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New developments in Vancouver far outpace what regional plan says population should grow by: residents

November 3rd, 2013 · 121 Comments

As some of you careful readers might have noted in the past, I am not always an admirer of the way opposition groups do war.

Saying they’ve been treated disrespectfully by city hall politicians and staff, they then proceed to issue statements and write blog comments that make them sound like foul-mouthed 13-year-olds.

Complaining that city planners and engineers have been deceptive, they circulate wonky bits of information and “facts” that suit their rhetorical purposes at the moment.

They’re not doing themselves any favours, that’s for sure.

But the new Coalition of Vancouver Neighbourhoods has just issued a news release that deserves to be taken seriously and debated.

The group has looked at the population number that Metro Vancouver set as a target for the city in its recently passed Regional Growth Strategy. (To see it for yourself, go here.) It’s worked out what kind of growth that means per year if Vancouver is going to get to 740,000 b6 2041 from the approximately 630,000 it’s at now. And it has compared that to the actual number of completions of new units currently going on.

There are lots of issues still to be considered here: for example, does it matter what the RGS says, if people are moving here and prepared to outbid existing residents for housing if they can’t find enough supply?

But the numbers at least help us put what’s going on in context.

As I’d said in previous blog posts (or tweets or something), one of the things that’s making people uncomfortable about the current community plans is the sense that city planners are just jamming in maximum density wherever they think they can. Residents have had no sense of what projected rate of growth for their area is, no chance to talk about whether they think that projected rate is reasonable, no sense of whether the new density in plans matches that rate, and no sense of what the end game is at all.

The release is copied below

November 4, 2013
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
What’s The Rush? Vancouver Communities Question Rapid Rate of Development
Vancouver, B.C. – The City of Vancouver is accepting proposals and approving residential construction five times faster than their own projections demand.
According to the Regional Context Statement approved by Vancouver City Council in June this year, the planners anticipate that Vancouver will see an increase of 153,800 people in the thirty-five years from 2006 to 2041 – a rate of an additional 4,350 people per year.
It is this expected increase of 153,800 people that the City says demands the densification plans they have been pushing.
However, since 2011, the city has already proposed or approved sufficient new housing to accommodate 43,000 people. In just two years, this planned housing satisfies 28% of the growth the city projects being required over the next 35 years.
This rapid pace is not justified by the city’s own projections. Continuing at this blistering pace of development, the city will reach its own 2041 targets by 2019, twenty-two years ahead of schedule.
Coalition of Vancouver Neighbourhoods spokesperson Jak King noted that “these numbers do not include any units that were approved between 2006 and 2011 for which we do not have figures but which we believe add significantly to this total.” The Coalition of Vancouver Neighbourhoods represents community associations across the City, and is seeking a new and more respectful and involved relationship between the City and its neighbourhoods.
“The Coalition supports well-planned, reasonably-paced growth, with developments that are aligned with the interests of local communities,” said co-chair Fern Jeffries. “We want our local communities to be a respected and influential part of the process, to ensure that the increased density is consistent with neighbourhood plans and maintains good livability for its residents.”
By any measure, the current rate of development greatly exceeds the City’s own projected requirements. The Coalition of Vancouver Neighbourhoods therefore asks the City, why is it pursuing this unsustainably rapid pace of development so aggressively and so unilaterally?

 

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  • MB

    gman, you’re reaching.

    The issue you brought up about Habitat was Land is an essential element in development of both urban and rural settlements.

    Though about 30% of Vancouver’s land is consumed by publicly-owned roads, and another 15% or so by publicly-owned parks, the majority of urban land is owned privately and traded via the market. That is where the inflated housing values originate, not in the leases of False Creek ….. or the boreal forest.

  • MB

    Richard W 99, great comments.

    I agree wholeheartedly that there is an entire missing category here that rests in the deep crevasse between strata titled condos and the detached home. And ground-orientation is key.

    Ergo the rowhouse, hopefully freehold.

    However, rowhouses, though cheaper than detached houses, will not be as cheap as strata’d condos. This is where it’s natural design flexibility can come into play. Rowhouses with basement rental suites will really help, in my view, make them more affordable to non-professionals.

    Proximity to quality transit will also help keep family income from being drained with car ownership, and hence have more disposable income for big city homes. The digital age has also made running businesses from home and telecommuting more feasible, which would indirectly help make rowhouses attractive to average folks.

    The city is now allowing rowhouses at the periphery of tower clusters (Norquay?). I am not sure whether they will be forced into strata title or not. That would be a deal killer for thousands.

  • gman

    MB,
    I guess if you’re familiar with this material and choose not to believe it that’s your prerogative. Im just offering an explanation for you to give your great grandkids when three generations are sitting around in your 70 story government owned housing project unit looking at old photos of what was once the family home and they say pappy why don’t we live in that pretty house anymore.Its up to you to tell them why you let the bad men take it away for the collective.Have a nice day.

  • Richard Wittstock

    MB #102

    I don’t think strata-titling in and of itself is an issue. Fee simple is better, agreed although it brings additional challenges and costs. I’ve built and lived in (strata) duplexes and they are not much different in practical terms from a row house…you still have a party wall, but you largely have 100% control over your outdoor area.

    The issue for me is one of form, and this has planning implications with regard to density. The urban townhouses that are built in Vancouver are typically in the RM zones, i.e. they are zoned (and land is priced) for apartments at up to 1.45 FSR (which requires underground parking). You can’t buy an RM-4 zoned site and make the numbers work without going underground. The result is a high-density (1.1-1.2 FSR) townhouse form with very limited outdoor space and units at the small end of the size range (ie 1300-1800 sf). Not an acceptable alternative for most growing families.

    In order to make the numbers work for lower-density rowhouses, i.e. 0.70-0.80 FSR, the parking has to be at grade in a garage, either attached or (preferably) detached. Then you can provide a really good, useable private back yard, possibly even a basement (suite or not); all the things that people want from a single-family home in a more efficient package. The issue then is that in order to keep the land value affordable, it has to be priced at single-family land values. So this means re-writing the RS or RT zones to permit this.

  • ThinkOutsideABox

    Richard Wittstock and MB, glad to see your thoughts on this, thanks for sharing. Richard it would be nice to see more of your form of development in Vancouver. That step is mostly missing on the property ladder. Does building with concrete work at that density? Or would it be wood frame? I ask because it appears the favoured developers du jour only do concrete and subsequently affects the form of development we see being built.

  • Richard Wittstock

    As with single-family homes and townhomes, these would be wood frame except in the case of very-high-end product.

    Not sure who the “favoured developers du jour” are and I don’t believe that the developer/choice of material typically dictates the form of development; its the other way around. Form of development is dictated by the zoning/density/height and economics of the site, which in turn dictates the material used. Sites are either highrise or lowrise by their nature, automatically determining whether concrete or wood is used. The only exception is Cressey, who choose to build 4-storeys in concrete however the choice of material in that instance does not affect the form of development.

  • Jay

    @Richard W

    I’m wondering how much these 3 bedroom townhouses in Norquay are going to cost. I see 3 lots that are zone for townhouses for sale on Clarendon Ave. at around a million each. You can put 9 stacked townhouses on 2 lots, so 2 million / 9 = 220 000. Add a construction cost of 200 per sq. foot for an 1050 sq foot townhouse = 210 000, plus profit, for a selling price of around 470 000. Does that sound about right?

  • Jeff Leigh

    If there were two similar forms of rowhouse/townhouse product being compared, 1800 sq ft for sake of discussion, ground orientation, would the issue of strata vs fee simple drive selling price and by what sort of %? I understand the attraction of fee simple, but what does it mean to actual cost?

  • MichelleofMtPleasant

    @Julia #43

    Here is a bit of enlightenment for you Julia…the Mayor and 2 Vision Councilors asked City Planning during the Rize public hearing “so, you are telling us (City) that no other properties in Mt Pleasant will be allowed extra height and density except these 3 sites (this is the IGA site, Rize and Kingsgate Mall). Planning to Council “yes this is correct”……

    Well Julia, then could someone please explain to me how 12 storey buildings are in the pipeline along Main 2nd to 7th and at 11th and Kingsway (15 storeys) if this is the case….especially when the MPCP was very strongly worded that the community wanted to keep things to a 6-8 storey height but the City would never commit to putting actual height restrictions.

    So to answer your question….they (City Planning) likes to leave things with loopholes so big you could fly several 747’s through filled with foreign investors…..or the short answer, no they do not formalize any restrictions and my feeling now is that this is intentional and again shows the citizens of Vancouver that they have ulterior motives prior to engaging in a community plan that have very little to do with ‘community input’.

  • MichelleofMtPleasant

    @Kenji #59

    Kenji you throw around the comment “I don’t really care” a lot in your posts so why are you on here writing? because I get the feeling most of us here post comments because we “do care”

  • MichelleofMtPleasant

    @SillySeason #85

    Thank you!!! been trying to tell people out here this is what is happening in their town but they keep hiding their heads up their sheer Lululemon pants in denial or ignorance! jury’s out which attitude is more prevalent but it all boils down to the same conclusion……

  • brilliant

    @Michelle 111-speaking of sheer Lululemon audacity it appears Chip Wilson may have broken bylaws with his seaside mural. Maybe bylaws are just for little people who aren’t friends of the mayor.

  • Kenji

    @111

    Michelle, I care enough about good debate and about civic issues to ask questions here. When it comes to offering solutions, at times I may say something like I don’t care whether we do A or B, as long as we don’t do C or D.

    It is a rhetorical device, and meant to leaven the tone of my posts, as there are plenty of other people here who are ponderous lecturers immune to the notion that there are better ideas than their own.

  • Kenji

    And by “here” I mean the Internet. Bulablog is awesome!

  • teririch

    @brilliant #112

    That so called graffiti art sadly (okay, it is ugly – my opion of course) commissioned by Chip Wilson and his wife, was an issue in the Pt. grey area before the media got a hold of it. I was actully surprised the media took so long to bring it to light. (Yes to privagte roads, No to graffiti art)

    With that said, do you remember another one of Robertson’s pals and supporters – the Nature Path guy that cut down a whole swath of trees without permits….

    Nothing happened to him – so I truly doubt anything will happen to Wilson.

    I guess it pays to be friends and donors to the Mayor.

    As for the rest of us…. ‘let them eat cake’.

  • teririch

    Worth the read – Georgia Straight

    The Georgia Straight‏@georgiastraight32m

    Thoughtful Twitter response from Wise Monkeys to Geoff Meggs http://j.mp/1hnsBdF

  • Richard Wittstock

    Jay @ #107

    I see the stacked townhouse site you are referring to:

    http://cansellmyhome.com/2013/07/norquay-village-development-site-for-sale-townhomes-5038-clarendon-st/

    Personally I (and I think most other experienced developers) now think that this form of stacked townhouse is not optimal. I have built these and I have lived in them, so it pains me a bit to say this…I used to be a big proponent of them but now (perhaps because I now have a family) I have revised my thinking. They were very popular for a while; Adera built hundreds of them around Edmonds in S. Burnaby.

    Stacked townhouses are a hybrid of a regular townhouse and an apartment. The advantage is that you have your own front door and the developer can achieve close to an apartment-style density without having to build common corridors. But I now feel that they are the worst of both worlds. They don’t offer the efficiency of an apartment (stairs eat up valuable square footage) nor do they offer the good useable outdoor space of a townhouse, and the necessity of underground parking means a ton of extra cost. The layout of these means that generally once a couple starts to have kids, they realize that the stacked townhouse form doesn’t work all that well.

    As far as your numbers go, it would cost a lot more than $200/sf to build this. Probably $175/sf+ hard costs, plus another $100/sf soft costs (city fees, design consultants and professional fees, financing and marketing costs), so you are looking at $275, plus $239 for the land, and the developer’s costs are $514 per sf.

    Add the bank’s required 15% profit margin (a developer can’t get financing unless he can show a 15% profit margin going into the project; of course cost overruns or softer than anticipated sales can eat into this fairly quickly) and the units would have to be priced at $591 psf or $580,000 on average for the 13 units (982 sf average size).

    Personally I think that that land price is way too high. $239 per buildable sq.ft. is outrageous for that location. The land cost should be under $200/sf which would bring the price of the land down from $3,050,000 to about $2,540,000 ($846,000/lot). At a total cost then of $475/sf, the developer could afford to sell these for $546/sf or $536,000 each. That’s a bit more realistic I would say.

    This would be a good row-house site. You could get 7 row houses on this site, each 1500-1800 sq.ft., and because you wouldn’t have to go underground, construction costs would be probably $30/sq.ft. less. So using the same $850,000 per lot land price, and assuming a size of 1650 sq.ft., you are at about $220/sf for land and $250/sf construction so $470/sf costs, selling at $540/sf or $890,000 for a 1,650 sq.ft. row house.

    While this may sound expensive, I think it provides a good family-friendly alternative to a new 2,200 sq.ft. Van Special in East Van which sells at $1,100,000 – $1,200,000 these days.

  • Jay

    @ Richard W

    I figured my formula was flawed. Thanks for your detailed reply.

    It’s disappointing to see those higher numbers that are still out of reach for most families. Then again, maybe an increasing stock of 3 bedroom units (townhouses and row-houses) in Vancouver will create better affordability in the inner suburbs.

  • Roger Kemble

    Well, Jay @ #116 I suppose you can be excused for reiterating the old canard . . .

    “Then again, maybe an increasing stock of 3 bedroom units (townhouses and row-houses) in Vancouver will create better affordability . . . ”

    . . . but surely you don’t believe it.

    Then again you are not alone: all the fervid, time worn, gossips on this blog seem so happy to be thus disillusioned. And of course the remedy to fractional reserve banking . . .

    http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-wall-street-ponzi-scheme-called-fractional-reserve-banking

    . . . is so ominous no one dare touch it. What else can you do but follow the party line. A town that relies on vanity and views isn’t going anywhere.

    Yes incompetent planning, neighbours who will not see beyond no towers, selling out to off shore speculators, a town divested of any meaning full job opportunities and wealth creation have a part to play.

    History shows resource based, mindless squandering of those resources, bodes ill for any population, but hey . . . TGIF!

    Enjoy the party!

  • Lewis N. Villegas

    There are people in apartments today “hiding out” because they can’t afford to buy (MB 97).

    DATA sometimes gets it wrong. Sometimes it’s better to stay in the mix and just walk on the sidewalks (RW 99).

    Rows & Apartments. Keep in mind that Rows are not the first wrung on the property ladder (MB 102).

    I’m with gman’s Pappy (103):

    HUMAN SCALE
    USING RENEWABLES (WOOD)
    FSR 2.15
    FEE SIMPLE
    SELF-PARKING (NO U/GND)
    AFFORDABLE RENTAL = MRTGG.HLPR
    HI-DENSITY
    ANYWHERE FRONTING ARTERIALS

    Councillor Meggs couldn’t get it right either:

    http://wp.me/p2FnNe-aZ

    Strata fee is a hidden tax. A payment that keeps going up in perpetuity even after the mortgage is paid off. (Jeff 108)

    Richard’s (117) numbers are horrendous. But, then, he is putting product on the market in toe-to-toe competition with the other stuff.

    I’m calling for a New Vancouver Special where CMHC gets financed so that we can lower the profit margin; virtually eliminate soft costs (remember plan books and plan services?); and combine DIY options with design that is intended to build at a lot less than $175/s.f.

    Of course, I don’t mean “build cheap”. There are two other elements in the equation missing from the analysis:

    (1) We have to build efficient housing not cheap structures. The life-cycle costs of these New Vancouver Specials have to be significantly reduced. In great part due to the quality of the windows in each unit, and the energy performance of the built form as a whole.

    When the tower is on its side, one of the large faces of the tower is in contact with the ground (10°C constant); the other has an R60+ roof on it. That’s at least 200% more efficiency right there.

    (2) We have to plan this intensification to return livable streets, walkable neighbourhoods and (as we have been discussing) affordable housing.

  • gman

    MB#101
    MB your dishonest cherry picked attempt to misrepresent the quote at #95 shows more about your character than your knowledge of the subject,I suggest you might want to familiarize yourself better with the subject rather than spouting the party line like a robot. MB if you truly agree with what they say about private property ownership………” The use and tenure of land should be subject to public control…Land…cannot be treated as an ordinary asset, controlled by individuals and subject to the pressures and inefficiencies of the market. Private land ownership is also a principal instrument of accumulation and concentration of wealth and therefore contributes to social injustice; if unchecked, it may become a major obstacle in the planning and implementation of development schemes. “…..Then you and yours will most certainly end up in the state owned tower, stacked up in neighborhoods devoid of any character or definition.More like containment than living.

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