Clearview cracks down on shipping containers
Clearview council has given township staff the go-ahead to crack down on the use of shipping containers for non- conforming uses and has set priorities for enforcement.
The use of shipping containers as permanent storage units was explicitly prohibited during an earlier zoning bylaw update and was later challenged by Deputy Mayor Barry Burton who asked staff to investigate ways to make them legal and to monetize them, should they be permitted on lands zoned industrial, commercial, and agricultural, either through fees or taxation.
A shipping container can be used as a building, for storage or any other use, as long as a building permit is obtained. This would require a fee, development charges, and probably an engineered foundation. In some cases a site plan may also be required.
There are only two instances in the township where permits have been issued for these types of buildings.
“It is for these reasons, that people typically do not apply for building permits for shipping containers. They do not want to go to the trouble of complying with the Ontario Building Code, Zoning or pay the applicable fees and taxes. Therefore, it is for these same reasons that some other form of licensing, fees and planning is likely to be unsuccessful,” reported staff.
“Nothing is changing,” said chief building official Scott McLeod. “To be clear, they are all prohibited but they can be legally established on a property if a person wishes to go through a building permit [process].”
With council’s blessing, the bylaw department will be prioritizing enforcement on residential properties; where there is more than one shipping container on a property (except for where the property has legally been permitted by the township to have storage containers as part of their
commercial storage business); where the shipping container is not being used for storage accessory to a permitted legal commercial, industrial or agricultural use on the property; where the shipping container(s) is unsightly and/or causing a nuisance; and where the shipping container does not meet the setbacks for an accessory building; and that in commercial and industrial zones the total square footage of multiple containers cannot exceed the size of the principal building.
“This is going to be, in some cases, a very difficult thing to enforce so I think the clarity is absolute. It has not been the case,” said Councillor Thom Paterson. “I am not confident that we have the resources or even the will to do this to some of our residents.”
“I think we are going to have more discussion on how we apply this and I would suggest that we need to have an open mind to make further changes if we find that we’ve kind of overshot the mark here. First, we were too slow and now we are running too quickly to comply.”
Director of Community Services Mara Burton said during the pandemic there were some rather serious infractions including substantial building projects done without permits and multitudes of shipping containers, out of which businesses are operating.
“We absolutely, in my opinion, need to start getting on top of some of these rather serious situations because if we don’t, we are going to become the shipping [container] capital of Simcoe County and we need to start somewhere,” said Burton. “We need to start reversing this train… and turn it around. It won’t happen overnight.”
“It’s unfortunate, but to be realistic it’s understandable why residents would utilize these devices when they are very secure, very robust, very easy to move around,” said Mayor Doug Measures.
The final vote passed unanimously.
