Top 5 biggest news stories in Mississauga in 2019
Published December 29, 2019 at 9:48 pm
A lot has happened this year in Mississauga. The city continued construction on the billion-dollar Hurontario Light-Rail Transit project (better known as the LRT), moved forward on two massive redevelopment plans, welcomed a highly-anticipated exhibit and was told it could not exit the Region of Peel.
It’s true that Mississauga has seen both good and bad news in 2019. That being said, a mix of different news stories managed to pique your interest this year. But which stories were the most popular in Mississauga from the beginning of January all the way until the end of December?
New developments, wild moments and breaking news all made the list of Mississauga’s biggest news stories this year!
Here were the five biggest news stories in Mississauga in 2019:
5) The LRT officially moves forward in Mississauga
The project looked like it was in danger in 2018, but the highly-anticipated Hurontario Light Rail Transit project (better known as the LRT) is officially moving forward in Mississauga (and even the cancellation of Hamilton’s LRT hasn’t caused any concern that ours is on the chopping block). In October 2019, Infrastructure Ontario (IO) and Metrolinx awarded a contract valued at $4.6 billion to Mobilinx to design, build, finance, operate and maintain the Hurontario LRT.
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The LRT, once completed, will span 18 km and run from Port Credit GO at Lakeshore Rd. in the south to the Brampton Gateway Terminal at Steeles Ave in the north. The LRT will boast 19 stops and provide connections to the Port Credit and Cooksville GO stations, Mississauga Transitway, GO Transit’s Milton line, Lakeshore West rail lines, MiWay and Zum transit lines. Initially, it was slated to run 20 km and feature 22 stops, but Metrolinx recently announced it was chopping the City Centre loop to reduce costs.
The project will also include a maintenance and storage facility for the light rail vehicles located south of Highway 407 and west of Kennedy Road
4) The city moves forward on Brightwater and Lakeview Village
On July 31, 2019, Mississauga council formally endorsed the West Village/Brightwater Master Plan. The plan involves the redevelopment of the former Imperial Oil lands (at 70 Mississauga Road S and 181 Lakeshore Road W). The lands will be made into Port Credit West Village (or Brightwater Neighbourhood).
The proposed multi-phase community will reportedly include 2,995 new residential units (townhomes, mid-rise and high-rise up to 29 storeys), retail, parkland and campus (employment, recreation and education) uses on the 72-acre property.
Brightwater isn’t the only plan that got the green light from council in 2019. In November, city council endorsed the Lakeview Waterfront Development Master Plan. The plan sets out the framework for the development of the 177-acre site, which was once home to the Lakeview Power Generating Station lands. According to Lakeview Village Partners (LCP), Lakeview Village will offer a mix of residential units alongside a number of institutional and cultural uses. It will also offer over 825,000 square feet of employment space and over 100,000 square feet of retail space.
3) Mississauga becomes a sports mecca
In 2019, Mississauga made headlines when local tennis phenomenon Bianca Andreescu rocked the athletic world with an incredible 12 months worth of accomplishments. Andreescu’s 2019 has been insane, and one highlight is winning the US Open 2019 Women’s Singles (the first Canadian in history to win a Grand Slam singles title). Her outstanding results saw her become the highest-ranked Canadian ever on the WTA rankings, as well as having the city commemorate her with a massive She the North rally at Celebration Square.
In fact, thousands of fans from all over came out to attend the She the North rally, which took place on a Sunday afternoon at Celebration Square in September. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Toronto Mayor John Tory and Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie were all on hand to congratulate the rising star.
In other athletic news, Mississauga turned Celebration Square into Jurassic Park West to celebrate the historic journey of the Toronto Raptors as they emerged victorious in the NBA Finals for the first time ever.
While it’s been challenging to confirm whether or not Jurassic Park West was one of the largest Jurassic Park spaces in terms of size, the City of Mississauga has confirmed that its Celebration Square event space is about the size of 10 Olympic-sized swimming pools and that the area welcomed 112,500 attendees over the six games. Those attendees were able to watch the games on two huge screens with dimensions measuring 28×18 feet.
2) Square One welcomes massive Dr. Seuss Experience exhibit
This past year was a good one for Mississauga because it was a great year for Square One. The massive and ever-growing shopping centre welcomed the Cineplex-owned Rec Room and The Food District, an upscale food hotspot that’s home to La Carnita, Sweet Jesus, Pier 87, Midici and more.
But while there’s never been more to do at Square One, the shopping centre made headlines when it was announced that it would be home to the Dr. Seuss Experience, an Infinity Mirrors-style interactive journey into the world of Dr. Seuss. Located in the old Sport Chek location just outside the shopping centre, the instalment features interactive elements from “Oh, The Places You’ll Go!”, “The Lorax” and “Horton Hears a Who!,” as well as speciality rooms dedicated to “How the Grinch Stole Christmas!” and “If I Ran the Circus.”
All the rooms are designed around key scenes and characters from each of the books, and while the tour will travel to multiple, yet-to-be-announced cities across North America, it got its start in Mississauga.
1) Mississauga is told it cannot leave The Region of Peel
If at first you don’t succeed, try and try again–even if the province says no. When the Ontario government said it was going to review regional government systems for efficiencies, Mississauga was hopeful that it would finally be able to extricate itself from the Region of Peel. Sadly for Mississauga, the government chose to leave all regional governments in place.
Earlier this year, the Region of Peel commissioned an independent financial analysis on the fiscal impact of potentially dissolving or carving up the region. The push for the report emerged after a Deloitte report–which the City of Mississauga disputed–suggested it would cost billions for Mississauga to exit Peel.
The newer report—which suggests Mississauga residents would enjoy some savings—was conducted by Ernst & Young (EY) and released around the same time that Brampton city council officially voted to keep the region intact.
“EY confirms that if Mississauga were to separate from the Region, Mississauga taxpayers would see $84 million in savings,” Crombie said in an earlier statement.
“This report proves Mississauga’s long-held position that our city would be better off, both financially and from a governance perspective, should we become independent.”
Since the city cannot separate from the region at this time, it’s pushing for a more equitable division of funding for Peel Regional Police.
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