@Chris Keam 234:
I deliberately chose the term “razing”, as elementary physics tells us that two objects cannot occupy the same space simultaneously. Since False Creek South (i.e. the area north of 6th Avenue) comprises a limited amount of buildable area, and since most of that area is already occupied by low-rise development (with a few exceptions, eg. the area around Leg-in-Boot Square and immediately to its east), the only way that the densification you propose could be accomplished would be if the current residential structures were demolished and their occupants evicted. Unless, of course, you think that Charleson Park would be sufficient landbase for your proposal.

Re your speculations on co-ops and “empty-nesters”– most housing co-ops built before 1990, such as the co-ops in FCS, operate according to a funding formula that facilitates internal subsidies for those who cannot afford full market rent. The concept generally required that no member pay more than 25% of their gross monthly income for housing charges. This was meant to aid low-income members (one of the founding principles of the co-op housing movement was that, unlike public housing, co-op membership would represent a range of income levels, from welfare moms to people with comfortable incomes who requirre no internal subsidy.

I say “required”, as economic realities and CMHC’s ongoing and deliberate withdrawal from the co-op housing sector–together with that body’s financial support for co-op housing– have required most co-ops to raise the 25% figure to 30, 35 or even 40% or more, which renders co-op housing a less viable option for low-income people. Most co-ops built after 1990 operate according to a different funding formula which require their members to pay full market rent, with no subsidy available. But to get back to the empty nest issue, subsidized co-ops operate according to strict internal rules which require that no unit be occupied by fewer people than the unit’s number of bedrooms. In other words, a family with two children who live in a 3-bedroom apartment whose children move out are deemed, after a grace period, to be “overhoused” and will be required to downsize to a two-bedroom when one become available. If a couple is living in a two-bedroom aspartment suffers a breakup, and one moves out, the remaining member will be required to move to a one-bedroom apartment. This policy has caused a good deal of internal strife in some co-ops as there are always those who try to bend or subvert the rules to their perceived needs or desires, but most co-op members accept and comply without protest. The membership committee of a well-managed co-op will make every effort to keep track of members’ housing status.

For these reasons, I suspect you will not find a lot of unoccupied bedrooms in FCS co-ops. There is simply too much demand for co-op housing for such vacancies to be allowed to linger, and because of their funding structure, no co-op can afford to have unoccupied housing units. Stratas, of course, are another matter entirely. Perhaps you could turn your keen eye in that direction instead.

And today we hear that the metro mayors are PULLING funding from TransLink. Oy.

Just a day after this story appeared in the Georgia Straight (note the relevence to who/ density/development/taxation/transit question).

Absolute friggin’ Bedlam…

Municipalities asked to help fund transit in B.C.

by Carlito Pablo on Mar 14, 2013 at 3:05 am
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The Urban Development Institute says that, since municipalities benefit from transportation projects, they should reinvest in transit.
Stephen Hui

Municipalities should pay part of the cost of transit, according to the president and CEO of the Urban Development Institute.

Anne McMullin notes that whether it’s the Canada Line, proposed projects like the subway along Broadway in Vancouver, or light rail in Surrey, transit causes property values to shoot up.

A portion of that increase is taken by cities through community-amenity contributions from developers. Some of that should be reinvested in transit, which is typically financed by senior levels of government, the UDI executive said.

“The industry currently, in some municipalities, pays an enormous amount—tens of millions of dollars above the development-cost charges,” McMullin told the Georgia Straight in a phone interview. “Right now, it’s just going into the municipality that has benefited from existing transportation infrastructure, such as the City of Vancouver. The Canada Line created an enormous increase in value along that line, and developers are developing along that line because the buyer wants to buy along there.”

In 2011, Vancouver collected $180 million from developers across the city in exchange for allowing them to build more through rezoning. The money was spent mostly on affordable housing, community facilities, heritage preservation, and parks and open spaces. According to a city staff report, $3.2 million was allocated for “transportation”. The Straight asked the city’s corporate communications and engagement department for details about these transportation expenditures but no information was provided by deadline.

“That money has gone right back to the City of Vancouver—not a portion to TransLink or even a portion back to the province,” McMullin said about public benefits paid by developers. “So I think there are opportunities to look at that: how do we distribute or apply or allocate those community-amenity contributions?”

Two municipalities in the Lower Mainland have demonstrated that cities can work with developers to build transit infrastructure.

In Richmond, a new Canada Line station at Capstan Way (with an estimated cost of $25 million) will be financed by developers of new residential units in the area. Developers are also funding the $20 million Lincoln Station on the future Evergreen Line in Coquitlam. In exchange, developers will be allowed to construct more homes in these transit areas.

“Whether you build the station or contribute to the line, whichever way you cut it, I do think that is a very valid opportunity and a valid allocation of funds,” McMullin said.

In December 2012, the Victoria Transport Policy Institute released a study on transit financing achieved through a model called land-value capture. According to the authors, many planners and economists suggest that “cities could benefit by funding transit system development costs and a major portion of operating costs from land value capture.” They can do that “by taxing a portion of the additional value of adjacent properties that result from transit accessibility”.

In a January 31 letter to Transportation and Infrastructure Minister Mary Polak, the Mayors’ Council on Regional Transportation presented land-value capture as one of five options for funding transit.

According to the mayors’ council, which includes Vancouver’s mayor, Gregor Robertson, “there needs to be a negotiated sharing” of community-amenity contributions paid by developers.

However, Vancouver council’s lead person on transit, Geoff Meggs, doubts whether this model will work for the city on projects like the proposed $2.8-billion underground Broadway transit line.

“It might work best with the UBC setting, where UBC is the landowner and developer and is able to, as they do, make decisions to allocate land for housing and then keep the revenue from that housing,” Meggs told the Straight in a phone interview. “So they may be able to do that for transit; I don’t know.”

Meggs noted that the model works well in Hong Kong, where the transit authority there is also the developer of properties.

“We don’t object to looking at it and exploring it,” Meggs added. “But it’s an innovation that will be hard to implement. And it would be difficult to calculate what the share of improved property value was attributable to, say, general economic growth and how much was due to transit. I’m sure there’s ways to do it, but at the same time, it varies.”

McMullin is hopeful that when Adrian Dix addresses members of the UDI for the first time this Thursday (March 14) at Vancouver’s Hyatt Regency hotel, the B.C. NDP leader will include transit financing in his talk.

“We all know that municipalities, the province, and the federal government are all cash-strapped,” she said. “So what are the priorities? The taxpayers are faced with huge costs in terms of improvements to our waterworks, sewage, and there’s huge demand for transportation in order to keep our economy going. We need to look at how do we allocate funds, and how do we allocate the funds regionally?”

@Chris Keam (again):
I wrote #233 in haste early this morning before what’s left of my mind was fully active. Perhaps as a result , I see a need to clarify and/or correct something I said. My use of the term “ghost town”, accusing you of using the the empty-nest theory to imply that False Creek South may be becoming underpopulated and therefore ripe for densification, was perhaps ill-chosen as a pejorative. I say this becuse there has in fact been increasing speculation that City Hall’s long-time stonewalling on the lease issue may in fact represent a desire on their part to destabilize the neighbourhood and make it ripe for redevelopment. Developers are known to be interested in the area and if it could be made untenable for the current housing mix, then opportunites for redevelopment would present themselves. Thanks to the uncertainties surrounding the lease issue, it is already becoming difficult to secure a mortgage on many FCS properties. And sales in general have been impacted as well. There are real fears that if this trend continues, if could ultimately lead to a progressive “ghettoization” of the FCS community, as more and more people move out, transient renters move in, and underpopulated buildings–or buildings whose residents who not have a long-term stake in their upkeep– begin to deteriorate. It might not turn into a “ghost town” per se, but certainly it could become a less desirable neighbourhood in which to live.This is, granted, a nightmare scenario, but it is not beyond the realm of possibility, and is one more reason why it is urgent that the dialogue between the FCS community and City Hall continue. Hence Re*Plan. Read the document for which I provided a link. It lays out the issues at some length.

@Terry M

I am about as non-political as they come. I don’t even live in the City of Vancouver. I can assure you, I work for none of the decision makers or organizations involved in whatever happens along Broadway. I’m just a commuter who follows this blog and has an opinion or two about what I think is the best course of action.

If I had known about this rally ahead of time, I would have loved to have commented in public. In any event, going toe-to-toe with some former bureaucrats, academics, and aspiring politcians has been swell. In the end, the general public will decide what happens. I just hope I remain in Metro Vancouver long enough to see the outcome, whatever it is.

@gmano

But the much slow trams would not attract anywhere as many new people to transit. Look at the Surrey Study. $2 billion worth of LRT attracted around half as many new riders as SkyTrain and rapid bus solution costing just a bit more. Clearly, if the goal is to encourage transit, the money is better spent of what actually works on getting people to switch to transit.

Richard @ 259 but my comment applies equally to all the other hundreds of amateur tattlers . . . trying to get their face into a TX conversation they know absolutely nothing about!

Take the 3 billion and buy us 300,ooo smart cars.

Okay, seriously?? Was someone not wearing a helmet when they fell of their bike ….? $75 M for bike infrusturcture?

http://www.theprovince.com/health/Cycling+group+seeks+bike+infrastructure+education/8117207/story.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

Thought of The Night

“Nice biking racket, if you can get it…”

Ha, ha, ha…

Terry M # 243 said
“Lots of HUB and BEST “non profits” LOL, advocates in here, am I right Richard?. How does asking the Province to invest $10 million in perpetuity to satisfy the cycling leeches, works out for you?”

Well, you were not that wrong, only by a little bit…
Look here:

http://www.theprovince.com/health/Cycling+group+seeks+bike+infrastructure+education/8117207/story.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

… via teririch #265
Like the song says:

“Nice racket if you can get it,
And if you get it —
Won’t you tell me how?
And you can get it — if you try.
And you can get it — if you try.
And you can get it — if you try.
And you can get it — if you try…”

Which is what all these “cycling advocates” are really doing.

We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.

Bill?

“Significantly reduce or eliminate one or more of the major proforma components – land / construction / soft costs / profit. ”

That sounds great–how would you reduce or eliminate any of those?

@270
That was supposed to be ” bend wide” 🙂

Well, the game is up . . .

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/home-and-garden/real-estate/vancouvers-vacancies-point-to-investors-not-residents/article10044403/

. . . the lies, the posturing, the weaseling, we new instinctively, is exposed. Thanqu Frances.

That big mouth Geller, no longer the expert, the mayor’s task force and it’s round table was a smoke screen: that Ilich woman was in to grab the subsidies she knew were coming.

The lying corrupt real estate operators, and their developer partners-in-crime, and the phony line-ups of buyers that never were, are shown up to be what they are.

At C$2.8B+, and rising, (that no sane government would commit to) for a subterranean shiny trinket to Wreck Beach, committing us provincials to paying C$70M annually, to the bank in perpetuity.

Surely we can find a better way to waste our money!

Oh and even that was forgotten as the bicycle lane morons took over the conversation as the always do.

So here we are at post #272 with all its acrimony and twisted gossip: haven’t you got anything better to do with your lives?

Yet here you are Roger, flinging poo with the best of them.

So I guess you woke up on the wrong side of the bed Roger, am I right?
Calling me, CK, Richard, teririch, GR and others … Wankers!
That’s class, old fart!