If you’ve ever seen a construction site in the Municipality of Lakeshore and wondered what’s being built there... this new tool is for you. The municipality has now launched its new Development Activity Hub, which is an online interactive tool designed to give residents real-time information about construction and developments happening in their community. This online hub includes information on current and past planning applications and building permits, including application types, volumes, values and statuses that date back to 2023. It also features an interactive map showing where all active applications are located, with colour-coded pins identifying the application’s status. Lauren Miller, Lakeshore’s Executive Director of Development Services, says residents can use the hub to see what’s happening in their own neighbourhoods. “Anyone can see the current applications that we have in for planning applications as well as for building permits. So if you’re curious about what’s happening in your neighbourhood, what’s happening next door or what’s happening throughout the municipality, all of those applications are on an interactive map.” She says the goal is to make development information easier for the public to access. “One of the major questions that we get in development services is what’s that going on across the street? So we really want to be able to make basic information about what’s happening in the community available to everyone so that they don’t necessarily have to pick up the phone and try to navigate the phone tree to get an answer from someone. They can see right on their screen what’s being applied for.” Miller says this is a major step for Lakeshore as this has become an industry norm for municipalities. “So this is really Lakeshore’s first foray into what most people refer to as open data. So just data within the community being available to the public. This is something that I’ve seen in other municipalities, but has become a standard across municipalities.” The Development Activity Hub will be regularly updated as new applications and feedback come in. The municipality says some information will be limited to meet privacy requirements, while requests for records such as building plans will continue to be handled through freedom of information legislation. -with files from AM800’s The Shift with guest host Chris Byrne
