For the last couple of years, there’s been much agonizing over whether condos are encroaching too much on the downtown, the invasive species of the development world choking out commercial and industrial uses wherever they go.
People often talk as though this is something unique to Vancouver, the product of its policy of promoting housing downtown. What is often missed is that this is a phenomenon going on in many globally attractive cities, as there’s a kind of reshuffling of uses going on. Of course, it’s a worrying one, since no one is enchanted by the idea of city centres turning into places that don’t have anything but service jobs for the ceremonial and residential users downtown.
But it’s not a Vancouver-only problem by any means as this story about the problems of New York shows.