Snapshot

There is only one Niagara Escarpment. It’s our wild place here in Southern Georgian Bay.

We are very close to losing 1,532 acres of pristine Escarpment to the massive new Castle Glen development, right above Collingwood, and another 133 acres of treasured greenspace at Talisman in the Beaver Valley. Sure, developers can make another billion dollars, but we all lose those pieces of pristine nature. They are severed forever.

Join the once-in-a-lifetime fight to stop the Castle Glen mega-development and other inappropriate development on the Niagara Escarpment of Southern Georgian Bay.

Please donate today and help Small Change Fund, in partnership with Escarpment Corridor Alliance, keep our Escarpment wild.

Southern Georgian Bay, Ontario, Canada

A 50 Year Old Planning Mistake is About to Destroy The Niagara Escarpment

$103,687 Raised
95 Donors
0 Days Left
Raised:
41.47%
Goal: $250,000
Minimum amount is $10 Maximum amount is $
$
Bruce Harbinson
1 Campaigns | 0 Loved campaigns

Story

There is only one Niagara Escarpment. It’s one of Canada’s natural wonders and it is recognised globally as a UNESCO biosphere.

It’s our wild place here in Southern Georgian Bay and we need your help and donations to save it.

The Niagara Escarpment is our natural corridor. It’s home to old-growth trees, the headwaters of our rivers, ancient rocks, and countless rare flora and fauna. It’s our source of well-being and our escape to nature. It’s a rare gem and it’s our responsibility to protect it.

But, legacy planning decisions, some five decades old, are now a massive threat to this 450-million-year-old “masterpiece of living art”.

And no threat is bigger than the proposed new Castle Glen Development in the Blue Mountains.

If completed, the development will:

  • Ruin the largest undeveloped property on the brow of the escarpment in the entire Collingwood / Blue Mountains area;
  • Destroy vast amounts of forest and ecologically sensitive land across 1,532 acres;
  • Build 1,600 homes, 2 hotels, 3 golf courses, kilometers of paved roads and hardscaping; and
  • Devastate the essence of the escarpment with 54,000 sq. ft. of retail commercial space and a gas station – right on the Bruce Trail!

Our wild escarpment spaces will be replaced by a brand new mega-development larger than the town of Thornbury … a mega-development larger than any other in the history of the Niagara Escarpment Commission.

Great Gulf Homes, one of North America’s largest developers, acquired the Castle Glen property in April 2021 and inherited great-great-grandfathered approvals dating back to 1971 – over 50 years ago! Everyone knows that these approvals would never be granted today, so why are our local and provincial governments letting this happen? Our elected officials cannot allow our most sensitive natural spaces to be destroyed for corporate profits!

Castle Glen is the epitome of short-sighted, inappropriate development. It should be our newest Provincial Park, not a mega-development perched on the brow of the beautiful Niagara Escarpment. To learn more about the proposed Castle Glen development please listen to the CBC Ontario Morning feature interview and watch a recent deputation made to the Blue Mountains council.

Please support our fight to save Castle Glen.

Other glaring examples of tragic planning mistakes across the Escarpment of Southern Georgian Bay include the development of the Talisman lands and the Silver Creek Wetlands. And, as the second fastest growing area in Canada, development pressures across the region are only increasing. We need to stand up and say “enough” and we need to do so with urgency.

We are asking our governments to work with us and save, not just Castle Glen, but create a fully protected land and park system that stretches from Devil’s Glen to Georgian Peaks, from Castle Glen through Duncan and Kolapore and up and down the Beaver Valley. Protected. Deeded. Not subject to a Planning Act that could be rescinded at any time with a stroke of the pen.

Where it all started. 

Please help us keep our wild spaces on the Niagara Escarpment.

Please donate today!

This Small Change Fund project is in partnership with the Escarpment Corridor Alliance.

 

Name Donation Date
J. Michael Robbins & Associates Inc. $5,000 May 23, 2023 3:48 pm
Bruce Harbinson $5,000 May 23, 2023 3:40 pm
Robert G. Parney $250 May 16, 2023 8:49 pm
Georgia Jacobi $50 May 16, 2023 2:31 pm
Brett Sura $50 May 8, 2023 6:49 pm
Juliet Jancsi $100 May 7, 2023 6:38 pm
Anonymous $250 May 7, 2023 5:25 pm
Anonymous $50 May 5, 2023 11:48 pm
Sharman Smith $50 May 5, 2023 7:07 pm
Anonymous $1,000 May 5, 2023 6:47 pm
Liz Ord $255 May 1, 2023 9:19 pm
Julia McCarthy $111 April 29, 2023 1:38 pm
Jarvis Strong $55 April 27, 2023 3:53 pm
Becky Channer $50 April 21, 2023 1:52 pm
Anonymous $275 April 21, 2023 1:32 pm
David Kinoshita $250 April 6, 2023 2:19 pm
Karen Chorny $50 March 29, 2023 12:58 pm
Sean Russell $50 March 10, 2023 9:59 pm
Anne Redston $55 March 10, 2023 8:29 pm
Kara McIntosh $1,000 February 15, 2023 1:32 pm
Lorna Visser $100 February 12, 2023 10:09 pm
Andrea LaFayette $1,005 February 9, 2023 1:36 pm
Jeanne Bullock $105 February 1, 2023 2:29 pm
Suzanne Rawn $65 January 19, 2023 2:32 pm
Drew Hubbard $250 January 12, 2023 8:26 pm
Ian Rhind $250 January 11, 2023 2:59 am
Judy Jarvis $500 January 10, 2023 1:51 am
Thomas A. & Nancy G. Eisenhauer $10,000 January 3, 2023 3:20 pm
M Benjamin Polley $525 December 31, 2022 11:54 pm
Anonymous $200 December 31, 2022 8:58 pm
Jeremy Wentworth-Stanley $200 December 31, 2022 7:00 pm
Pinky Franklin $255 December 30, 2022 9:59 pm
Anonymous $25 December 30, 2022 4:45 pm
Anonymous $2,000 December 28, 2022 3:12 pm
Penelope Bell $525 December 27, 2022 6:17 pm
Laura Travosi $50 December 26, 2022 8:53 pm
Chisholm Thomson Family Foundation $5,000 December 23, 2022 3:36 pm
Linda Pim $55 December 23, 2022 3:06 pm
Robert & Kate L. Gorrie $2,000 December 22, 2022 9:36 pm
Anonymous $15,000 December 22, 2022 8:50 pm
JP McMorrow $250 December 22, 2022 3:28 pm
Chris Mifflin $100 December 22, 2022 3:13 pm
Barbara Zimmerman $255 December 22, 2022 1:56 pm
John Tremayne $1,000 December 16, 2022 7:35 pm
Ani Redston $50 December 12, 2022 8:49 pm
Tom Antony $250 December 12, 2022 1:49 am
Anne-Marie Widner $500 December 11, 2022 11:19 am
Burkhard Mausberg $10 December 10, 2022 5:04 pm
Christina Eaton $2,000 December 9, 2022 9:15 pm
Betty Morris $1,000 December 8, 2022 3:33 pm
Cynthia Bracewell $50 November 30, 2022 1:05 pm
TOM & SUSAN MAIN $2,005 November 29, 2022 8:15 pm
Aileen Kemerer $150 November 29, 2022 4:09 pm
robert dilworth $100 November 29, 2022 4:06 pm
Michael McLaughlin $200 November 28, 2022 9:07 pm
Ian & Christie Gray $250 November 27, 2022 1:48 pm
Kevin Towers $100 November 25, 2022 9:16 pm
Greg Aspin $100 November 25, 2022 6:44 pm
Christopher Deane $500 November 22, 2022 9:49 pm
Anonymous $200 November 16, 2022 8:56 pm
Aqueduct Foundation $5,000 November 4, 2022 3:13 pm
Michelle Berman $100 November 1, 2022 10:04 pm
Alexandra von Schroeter $500 November 1, 2022 1:56 pm
Monica Jenset $50 October 24, 2022 4:30 pm
Chris Mifflin $505 October 22, 2022 4:48 pm
Anonymous $55 October 22, 2022 1:20 pm
Jennifer Marley $225 October 21, 2022 7:49 pm
Anonymous $30 October 20, 2022 8:16 pm
Brian Prendergast $500 October 17, 2022 6:51 pm
Anne Morash $1,000 October 3, 2022 8:44 pm
Anonymous $25 September 28, 2022 2:07 pm
Lynn Quesnel $50 September 28, 2022 12:36 pm
Anonymous $250 September 28, 2022 12:16 am
Anonymous $105 September 27, 2022 9:45 pm
Dorothy Zajac $50 September 27, 2022 4:52 pm
Anonymous $25 September 27, 2022 2:23 pm
Sylvie Clamageran $55 September 27, 2022 2:08 pm
Judy & Craig Jarvis $505 September 22, 2022 6:38 pm
Anonymous $300 September 20, 2022 3:43 pm
George Butterfield $25,000 September 19, 2022 2:40 pm
Anonymous $250 September 18, 2022 10:25 pm
Lindsay Bradbury $70 September 17, 2022 1:07 pm
Dave Loopstra $1,587 September 17, 2022 1:02 pm
Jane Garthson $100 September 16, 2022 4:08 pm
Gary Markotich $250 September 16, 2022 1:41 pm
judy ross $60 September 16, 2022 1:21 pm
Jon & Marty Linton $200 September 15, 2022 6:27 pm
Susan Himel $205 September 15, 2022 12:48 am
Andrew Duncanson $5,000 September 14, 2022 6:08 pm
Rene Ebacher $50 September 14, 2022 5:01 pm
Sarah Corrigan $50 September 14, 2022 12:03 pm
Will Sutherland $255 September 14, 2022 1:12 am
Christina Eaton $30 September 13, 2022 8:51 pm
Caroline & Andrew Porter $250 September 13, 2022 4:35 pm
Peter Henderson $100 September 13, 2022 3:59 pm