304 and 318 Spruce Street: seven house lots refused by Council in 2024, approved by settlement in 2025

What Council decided

On July 8, 2024, Oakville's Planning and Development Council refused a zoning by-law amendment and draft plan of subdivision for 304 and 318 Spruce Street, at the southeast corner of Reynolds Street and Spruce Street in Ward 3. The applicant, Spruce Rose Inc., proposed seven lots for detached houses and a small block for a daylight triangle at the corner, with the land rezoned from Community Use to Residential Low 5 with special provisions. The files are Z.1613.66 and 24T-24003/1613.

The motion refused the applications "as proposed" and directed that, if they were appealed, staff "use the appeal process to attempt to mediate issues affecting zoning regulations and development standards". The Town's notice attributes the refusal to the reasons in a staff report dated June 25, 2024 and gave August 12, 2024 as the last day to appeal. That notice is headed March 15, 2024 on the Town's website, a date that predates the application; its text records the July decision.

What residents and Council raised

The statutory public meeting was held on May 21, 2024. Five residents and the Trafalgar Chartwell Residents Association spoke after the applicant's presentation, and the minutes record each as opposed to the proposal or its zoning. They raised neighbourhood character, narrow setbacks and crowding of the lots, building heights, added driveways on streets where many children walk and catch school buses, and the effect on the heritage district. One speaker suggested five lots rather than seven.

Council asked staff to examine compatibility with the neighbourhood's lot pattern and character, whether the Residential Low 5 zone was appropriate when the surrounding zoning is RL3-0, tree preservation, heritage character, the number of lots, built form and materials, and traffic matters including sight lines, driveway spacing and school bus pick-up points.

The appeal and the settlement

Spruce Rose appealed. At a case management conference on October 17, 2024, the Ontario Land Tribunal made two residents participants, set a five-day hearing to start March 31, 2025, and noted that the company and the Town had arranged a first meeting with a Tribunal mediator for that afternoon. On April 4, 2025, the parties told the Tribunal they had reached a full settlement.

The order of April 8, 2025 allows both appeals in part. It approves By-law 2025-059, which rezones the land to RL3-0, the zone of the surrounding streets, with a special provision in place of the RL5 zone the application sought. Each lot must be at least 480 square metres with 14 metres of frontage. Maximum house heights are set lot by lot, between 10.65 and 10.99 metres. Driveways may be no wider than six metres. One lot, Lot 7, is limited to 31 per cent coverage and must set its second storey back 0.6 metres above the garage on the side facing its eastern neighbour.

The draft plan still shows seven lots and one block. It is approved in principle subject to conditions, which the Town has authority to clear. One requires a revised urban design brief that has regard for the adjacent Trafalgar Road Heritage Conservation District. A holding symbol, H61, limits the land to its existing legal uses until the Town approves a geotechnical study and receives an updated certificate of insurance and letter of reliance from a qualified person under Ontario's environmental site assessment regulation.

Where it stands now

As of November 9, 2026, the Town's development data lists the zoning as approved by the Tribunal for seven detached houses and the subdivision as draft approved. The Tribunal's case status page still shows the lead case at the pre-merit hearing stage, although the April 2025 settlement order is posted there. The Town no longer lists the file among its active development application pages, and the sources checked do not show whether the holding symbol has been removed or the plan of subdivision registered.