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Floating homes that can pull up and park on any lake or river have put our cottages, waterfront communities and marine environments at risk. They have also exposed major gaps in the oversight of Canada’s waterways.
Transport Canada (TC) has labelled them vessels, which means they are under federal jurisdiction on any navigable waterway. Others call them water squatters – they are exempt from all provincial and municipal rules and regulations so long as they are classified as vessels and are not physically connected to the shoreline.
And they have floated into Port Severn, Ontario, on the Trent-Severn Waterway, and into Georgian Bay. One manufacturer of the floating homes – essentially converted shipping containers on barges – is advertising them as affordable waterfront alternatives and Airbnb accommodations.
Aside from the encumbrances on lakes and waterways, the floating structures take advantage of other loopholes. They do not have to pay taxes yet can consume a municipality’s resources in the event of a fire, for example. They are also not subject to municipal bylaws on noise, lighting, safety, building codes, environmental controls or waste disposal. The National Post and Cottage Life have reported on the controversy.
The risks to safe, quiet and sustainable lakes is real in any province except British Columbia. Dealing with a rising number of houseboats and floating homes in Victoria harbour, B.C. was able to obtain a TC policy that specifically regulates float homes around 20 years ago.
Now others are picking up where B.C. left off. Gloucester Pool Cottagers' Association, on the Trent-Severn Waterway, where the floating structures first appeared, has formed a national coalition to lobby TC to change their designation, consistent with B.C. Float Homes Not Vessels Coalition currently represents more than 30,000 cottagers. Organizers have started a letter-writing campaign to TC; are educating municipalities on the issue; lobbying MPs and submitting paper petitions to Ottawa to reclassify them as floating homes.
They are not trying to ban the floating structures, the coalition says. But by reclassifying them as float homes not vessels, they can then be managed by the same municipal and provincial rules that apply to landowners, cottagers and communities. A municipality does have the right to govern what’s in their lakebeds – so long as they are not labelled vessels.
“Right now, nothing is stopping them from going anywhere they want,” says Cheryl Elliot-Fraser, co-chair of the coalition. Those interested in joining the coalition’s efforts can find the petitions and instructions here. For more information, contact the group at [email protected].
Safe Quiet Lakes is also interested in your views on the issue. Drop us a line at [email protected].
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