Mundy Pond residents push back against pitch for a new community centre

A pitch to put a new Mundy Pond community centre across the street from the H.R. Mews Centre has residents in the area upset and uneasy.

"They don't want to lose the green space, they don't want a monster of a building put here," said Karen Hanlon, whose family has lived in Mundy Pond for three generations.

The City of St. John's has been planning to replace the aging H.R. Mews Centre for over a year, and on Monday night, officials held a public meeting to present the first of its replacement plans: a new building, the same size as the existing centre, built across the street on the gravel lot that often serves as an overflow parking lot for the facility.

A swath of the neighbouring green space would become the parking lot for the new facility.

"It concerns me for the loss of green space. St. John's has very little of it," Hanlon said, gesturing to the stretch of grass and trees between Mundy Pond Road and the pond itself, a view she's able to take in from her Connors Avenue deck, which is right next to the proposed site.

"If this building is erected right here I will no longer have the view that I have, which then reduces the saleability of my property," she said.

Vacant building left behind?

Hanlon is also worried about the fate of the old Mews Centre.

"They said they will keep it open while they're constructing the new building and after that, they don't know, it will be just closed," she said.

Residents are worried the building will sit vacant, she said.

"And we know what happens to vacant properties in the middle of St. John's. All we have to do is look at the nurse's residence just less than a mile from here."

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Ward 3 Coun. Jamie Korab shares Hanlon's concerns about the old Mews Centre.

"Right now, there's no plans with what would happen with the current Mews Centre," he said.

"The city would look at either selling it or repurposing it, but I'm certainly not a fan of having a derelict building left here for years and years which is open to vandals."

A loss of green space is likely inevitable too, he said.

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Property value concerns from residents close to the site would be taken into consideration, he said, noting that people who live close to the new Paul Reynolds Centre in Wedgewood Park did not see their property values go down.

"Albeit they are farther away," he said.

Location solves problems

The location presented Monday night was chosen because it kept the centre close to the pond and to the walkable heart of the community, he said.

It also solved a parking problem: right now, the Mews Centre lot is too small, so people park across the street and dart across MundyPond Road.

That's a safety concern, he said.

The city also already owns the land that's proposed for the new site, he said.

And building something new allows the Mews Centre to stay open during construction, which is expected to begin next summer, and finish in 2021, he said.

Korab said there are more public consultation sessions planned, and that residents will be listened to. He emphasized that the city is only in the first stages of the process and that the design of the new building has not yet been discussed.

Discussion, said Hanlon, is exactly what she's looking for. She says Mundy Pond is often overlooked because it has traditionally been a low-income area.

"I just think that right now is time to have more forward thinking, and to stop the 'it's good enough' thinking. I'm not denying that a new Mews Centre is needed," she said."That's not what I'm about. What I'm about it is where it's needed, where the footprint needs to be and what it needs to do and represent for our community."