The Northeast Industrial Park is located in the City of Belleville:
- South of Highway 401
- East of Cannifton Road
- North of the Canadian National Railway corridor
Belleville continues to double down on its identity as an industrial manufacturing hub, acquiring 685 acres of land adjacent to the existing industrial park and investing in municipal infrastructure servicing to these City-owned lands from the end of College Street East easterly to Atkins Road to make 395 acres shovel-ready and available for sale to industrial developers in the hopes of attracting industrial employers/property taxpayers.
Uses permitted in areas designated Employment Land Use include activities associated with the manufacturing, research and development, assembling, fabricating, packaging or processing of goods and services, including transportation/truck terminals, warehouses, railway uses, and other similar uses and ancillary facilities. Other compatible uses include retail and office uses accessory to industrial uses.
Official Plan
It’s a big speculative investment that will cost tens of millions of dollars in property tax funded long-term debt.
It comes at a tough time for manufacturing. In November 2025, Ontario’s Financial Accountability Officer’s (FAO) found that manufacturing – which represents about 10% of Ontario’s employment – recently fell below 10% for the first time since record keeping began in 1976.
Background
In 2008, Belleville began the expropriation of land from 5 property owners for a portion of 600 acres of land to expand the North East Industrial Park and address the shortage of municipally-owned, serviced industrial land paying them “market value plus some“, including:
- Whalen property
- Margaret Millington – 100 acres
- Andy Vos – 192 acres
The extension of a road network and municipal servicing into this area was previously evaluated as part of the Bell Creek Secondary Plan in 1991 and more recently, the College Street East Extension and Associated Servicing of Land West of Bell Creek – Municipal Class Environmental Assessment in 2012.
College Street East was extended in 2014 following the recommendations of the 2012 study which resulted in the servicing of approximately 200 acres of industrial zoned lands. The majority of these “Phase 1” lands along College Street East have now been sold by the City for development.
- 1996 East Belleville Servicing Study
- 2012 College Street Extension Municipal Class EA Study
- 2014 Transportation Master Plan
- 2021 Ministry of Transportation (MTO) Highway 401 Improvements in Belleville Transportation Environmental Study Report (TESR)
- 2023 Official Plan
The Northeast Industrial Park Expansion project was approved in the 2023 Capital Budget (23-1.081) $5,650,000 funded by _ to purchase land, construct new roads, and add water and wastewater services to more than 685 acres of City-owned lands from the end of College Street East easterly to Atkins Road to ensure there is a long-term supply of fully serviced and zoned industrial land ready for development.
2018 Municipal Comprehensive Review recommended increasing existing surplus of employment land to make Belleville more appealing
The 2018 Municipal Comprehensive Review of Urban Serviced Area (2019) identified that Belleville had a total of 191 gross ha (471 gross acres) of vacant employment land and that the majority of opportunities are located in the North East Industrial Park.
Over the 20-year planning horizon, the City is expected to add a total of approximately 1,510 jobs on employment lands. While a portion of employment growth is expected to be accommodated through intensification, employment land demand is expected to total 81 net ha (200 net acres). To accommodate this employment growth, Belleville is expected to absorb 4 net ha (10 net acres) of employment lands annually, comparable to the historical average.
In accordance with the existing supply of developable vacant employment land, Belleville has a surplus of employment lands to meet long-term needs to 2038. Despite an identified surplus of employment land to accommodate growth to 2038, it is recommended that the City complete a land exchange to strengthen its competitive position and economic development potential
A key focus of the Watson Report was to examine “the exchange of lands currently within the Urban Serviced Area (majority of lands located in the Cannifton East Industrial Area) for lands outside the Urban Services Area that have been recently expropriated by the City of Belleville (adjacent to the North East Industrial Park) for the purpose of future industrial development was undertaken. The goal of the City’s land exchange was to protect “the City’s supply of agricultural lands, and avoid exacerbating the City’s existing surplus of employment lands”. Such focus and purpose was confirmed in Staff Report No. PP-2019-32 dated May 6, 2019. City concluded in Staff Report PP-2019-32 that it must “remove 276 gross hectares of employment land located north of Highway 401 and east of Highway 37 from the City’s urban boundary which is currently unserviced and not considered serviceable within the forecast period
The City expropriated lands at the east end of the College Street adjacent to the North East Industrial Park which are currently designated “agricultural land use” and not within the designated settlement or urban area. Thus, to help support bringing these lands into the urban area and re-designate them “employment land use”, lands currently designated “industrial land use” in the urban area, such as the deferred growth area, had to be removed or eliminated from immediate or medium term use.
In doing so, the City’s goal was to exchange employment land that it owned and could service with industrial land that is privately owned and not readily serviced, even though it has been indicated to be part of the City’s urban serviced area for 20 years.
In June 2021, The Intelligencer reported that the municipality was “taking the first steps to nearly double the existing 1,000-acre Northeast Industrial Park by a further 900 acres on lands to the east already owned by the municipality.”
We know there is a need for this kind of land that is fully serviced and ready to go. We’re planning on developing it on a cost-recovery basis so whatever it costs us to develop and service those lands we hope to get that back in terms of the purchase price of that property.
Karen Poste, Manager of Economic and Strategic Services
The urban boundary was expanded to enable the lands to be developed in 2022 when the City’s new Official Plan was endorsed by the Province of Ontario.
A new Highway 401 interchange known as the Belleville Eastern Arterial Road (BEAR) at Highway 37 in northeast Belleville by the provincial government has been discussed to increase accessibility to the City’s Northeast Industrial Park.
Funding
Council has allocated millions through capital budgets for the North East Industrial Park expansion initiative.
Since 2008, Belleville has allocated over $26 million to capital projects expanding and improving the Industrial Park:
- 2013
- $6.6 million for 600m College Street East extension
- $4 million for land acquisition
- 13-2.06 – $5,000,000 for Build Belleville – North East Industrial Park Upgrades in the 2013 Capital Budget funded by long-term debt (taxation)
- $1,320,000 from the federal government
- $1,099,900 from the provincial government
- 17-1.010 – $250,000 for University Ave – Jamieson Bone to Dead End
- 20- Amendment – $2,419,800 for NE Industrial Park Upgrades
- 22-1.017 – $2,100,000 for North East Industrial Park Sidewalk (College St. E & Jamieson Bone Rd.) – Additional Funding funded by long-term debt (taxation)
- 23-1.081 – $650,000 for Northeast Industrial Park Expansion – EA & Design in the 2023 Capital Budget
- 24-1.041 – $630,000 for Purchase of 175 Airport Pkwy in the 2024 Capital Budget funded by Asset Management Reserve
- 25-1.005 – $5,000,000 for Northeast Industrial Park Expansion – Detail Design – Phase 1
- $4,000,000 from property taxes
- $500,000 from water rates
- $500,000 from wastewater rates
The 10-Year Capital Plan approved alongside the 2026 Capital Budget projected that $565,000 would be approved in 2026 and $57 million in 2027 for the Industrial Park Expansion.
As of July 29, 2025 the Upgrades (13-2.06) and Sidewalk (22-1.017) have been completed ($7,100,000):
- New sidewalks along Jamieson Bone Road and College Street East
- Bus shelters
- Enhanced culvert and ditch improvements for better surface drainage
- Roadway Rehabilitation between the railway tracks on College Street East
- Upgrades to railway level crossings on both College Street East and Jamieson Bone Road
Expansion
Phase 1
Phase 1 of the planned industrial park expansion includes:
- Making 43 hectares of land available in the southeast portion of the expansion area
- Extension of existing College Street East to Airport Parkway West
- Construction of a new north-south collector road
- Installation of new water, wastewater, and stormwater infrastructure
- Construction of a new stormwater management pond
Detail Design of Phase 1 is now underway. The process and timelines which the City is following to provide fully serviced and development-ready employment lands to investors includes the following:
- Detail design may be undertaken in a phased approach as funding permits. This MCEA includes preparation of an Implementation Plan including cost and time estimates for infrastructure detail design and construction required for development of remaining lands in a phased approach.
- Environmental and Regulatory Approvals: to ensure that development of these lands occurs in an ecologically sensitive and respectful manner it will be necessary to secure several permits prior to undertaking any construction activity in this area.
- Construction may be in a phased approach as funding permits.
- Severance and sale of employment lands – sale(s) can occur following completion of the environmental assessment.
- Development by private developers – development by private investors cannot commence until the servicing construction (roads, water, wastewater, utilities) has been completed. For Phase 1, this is currently projected to be 2029.
Construction is estimated to be completed by the end of 2029.
The City of Belleville, like many other cities, had invested in land and services to ready industrial land to accommodate the needs of new industry. Such investments were usually costly, and when considering the time value of money, the City rarely obtained any return on investment – in many cases, the City likely lost money. And it was noted that such investments were purely speculative, that there was no guarantee as to when or even if the City would realize any economic gain from such an investment.
Using incentives sometimes means walking a very thin line: Bonusing as an economic development tool – Stephen G. Hyndman (2014)
