This past week, Lake Ontario Waterkeeper, Environment Hamilton and Friends of the Red Hill Valley submitted comments to the Ministry of the Environment on a proposed policy for reviewing environmental assessment approvals in Ontario. The comment is part of a 15-year battle to make the province's approval process for major projects fair and transparent for all communities.

Proposed in the 1950s, approved in the 1980s, and changed in the 1990s, the Red Hill Creek Expressway has been a source of controversy in Hamilton for a generation. Despite widespread opposition by community members - including environmentalists, educators, engineers, musicians and native groups - the City of Hamilton refused to amend the highway design to better protect the Niagara Escarpment.

Last fall, Lake Ontario Waterkeeper and Environment Hamilton requested a review of Ontario's Environmental Assessment approvals program. Using the Environmental Bill of Rights, we argued that the Environmental Assessment Act should be updated to impose a duty on the Minister of the Environment to respond to requests for reassessment within a reasonable period of time.

Lake Ontario Waterkeeper and Friends of Red Hill Valley are requesting Section 11.4 of the Ontario Environmental Assessment Act be amended to provide more clarity about the review process and that all approvals issued under the Act in the future contain expiration or renewal dates.

The Ministry of Environment has charged Consbec Inc. after blasting in the Red Hill Valley sent debris flying through the air. Neighbours reported seeing "softball sized rocks" soaring over residential streets, resulting in significant property damage and sparking fears among residents that, "my kids ... could have been hit in the head." The rocks were launched after the Niagara Escarpment was blasted to make way for the Red Hill Creek Expressway.

There is a valley, at the western tip of Lake Ontario, that stretches to join sparkling bay with towering cliffs. Once, the fishery in this bay was the largest of all the waters of Lake Ontario. Today, the commercial fishery is long forgotten.

Once, the creek that ribbons its way down from the escarpment had thirteen brothers and sisters, each fuelling our lake with their waters. Today, they are buried, forgotten. Just this one remains.

In 1929, the city said, "Enough. This valley 'shall be parkland that is outstanding on this continent.'"

Barely had their promise been uttered when new voices rang out. "Progress!" the prophets of 1951 cried. The park became a highway-in-waiting, biding its time until the architects of tomorrow could tame it.

Hamilton's Public Works, Infrastructure and Environment committee adopted a resolution on Monday "that the City commence a Court Action against all identifiable individuals who, during the summer of 2004, participated in activities in contravention of the City's Injunction Order, seeking to have them held in contempt of Court."

Dear Premier,

On Thursday, August 6, approximately 200 individuals gathered in the Red Hill Valley to celebrate the talents of local writers and musicians and to support a neighbourhood fighting to protect its park. By all accounts, the Red Hill Valley Literary Festival was a successful community event.

That same day, you were in Stoney Creek, where you told the media that your government is committed to constructing the Red Hill Creek Expressway. You stated, "We believe we have had a full environmental assessment and we believe it is in the public interest to proceed."

To be clear: the environmental assessment is not, in fact, over. An environmental assessment begins when a project is proposed and it does not end until well after a project has been completed and its impacts have been monitored and documented.

In 1929, the City of Hamilton purchased the Red Hill Valley, declaring the valley would be, "parkland that would be outstanding on this continent."

Three quarters of a century later, the Red Hill Valley is Hamilton's largest park. It is the only natural area in the city's east end, and the creek running through it is the last of fourteen streams that once flowed through the city into Lake Ontario.

In the last year, construction began on the Red Hill Creek Expressway - a 7.5 kilometre link that will join Highway 403 with the Queen Elizabeth Way. 40,000 trees must be cut down to make way for the expressway. According to Friends of the Red Hill Valley, the roads and associated interchanges will carve the Red Hill Valley into at least 30 separate pieces.

Dear Minister Dombrowsky,

Further to our letters of January 23, 2004, December 17, 2003, November 5, 2003, November 13, 2003, and August 21, 2003, we are writing to clarify the status of the Red Hill Creek Expressway project.