Marine Drive Gateway | 102.1m, 77.7m, 63.4m | 35flr, 26flr, 14flr | Completed

[Changing City]

Jollyburger helpfully posted the link to the new draft Marine Landing Guidelines for future development in the area surrounding the existing development. Interestingly, while the Docksteader site is part of the review area, and is identified as appropriate for 'intensive employment', it's not identified for future residential use - not even if it's all rental, or even all non-market.

One reason is that the land is included in the Regional Context Statement ODP as mixed employment use. That's less restrictive than industrial designation, so the big office building could proceed, but it means that if City Council supported the idea of residential here as well as industrial/commercial, then there would have to be a report to, and approval from, Metro Vancouver's Board as well.

PCI will no doubt try to argue that with the industrial podium and significant office building they're providing the employment space that that's required, and all those residential buildings are just gravy, but it's not what the (very) new Guidelines are suggesting. Council could change the Guidelines, and support a rezoning (well, two, as they'd have to amend the ODP to change its designation at a public hearing as well), but it's equally possible PCI will find 'it's an 'intensive employment' area; you can have office use as well as industrial, but that's all you can have'.

And to answer all the 'that's ridiculous, they should be able to build residential all the way to the river and around', there are very few parts of Vancouver which are reserved for employment, and there are already plenty of high-density residential developments elsewhere around this station, both built and planned for the future. As transit improves, and there are more station areas, the few locations that could provide high-density employment outside the Core will become increasingly important - which is precisely why the Regional Context Statement ODP protected a few of them from residential incursion (and consequent land value hike that then threatens existing as well as future employment potential).

[Klazu]

Originally Posted by vanman

It was very interesting seeing the transformation of a neighbourhood that was up until that point pretty much frozen in time.

I remember there being a tiny forest with tall trees here when I moved to Vancouver back in 2012. I wish I would have a photo of the area, as it has changed so much.

[jollyburger]

Google Maps has photos of it in 2007 when they just started to build the Canada Line guideway columns.

https://www.google.com/maps/@49.2092...!7i3328!8i1664

[Klazu]

Thanks. I was struggling to find those on mobile. Memory seems to have served me only partially about how large the "forest" was but there was a patch of green.

Damn, I could have sworn EB Marine Drive had three lanes in front of the complex before, but apparently not.

[SpongeG]

it used to house an ICBC facility right?

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by SpongeG

it used to house an ICBC facility right?

Yeah ICBC claims centre

[officedweller]

All the purpose-built 1970s ICBC Claims Centres were concrete bunkers surrounded by a forest of pine trees. There's still one on Kingsway I think.

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by officedweller

All the purpose-built 1970s ICBC Claims Centres were concrete bunkers surrounded by a forest of pine trees. There's still one on Kingsway I think.

And Coquitlam, North Vancouver, Burnaby (BCIT) among others.

The architect

https://arthurallenarchitect.ca/pdf/buildings.pdf

Public automobile Insurance In British Columbia was conceived on the basis of earlier Crown Corporations active since 1945 In the Province of Saskatchewan, and since 1971 In Manitoba. The new corporation was named ICBC, The Insurance Corporation of British Columbia, and was created

In 1973 In April, 1973, ICBC commissioned Allen-Ewing, Architects, of Vancouver, to undertake early preliminary design of a network of buildings for the Corporation's operations throughout the province. Under extreme pressure of time, a simultaneous program of design and land acquisition was started, using a modular building system that could be adapted to various property configurations. A minimum property depth of 120 feet, common to city blocks, was held throughout the work. Simultaneous and overlapping design, supply, and construction activities were Involved wherever time could be reduced.

Design, land acquisition, and permit negotiation were simultaneous, with cooperation of most municipalities. Working drawings of foundations, steel and concrete work were started ahead of finished Interior design.
Steel and precast concrete were tendered ahead of general contract services. General contracts were tendered at cost plus fixed fee, and foundation work started Immediately. Sub-trades and supply were post-tendered and taken over by general contractors.

With a severe shortage of structural steel predicted for the winter of 1973-74, drawings and pretenders for steel were rushed, and Issued In July 1973. Erection began In November of that year. The volume of precast concrete panels needed was sufficient to tax the capability of all 3 suppliers In the province. Drawings were expedited, and tenders called In August 1973, on a unit price basis. Contracts were awarded to the 3 suppliers, on the basis of price, capability, and delivery dates (fixed by liquidated damage clauses In the contracts). Redundancy In the steel frame-concrete panel system added cost, but enabled roofing, early mechanical and electrical work, floor slabs, and rough carpentry to proceed in winter weather well ahead of delivery of precast concrete wall cladding.

The project delivered 13 buildings between August 1974, and January 1975. Cost over-runs for those buildings was approx. 8 %. 4 buildings were delayed by municipal Interference, and were completed by June 1976, with extra costs Incurred for delay, and storage of building materials.

[officedweller]

Thanks for the post!

[jollyburger]

Same thread or new thread for Marine Gateway 2?

Now, the big project for PCI is a sequel: Marine Gateway 2, which is set for the car dealership immediately south of Marine Gateway. PCI has actually been working on the sequel for nearly 10 years, and previously submitted a rezoning application to the City in 2021. However, the plans have since been changed and PCI says it is set to submit a rezoning application to the City in September.

In an interview with STOREYS this week, PCI Developments President Tim Grant discussed the pre-application work they have been doing with the City of Vancouver, what Marine Gateway 2 will look like, and several other development industry topics.

We're going to submit a rezoning application by the end of September. We're just kind of working with staff now on some pre-application work. [Pre-application work] is something that's changing all the time. One of things that we're seeing now is having almost a bit of a workshop with a bunch of different departments in the room and talking about the considerations from their perspectives. We've done that recently with our Great Northern Way-Emily Carr application and also the VCC-Clark 1155 East 6th application, which will be going live hopefully in the next week or two.

The Marine Gateway 2 application is for about 400,000 sq. ft of industrial, over three levels. Importantly, with that size, it'd be suitable for large-bay users, so it's not necessarily the small-bay units that you'll see in other places. And that [400,000 sq. ft.] is about nine times the area of the existing car dealership on the site.

And then we would have a two-acre local park that will kind of be one level above Cambie Street, with some adjacent community spaces, there will be a daycare and senior centre, and then we have 1,400 rental homes, 20% of which would be moderate income, and there will be a direct connection to the Marine Gateway highstreet with a bridge that would go over the bus loop.

And because we'd be realigning the bus loop, that kind of opens up the Cambie Street transit plaza. If you've ever been down to that area, there's a conflict between the buses leaving the bus loop coming onto Cambie Street and pedestrians, so we'd be reorienting the bus loop back to Yukon [Street]

Even with that, all the industrial is not feasible without the residential. That rental residential component, which we know would be in demand, certainly facilitates our ability to put in all the infrastructure and expensive things that are required for the industrial.

In our little world, we have a project near the Kootenay Bus Loop that previously was going to be a really challenging six-storey rental building to make work. Now we're gonna go back [with a revised proposal.]

https://storeys.com/tim-grant-pci-marine-gateway-2/

The Kootney Loop project in 2021



https://www.urbanyvr.com/3555-3561-e...stings-street/

[vanman]

Thanks for posting!

All sounds good but my only reservation would be reorienting the bus loop to exit onto Yukon. Not sure how that is supposed to work. The intersection at Yukon and Marine regularly backs up as it is with the amount of traffic entering and exiting Marine Gateway and conflicting with pedestrians. At the very least they'll need to add an advanced left turn signal for traffic heading northbound on Yukon.

[giallo]

It's nice to see that they're proposing 400,000sqft of industrial space, but it's interesting that it wouldn't be possible to build without the residential component. I thought demand for industrial land space with water access was high.

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by giallo

It's nice to see that they're proposing 400,000sqft of industrial space, but it's interesting that it wouldn't be possible to build without the residential component. I thought demand for industrial land space with water access was high.

I'm guessing it might be as a multi-level industrial project. If it was pure industrial it might be more of a one or split-level warehouse with less square footage..

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by jollyburger

I'm guessing it might be as a multi-level industrial project. If it was pure industrial it might be more of a one or split-level warehouse with less square footage..

It's got to be at least 3 storeys, and probably more. The site is around 217,000 SF, so 400,000 of industrial space will be multi-level.

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by Changing City

It's got to be at least 3 storeys, and probably more. The site is around 217,000 SF, so 400,000 of industrial space will be multi-level.

Sorry I meant the PCI guy might have said the residential component was required for a multi-level industrial building versus a more standard single or split level building with less square footage.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by jollyburger

Sorry I meant the PCI guy might have said the residential component was required for a multi-level industrial building versus a more standard single or split level building with less square footage.

Got it. If it's true that PCI need to add significant residential space to make an industrial project viable here, they paid a lot more than industrial land value for the site. On other sites close to here there are multi-level industrial projects already being developed, that aren't requiring other uses to make them work, financially.