Public Participation In Protecting Food Resources: The Case Of Federal Lands In Pickering

In 1972, the federal government’s plan to build the second major Toronto airport in the north Pickering area met strong public resistance that put the project on hold in 1975. This project investigates the role of public engagement in land use policy and the protection of agricultural lands by reviewing the literature on the Pickering Airport from a historical perspective and conducting archival research of historical records and documents from 1972 to the present. Consulting the literature on public discourse, I examine whether a 45 year-long delay in the completion of the airport could be solely attributed to public participation in policy making. The paper will focus on effective use of media, scientific evidence and expert advice that are leading to deadlocks in a process full of inconsistencies in government decision making, influenced by electoral politics, changing governments and jurisdictional differences between federal and provincial governments.