What's inside:
New Year's Greetings And Membership Renewals
We wish you and your families a joyous and healthy new year. We have exciting plans for 2024 including: Community Walk with new YNSE Project Sponsor David Panici; Metrolinx Town Hall; launch of Neighbourhood Watch; Royal Orchard Park Clean Up; Ice Cream Social.
With the new year comes a reminder to renew your membership this month or join RORA. Memberships are annual. The fee is $20.00. Payment can be made by e-transfer to: royalorchardra@gmail.com. Please include your name and address on the e-transfer notes. If you are a new member, please fill out the membership at our Join us page so that we can make sure you get all our emails and notifications. If you have made changes to your contact information, please email us at the same account.
We will also accept cash/cheques. Please make cheques payable to Royal Orchard Ratepayers’ Association and deliver or mail your payment to: Alice Young, 18 Banquo Road, Thornhill, ON, L3T 3H1.
RORA is your community voice and advocates for the health and safety our neighbourhood. We need your contributions to continue to represent your interests. Tell your neighbours how important it is that they join us!
Metrolinx "Comfort" Letter
On December 11, 2023, Metrolinx released an open letter to Royal Orchard residents to provide “additional and up-to-date written assurance of Metrolinx’s commitments regarding noise and vibration levels, and other issues of concern to the Royal Orchard community” as they move forward with the YNSE.
The letter re-confirms Metrolinx’s intent to use floating slab track in the tunnels under the Royal Orchard community. Metrolinx is confident that this technology will ensure noise levels from the subway in homes in the Royal Orchard neighborhood are no louder than 30 dBA and vibration levels inside a single-family home are no more than 0.05 mm/s (average vibration). To minimize noise generated from service equipment in the tunnel during construction of the tunnels, Metrolinx has prescribed in the RFP contract that rubber-tired vehicles be used in the tunnels to transport tunnelling supplies to the tunnel boring machine.
This letter is the result of RORA’s ongoing advocacy and liaison with Metrolinx. Despite these reassurances, we have a number of questions and will be issuing a formal response to Metrolinx. Stay tuned!
Metrolinx’s letter is available here: https://assets.metrolinx.com/image/upload/v1702073849/Images/Metrolinx/Open_Letter_to_Royal_Orchard_-_December_2023.pd
Request For Proposal for YNSE Tunnelling
The Ontario government announced on December 1, 2023, that a request for proposals (RFP) has been issued to complete tunnelling work for the project. The RFP invites three shortlisted tunnelling teams to submit proposals for how they would deliver a package of work that includes designing the tunnels, supplying the tunnel boring machines, and building the launch shaft and extraction shaft that will be used to lower the tunnel boring machines into the ground and bring them to the surface again.
The three shortlisted teams are: CrossTransit Group (Applicant Leads: VINCI Construction Grands Projets, Ferrovial Construction Canada Inc.); North End Connectors (Applicant Leads: Aecon Infrastructure Management Inc., Dragados Canada Inc., Ghella Canada Ltd.); and Toronto-York Tunnel Connectors (Applicant Leads: Acciona Infrastructure Canada Inc., Bouygues Construction Canada).
The successful tunnelling team will also design and construct the walls that will support the underground stations and emergency exit buildings and relocate some existing utilities along the route. Metrolinx expects to award the tunnelling contract in late 2024.
Royal Orchard Community Liaison Committee
RORA attended the first Community Liaison Committee (CLC) meeting hosted by Metrolinx on December 14, 2023. Invitees included Mayor Scarpitti, Councillor Irish, representatives from the Gazebo, the York Catholic District School Board. Meeting highlights included discussion of CLC Terms of Reference, YNSE project status and recent milestones. RORA will post Metrolinx’s presentation materials and minutes of the meeting on our website.
Development News
It has been quiet on the development front of late. However, the application for 8127 and 8149 Yonge Street (aka Tutto Bene Plaza) goes forward to the Ontario Land Tribunal on January 24, 2024. RORA is working with other engaged residents and the City of Markham to make our views known. Our submission to Markham Council in March 2023 can be found here.
Help Us Make RORA More Successful
We are interested in your views and your ideas for our neighbourhood. We need volunteers to help with events and activities of the committees. If you have some time to give, we would love to hear from you. We are still looking for a treasurer, secretary and membership co-ordinator.
Contact us at royalorchardra@gmail.com
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