By Kristy Nease, CBC News Ottawa
An Ottawa couple says it doesn't make environmental sense for a woodlot next door to be clear cut through a sensitive floodplain, and the grade raised three metres, without anyone having to submit a building application or grading and drainage plan.
In Ottawa's vast rural boundary, you can clear cut privately owned woods on entire lots, even through floodplains and shorelines, without a permit. You can also dump clean fill, significantly altering the grade of a lot and how water drains from it, before having to submit a building application and a grading and drainage plan.
... The city's site alteration bylaw states no one can change the flow of storm, rain, ground, surface or subsurface water in a way likely to negatively affect neighbouring properties, including by altering the grade of a lot.
City drainage staff believe there has been no violation of the bylaw at the property, "and no further action by the city is warranted," natural systems planner Amy MacPherson wrote in an email to CBC.