Public Comment Period on Intent to Make a Determination
Paardeberg Range Improvements – 4th Canadian Division Training Centre (Meaford)

May 5, 2023 — The Department of National Defence must decide whether the proposed project is likely to cause significant adverse environmental effects.

To help inform this decision, the Department of National Defence is inviting comments from the public on the project and its potential effects on the environment. All comments received will be considered public. For more information, individuals should consult the Privacy Notice on the Registry website.

Written comments must be submitted by May 24, 2023 to:
Capt Devon Kavka, Project Manager
Mailing Address: RR #1 Meaford, 112 Valour Road
Meaford, ON, Canada, N4L 0A1
E-mail:  Rebecca.MacInnis@forces.gc.ca

The Proposed Project

The Department of National Defence (DND) is proposing a project. The Paardeberg Anti-Tank range at 4th Canadian Division Training Centre Meaford is 1 of 2 facilities used by the Department of National Defence to train Canadian Forces personnel in the province of Ontario. The range is currently not in service due to current condition and suffers from several issues affecting usability. These include but are not limited to: the propensity of the range floor to flood during weather events; the ease for unexploded ordinance to be embedded into the range floor due to the natural floor; the range floor cannot support large vehicles; and the range is undersized as per DND safety standards. The project aims to excavate the range floor template to a depth of 150 millimeters and use the material to create a berm at the end of the range. Following the excavation granular material will be emplaced, graded, and compacted in order to create a hard surface across the entirety of the range floor. The range floor will be appropriately shaped to allow for appropriate site drainage. Additional site work includes minor ditching around the perimeter of the range as well as emplacement of range markers. Mitigation measures including, but not exclusive to, those received from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans will be implemented throughout the course of the project and until the site has fully stabilized.