, no one will think of that until there is a serious accident and then there will be a flurry of lame excuses, finger pointing and blaming it on the other guy, as usual. Just my thoughts. John Tatham, Georgetown