Ontario’s Green Party wants to double the size of the Greenbelt by including a ‘Bluebelt’ of protected waterways

The Greens want to put a lot more green in the Greenbelt by adding a bunch of blue.

Green Leader Mike Schreiner will announce Wednesday that his party would double the size of the existing 800,000-hectare Greenbelt of protected lands around the Greater Golden Horseshoe Area.

Schreiner wants to see a Bluebelt" added to the Greenbelt to ensure rivers, basins and watersheds are kept safe from development.

We need to urgently protect water before the situation becomes more costly," the Green leader said.

As the climate crisis worsens, we need to do everything possible to preserve water supplies and the places that protect us from extreme weather events like expensive flooding," he said.

Water belongs in our rivers and lakes, not in our basements."

With the Ontario election set for June 2, Schreiner is mindful that Premier Doug Ford's Progressive Conservatives are vowing to build Highway 413 from Milton to Vaughan, and the Bradford Bypass from Highway 400 to Highway 404.

The 60-kilometre Highway 413 would raze 800 hectares of farmland, pave over 160 hectares of Greenbelt land, and cut through 85 waterways.

Similarly, the 16.2-kilometre Bradford Bypass would cross 27 waterways and cut through environmentally sensitive Holland Marsh lands, impacting about 39 hectares of wildlife habitat and 11 hectares of wetlands.

Ford has shown time and time again that he doesn't care about protecting water or our children's future," said Schreiner, whether it's the Holland Marsh Highway' that severely threatens Lake Simcoe, Highway 413 that would destroy vital wetlands or his thwarted attempt to ram through an MZO (minister's zoning order) to pave over Duffins Creek."

While the Don, Humber, and Rouge river valleys are already protected, the Greens' proposed Bluebelt would add Carruthers Creek, Duffins Creek and the Paris Galt Moraine, and preserve lands up to the Lake Simcoe watershed and Georgian Bay.

Robert Benzie is the Star's Queen's Park bureau chief and a reporter covering Ontario politics. Follow him on Twitter: @robertbenzie