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Ann Hodges (AH): We started in the nineties; there had been a Golden Triangle Neighborhood Watch with just a few persons. I used to attend meetings where we would talk about safety in the community. Over time, group members became more concerned about residential properties in the area becoming commercial. So, the community association grew as we became more concerned about broader planning issues. We changed the name from Golden Triangle Neighborhood Watch to Golden Triangle Neighborhood Association.
Carol Narcisse (CN): So GTNA was instrumental in forming what eventually became Citizens Rights to the City. One community resident became deeply concerned with these issues and started writing articles for the newspaper about the rapidly changing urban landscape. She became aware of the efforts of GTNA and our partnerships with other resident associations and offered to convene a Zoom session for all of us. We invited some of the groups we had already collaborated with, and that started what was then called the "Thursday Group."
The Thursday Group grew as more and more citizen associations joined the Zoom meetings. One of the first things we did was to organize a meeting with the KSAC, at which some 13 community associations had representatives attending. We made presentations on the concerns across several communities. We got commitments and responses from the mayor and the other counselors who were in attendance.
Some of these commitments they have kept, like expanding the information on their website about pending developments awaiting approval or already approved. Before that meeting, that kind of detail was unavailable on their website, so that's a specific outgrowth of our CRC advocacy. Another outgrowth was a greater standardization of the posted notices about developments. We brought to their attention that development notices need to be visible.
As the Thursday Group, we also sought to be part of a presentation to Parliament initiated by the Charlemont Drive Citizens Association. The public defender had written to the Infrastructure Committee of Parliament on the community's behalf on concerns with the road and sewage works done to accommodate the many higher-density housing developments. The CRC sought to be included to bring to the Committee’s attention the broader issues of the rapid pace and scale of the increasing density in communities and the impact.
Unfortunately, CRC's presentation was actively blocked from happening because, by then, the Prime Minister announced that the provisional Development Order would be legally confirmed. We believe the Committee was expected to ensure that "pesky citizens" didn't interrupt that intention in any way. So, the chair of the Committee quite unreasonably insisted that we didn't need to be heard despite the opposition of other parliamentary members of the Committee on the floor.
So those actions as the Thursday Group led us to agree that we needed to name ourselves formally. We tossed around several names, and Citizens' Rights to the City emerged. So, as this new entity, we have generated a lot of media conversations about these concerns and have moved these issues from the periphery to the national stage. Some communities have even been able to take matters to court and are building up a body of jurisprudential positions on what is happening in the development space.
...the sense of being hemmed in by concrete, for me, is a profoundly dehumanizing experience. And a tragic ignoring of the physical strengths that Kingston has.
CN: One of the striking things I have witnessed, for all the communities earmarked for this super, massive increase in density, is the loss of community character. Kingston has always had communities with character, with a certain level of distinctiveness about them, whether you're talking about Allman Town, Mona Heights, Hope Pastures, Golden Triangle, Molynes Gardens, Eastwood Park, or Havendale. One never had a cookie-cutter approach to community design, and they had a physical uniqueness and a kind of social character. For me, these high-density structures disrupt community interaction and cooperation as the developments are enclaves, and they transform communities into placeless, homogenous areas with far less diversity in look and feel.
The high rise obliterates one of Kingston's distinctive features: the spectacular views of the hills and mountains. Kingston's specific geographic features are valuable and should be retained because they impact well-being (even if you're unaware of those impacts). We are consciously obliterating those views, green cover in the city and green spaces for community use. So the sense of being hemmed in by concrete, for me, is a profoundly dehumanizing experience. And a tragic ignoring of the physical strengths that Kingston has.
The extent of tree cover in Kingston has been one of the distinctive features of our older communities. You go to Havendale or Meadowbrook; you cannot starve because every yard is well-fruited. Urban food availability is decreasing because we systematically remove and replace older tree cover with ridiculous palm trees. We also have more runoff on our streets because everywhere is paved. In general, amenities and social services are not keeping pace with the increased density, making for a much less comfortable environment.
AH: What the development orders did with their blanket density guides of 100 or more habitable rooms per acre was open the floodgates to developers to put up these high-rise buildings even before a more incremental increase of, say, townhouses, which are two-story but still have trees and preserve the residential spirit of the Golden Triangle. Once they had the development order in place, Town Planning was happy to go ahead and approve these buildings, which led to the land price inflating as it reflected the fact that high-rise buildings were now allowable. That then accelerated the process of cutting down the trees, knocking down the houses, and replacing them with high-rise buildings
AH: Well, a community visioning exercise was our attempt to do just that. The Development Orders recommend the creation of Local Area Plans across the KMA, and Seymour Lands, having the same boundaries as the Golden Triangle area was one of the described regions. Our process brought many people from the community and the various agencies together to collaboratively create that plan, or at least a vision leading to the plan. Through the process, we agreed on the need for more open space, and that Lady Musgrave Corridor should become the mixed-use main street for the area.
CN: So, we started with a series of critical meetings. We needed to alert particular strategic people that we wanted to do this and let them know the why and the how and let them understand why their input would be valuable. We called our MP and other relevant ministers responsible for land, environment, climate change, and investment. We contacted NEPA and KSAC.
We contracted with architects and planners from EAFIT University, Medellin, Colombia, to assist the process. During their visit, there was a community tour of Seymour Lands. We arranged stops with householders who were okay with us chatting with them and hearing their concerns and hopes for the community. We documented these observations, opinions, and concerns of residents.
The stakeholder visioning workshop was the next big step, bringing residents, businesses, elected representatives, and other stakeholders together. We identified specific problems and challenges on some streets concerning mobility, environmental issues, and land use. We mapped all of this information. We also identified opportunities in the community and mapped those as well.
AH: We then created a timeline for these actions and opportunities: the first six months, then six to twelve months, etc. So, a plan emerged. Some of the short-term goals included reusing underutilized public properties. One was Trafalgar Park, and the other was 62 Lady Musgrave Road on the corner of Hopefield Avenue. We wrote to the Prime Minister and neighboring property owners to convert it into a public park.
Unfortunately, the pandemic slowed us down, but we had ideas about closing down Lady Musgrave Road on a Sunday once a month to have a car-free day, where people could ride their bicycles and where we could have vendors and stalls. But COVID came when people started to show interest and excitement about those ideas.
The NHT has in place a fund called the Township Development Assistance Program, which was available to community groups for planning matters.
AH: The NHT has in place a fund called the Township Development Assistance Program (since 2006), which was available to community groups for planning matters. We received a grant from this fund, which we used for the whole process, including bringing in professional planners and hosting the visioning exercise.
At the end of that visioning process, we agreed to move to the next phase: draft an actual physical plan for the area. The NHT said they would give us the additional funding if we received a letter of support from NEPA. And even though NEPA said they were in support, they have yet to provide us with that official letter of support. So we're still hopeful that that will happen.
CN: Well, the State facilitated it in terms of a dedicated fund to help communities pay for planning services through NHT. It would be wonderful if they publicized it, and more communities could take advantage of it. Also, State representatives were invited by us and sat on a steering committee with citizens, investing time in a collaborative process of planning and envisioning community development - that was also essential.
But aside from that, the hindrance is massive because there is absolutely no commitment by the State to do what citizens want and request: none, Zero, Zip, Nada. So, the bottleneck occurs because you've collaborated, co-created, and co-envisioned; however, we can't build the streets we envision, put in the community park spaces, or design the transportation system. And so, the response from the State to work with citizens to execute the vision is not there.
In our case, the execution part comes to a dead halt after citizens invest energy. The Development Orders speak to local area development plans, but there needs to be a policy commitment that codifies that course of action. That needs to be done; that needs to be the policy, and then the development that follows is in keeping with that local area plan because otherwise, what is the point?
Lastly, the capacity of voluntary efforts is stretched and hard to sustain. Like all other voluntary situations, most of the effort is from a few people, and that's just the way of the world, so sustainability is significantly challenged by reliance on voluntary action.
At its core, this is an exercise of consultation with different stakeholders in the community, articulating and capturing what those various stakeholders have as a vision for the community.
CN: Can other communities do this at this scale? If they can get support through the NHT funding that we used or any other entity that might be interested in these issues, it could be at a scale similar to what we had done. But even without funds, communities can still do visioning exercises. Through a series of community meetings, they can create a shared vision and submit that document to the relevant agencies, even just to have a record of the fact that they articulated and documented an alternative approach that they see as appropriate for their community.
I don't want communities to think that without a couple of million dollars, they can't do anything, or if it's not a particular scale, then it's not worth it. At its core, this is an exercise of consultation with different stakeholders in the community, articulating and capturing what those various stakeholders have as a vision for the community. Coming to some agreements around that vision, creating documentary evidence of your process and the outcome of the process, and then determining which agencies strategically you want to make this documentation available to so that they're aware. Your elected representative would be one place to start. Everyone up for reelection should articulate their community's interests and desires. The process is doable at any scale.
CN: We had long heard of a plan to widen Lady Musgrave Road. After completing the first round of the visioning process, we met with the National Works Agency (NWA) leadership about this planned widening in 2019. We tried to impress upon them why there were better ways to go than a four-lane highway with a median down the middle. They responded by saying they were very aware of the issues, but this plan was not their call; they were executing a vision given to them. They shared draft road designs and asked us to share what we would like to see differently. GTNA has since then been trying to get the proper help to do a technical street design and streetscape alternative.
AH: Among our members is a traffic engineer, who reviewed and critiqued the plans, and we constructed a detailed letter to the NWA asking questions about their design process and why they felt this expansion was necessary. But we are still waiting to receive a response to that. Since then, they have gone to tender; we saw that in the papers. We have since tried to get the updated plans from them using the Access to Information Act twice, to which they told us there were no plans.
CN: I cannot understate the enormity of what it means when your planning and executing agencies tell you in an official response that they do not have a plan, but they go on to tender and post notices on residents' gates to say, "We are exercising the power of the state and giving you notice that we will be taking some of your frontages." That should make everybody very concerned and worried.
And it's not just Lady Musgrave; it's from Barbican Square down East Kings House Road and across unto Lady Musgrave Road. We anticipate mayhem in the construction phase, as was seen in every other road construction and widening exercise. We anticipate delays in the project so that when they say it will take a year, it will take two. We anticipate complete dislocation to residents in the interim time. We anticipate nothing but scant regard for community consultation in the process.
They will do some consultation because we, as citizens, will jump up and down, as in every other road widening project. They will do perfunctory meetings to tell you what their plan is. They will proceed to widen the road, and then we will live with the continued splitting of the community, the complete disregard for pedestrian safety and well-being, and the highway experience right outside our gates.
AH: NWA was saying that they deal with main roads and highways and do so independently of town planning and all other government agencies and their plans. When we talk to officers at NEPA, they agree that NWA is a law unto itself. They have a specific way of building roads, which they intend to keep doing. They must have four lanes; they must have turning lanes. So yes, the plan may come from outside in that politicians like building roads, but it's also that NWA is their master when it comes to building roads. They are not part of the overall planning process. They plan roads, they plan highways, they don't plan communities.
CN: It's also driven by a publicly articulated vision of the Prime Minister. The publicly articulated vision of our Prime Minister is of Kingston as a “first-world” city. He references Miami as the envisioned model and has done so in public addresses and statements. So, his vision and his desire for Kingston, that reflects a model of development (i.e., the North American model), is a driver of the actions and the priorities of the relevant agencies. That was part of what was being telegraphed to us quite unmistakably.
CN: Golden Triangle has established a presence not just in the minds of concerned communities but also in the minds of policymakers and implementers. And that's important because policymakers and implementers often proceed without the concerns of people or communities in mind. We insert ourselves in the process in different ways. We are part of a tradition of several communities before us saying: "We are here, we wish to be heard and will ask politely, or will insert ourselves uninvited, and we will not go away even if we don't have huge wins out of the process."
The Golden Triangle has made detailed written submissions on what was then the provisional development order (now confirmed) and sent that to NEPA. We have written to the Prime Minister countless times, clearly stating our concerns and suggestions for other ways of doing things. So, they cannot credibly claim that citizens are not interested in public consultations. Our written submissions act as a contradiction to these assertions. So, over time, the field of citizen action has grown, and it has grown because of the example and efforts of groups like Golden Triangle, Eastwood Park Citizens Association, and all the others.
AH: Its our pleasure
CN: Part of what we're all challenged to do is to understand how we define what wins means and what that is. And I think if you define it in terms of "Did you make a grand difference to actual outcome on the ground?" or "Did you change the plan for a road?", it will feel less impactful. Hopefully, this conversation helps us think more expansively about the impact and wins at a community level.
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This article was made possible by generous support from the Open Society Foundations.
