Tag Archives: Queen Elizabeth High School

Rick Howe Interview: St Pat’s Land- Plan For Our Future

Common Roots Urban Farm is an inspiration. In 2007 instead of returning the former QEHS land to the Halifax Common as promised, HRM traded it to Capital Health. FHC and smart Capital Health decision-makers agreed that a community garden would be a good interim use. In the 5 years since a valid public consultation, gardening doula Jayme Melrose’s imaginative

In 5 years Jayme Melrose and her team of volunteers have transformed the QEHS land into a place of productive beauty. Let's have a vision for St Pat's that's bigger than a developer's profit.

The QEHS land is now a place of productive beauty. We need a vision for St Pat’s that is bigger than a developer’s profit.

guidance and amazing volunteers have transformed it into a productive, edible landscape. But it’s temporary.
Rick Howe’s interview with Peggy Cameron explains why the Mayor & Council’s decision to sell St. Pat’s is just as short-sighted as the loss of QEHS. Listen to the recording below and then write <clerks@halifax.ca> to tell them to keep the St Pat’s land public.

The Coast, Bruce Wark Editorial – Looking for Common Sense

E D I TO R I A L by Bruce Wark

Looking for Common sense
The land deal between the city & the province chips another piece off of the Halifax Commons
Rodney - Common Sense?I call it city council’s royal fuck-up. The Queen’s High School
is being traded to the Queen’s Hospital for a new central library on—where else—Queen Street. And we’re all worse off. The deal means another chunk of the Halifax Common is about to disappear. It’s all part of a land swap between city and province that council approved last week.
Believe it or not, the city is giving away 269,000 square feet of prime downtown land in return for 131,000 square feet of prime downtown land and paying nearly two million bucks for the privilege.

Under the deal, the province gets the former Birks site on Barrington to build more office space plus the Queen Elizabeth High site at Robie and Bell for expansion of the QE II Infirmary. In return, the city gets the block on Queen between Spring Garden and Morris for a central library, officespace, shops and housing.

Halifax Metro News – Hospital space trumps green space in Common decision

By Lindsay Jones

The Queen Elizabeth High School property is part of a land swap between the city and the province.

The Queen Elizabeth High School property is part of a land swap between the city and the province.

Regional council approved giving up the rest of the Queen Elizabeth High School land to become part of a hospital expansion yesterday.

The city is exchanging the former Halifax Common land, as well as several other parcels, with the province to help pay for land at the corner of Queen Street and Spring Garden Road. That’s the site where the city wants to build a new Central Library. Continue reading →

Media Release – Common for Sale?

Is the Halifax Common for Sale?

HRM Council is going to sell the Queen Elizabeth High School site, Halifax Common land. This is to facilitate Flagship Developments on Spring Garden Road & Queen (the new public library) and the Grand Parade & Province House.

The Halifax Common Plan is very specific about the amount of city-owned land in the Halifax Common not being decreased (3.1). The Plan recommends preserving public open space for a variety of outdoor recreation and leisure activities or other suitable public uses.
Continue reading →

Chronicle Herald Op Ed – Protecting Halifax’s Common Ground

Money spent by HRM for private and expensive Concerts on the Common would be better spent on protecting the Common for everyone.

Public money spent by HRM for private, expensive Concerts on the Common would be better spent on protecting the Common for everyone.

Recently, Friends of Halifax Common were informed HRM will begin electrical repairs to the Centennial Fountain on the North Common. This was conveyed to us as a “good news” story. Indeed there hasn’t been much good news about the Common for a long time.

The Halifax Common, Canada’s oldest urban park, was created in 1763 when King George III granted 240 acres “for the use of the inhabitants of the Town of Halifax forever.” Originally extending between Cunard and South Streets, bounded by Robie on the west Continue reading →

Friends of Halifax Common Challenge Sale of Common Land – Media Release

Friends of Halifax Common (FHC) are calling on the provincial government to stop the sale of 5.5 acres of Halifax Common land at the former Queen Elizabeth High School (QEHS). The QEHS land is included in a land swap between HRM and the province. FHC says this a bad deal. HRM will lose public open green space, pay $1.9 million for the land swap but will acquire half as much as land as the province.
Continue reading →