Rural Housing Futures: A Warkworth Case Study

By Kaylaira Lea

keeping people out of hospitals. Here in Northumberland, our Ontario Health Team has made access to primary care and specialist care one of the highest priorities.

The Recruitment and Retention Committee are working on this challenge, to attract Physicians and Nurse-Practitioners to practice primary care in Trent Hills in the Family Health Team and at the Hospital. The Committee will be working to engage the community to help promote our healthy rural living to prospective Physicians and health care professionals.

Please show your support for local Physicians and the refresh of recruitment efforts by attending the fundraiser. The jazz concert and short film will be held at the Aron Theatre Co-op on Thursday, May 11 at 7:00 p.m. (doors open at 6:30 p.m.). Tickets are $40 each and can be purchased online at www.arontheatre.com

The Recruitment and Retention Committee is grateful for support from the main event sponsor: Co-operators, Paul Moran Insurance Group Inc.; and supporting sponsors: Jana Reid and Melissa Smeets RE/ MAX, Wallace J. Brown Legal Services, and RBC Wealth Management – The Harris Lowe Group.

Events are numerous and life is sweet!

The spring exhibition at Ah! is in part a response to the new provincial action to build housing (subdivisions) in Ontario’s Greenbelt. The Arts & Heritage Centre will be transformed into a fictional Subdivision Sales Pavilion. ‘Sugar Mountain’ is a hypothetical housing development on the periphery of Warkworth, offering more housing per acre than the conventional subdivision. By focusing on architecture, managing the impact on the land, and utilizing a variety of housing types, it is possible to create a cohesive and beautiful development reflecting the character and compactness of smalltown Ontario. Sugar Mountain offers several housing types: starter terrace housing, lofts for live-work, villas for those who can afford more gross floor area, co-housing, and a small ‘palazzo’ housing multiple units with a collective southern view of the agrarian landscape. There is something for everyone. In addition to fifty-four dwelling units, there is a Sugar Bush (reforestation), a barn, a small greenhouse, a daycare, and modest community workshop. The conventional subdivision is not a design type that fosters community, nor is it oriented towards building beautiful places for people to dwell. It is the most efficient model for the development industry, only. The roads and infrastructure that service switching from agricultural land to subdivisions is paid for by the us, the public. Developers prefer ‘leap-frogging’ over more expensive serviced land (near existing communities) and speculate on land that is purchased before it becomes serviced by roads and utilities. This is precisely why we get subdivisions and not communities. It is easier to build where no one lives, for the additional reason that change to established communities is often met with resistance by the communities that need housing. ca Collaborators:

The exhibition opens during Warkworth’s Maple Syrup Festival (March 11th) and continues through the spring at the Arts & Heritage Centre. For more information please the Arts & Heritage Centre in Warkworth or Dimitri Papatheodorou. www.theperiphery.

Students of Architecture, Toronto Metropolitan University:

Caleb Culmone

Arsalan Hosseini

Hunter Kauremszky

Wincy Kong

Nuvaira Tahir

Sara Vitti

Special Thanks:

Centre & Main Chocolate Co. Authenticity Antiques & Folk Art Ah! Arts & Heritage Centre

Building Beautiful

Judy Kaufmann

Scott Sorli, TMU University

Roberto Chiotti Architect

Mark Gorgolewski, Toronto

Metropolitan University

Jordan So, TMU University