An open house was held recently to look over the Riverwood plans for residential development on the Souris Valley grounds, the former home of the historic landmark institution, the Souris Valley Extended Care Centre, or the Weyburn Mental Hospital as it was formerly known.
Nicor Developments bought 52 acres of that land in order to build some neighbourhoods of residential properties, ranging from high-end executive homes down to condos and apartments, with a view to addressing some of Weyburn's ongoing need for more housing, particularly affordable housing.
It's arguable whether the plans address the latter problem, but then the plans weren't finalized at the time of this writing.
What the plans do show is, this area and the development planned for it, look to be an exciting new prospect for the city of Weyburn. Is this a fitting way to use the land left vacant by the demolition of SVECC?
Many people still hold their memories dear from working or visiting family members who lived or worked at Souris Valley; for the sake of these people, and for the sake of history of the community, there needs to be at the very least some sort of monument to commemorate the site as historically significant to the community, and the developers have indicated there would be something along these lines.
Another important aspect to the plans is to have green space, and there is a plan to have this, with paths that will connect up with the park pathways already in place on the Souris Valley grounds, connecting with the Tatagwa Parkway.
As to the presence of affordable housing, the president of Nicor indicated the market will dictate this, and how much entry-level housing will be present; if by affordable housing they mean the condos that start at $199,000, then they are missing that mark altogether.
There needs to be affordable-level apartments available, both for young families and workers, and for seniors, and city council needs to ensure that Nicor will indeed make these available. As one man said who was at the open house, if as the mayor said $260,000 is an affordable home, there will be a lot of people automatically shut out of being able to buy a home at Riverwood. This surely cannot be a good thing when affordable housing is the biggest need Weyburn has, to enable her to grow and prosper.
