"This is your key to a confident understanding of the structure, organization and authority of municipal and planning law in Canada. The book analyzes the purpose and role of municipal councils, courts and provincial agencies, giving you the basis for the interpretation of municipal legislation. It includes references to the planning and municipal statutes of a number of Canadian jurisdictions, keeping you abreast of the most current legislative developments in this area of law. This new edition is fully updated to reflect the changes and developments that have occurred over the last 20 years, and since the advent of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms."--Publisher.

At a time when pollution, urban sprawl, and condo booms are leading municipal governments to adopt prescriptive laws and regulations, this book lays the groundwork for a more informed debate between those trying to preserve private property rights and those trying to assert public interests. Rather than asking whether community interests should prevail over the rights of private property owners, Public Interest, Private Property delves into the heart of the argument to ask key questions. Under what conditions should public interests take precedence? And when they do, in what manner should they be limited? Drawing on case studies from across Canada, the contributors examine the tensions surrounding expropriation, smart growth, tree bylaws, green development, and municipal water provision. They also explore frustrations arising from the perceived loss of procedural rights in urban-planning decision making, the absence of a clear definition of “public interest,” and the ambiguity surrounding the controls property owners have within a public-planning system.

Illuminates OMB practices of overturning municipal land-use planning decisions to impose its own policies, which are generally protective of private interests, and of applying provincial planning policies within the context of its own standards.

"In Canada, municipalities across the country are growing and the landscape is changing everyday. Likewise, by-law drafting practices and implementation protocols are no longer the same in municipalities. In particular, sweeping changes were brought about by Ontario Bill 130 in 2007 that confers broad authority on municipalities to pass by-laws.