The cleanup of a prime piece of property in Point Edward is proceeding.
The village and owners of the former Holmes Foundry site, Point Edward Gateway Inc., have reached an agreement to demolish derelict buildings, and remove overgrown vegetation.
Point Edward CAO Jim Burns said the owners initially appealed the village's cleanup order but it was upheld by the Property Standards Committee at a hearing December 17. Gateway agreed to forego any further appeal and move forward.
Burns said council is excited to finally see the 16-acre property at 200 Exmouth Street cleaned up, and he's hopeful the commercially zoned land will eventually be developed.
"The cleanup I think will help in the marketing of the property," said Burns. "Part of the agreement with the owners is that they're going to continue to market the property for sale, and they're also going to continue with an environmental assessment, and then once that's completed, a risk assessment that talks about if there are problem areas on the property or not."
Burns said there are a number of uses that could happen there and that council is quite flexible when it comes to what they would like to see there.
The site is expected to be cleaned up within a few months, but a start date hasn't been confirmed.
Cleanup, and monitoring is expected to cost around $250,000 with Schouten Excavating doing the work.
Point Edward Gateway Inc. took possession of the property late in 2017, after 17 years of costly legal wrangling, and listed the site for sale for $7-million.