Federal Government & Politics II

[CanSpice]

Originally Posted by lio45

People personally known to me have been killed by Quebec’s excessive building regulations

How so?

[Hecate]

Originally Posted by CanSpice

How so?

I know lio has mentioned, in the past,knowing addicts. so probably them, those who used to be able to afford their addiction and a place to stay, now they can no longer afford housing, so they’ve ended up on the streets where they died.

How many people do you think have committed suicide or died of drug overdoses, because of the bleak futures this government foisted upon us?

[LuluBobo]

I would bet most Canadians live in homes built to 2000 NBC standards or older. It's not some 1920s deathtrap. The safety standards are 98% the same, but the sustainability and accessibility standards are maybe only 50% the same.

Most of the "modern" safety features we have in the building code were adopted in the 70s.

The 2015 NBC is the major cost additive. Let's not pretend 2014 homes were unsafe.

[O-tacular]

Originally Posted by Hecate

I know lio has mentioned, in the past,knowing addicts. so probably them, those who used to be able to afford their addiction and a place to stay, now they can no longer afford housing, so they’ve ended up on the streets where they died.

How many people do you think have committed suicide or died of drug overdoses, because of the bleak futures this government foisted upon us?

Know what else causes fatal overdoses? Closing safe consumption sites like conservatives love to do.

[casper]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

Overly strict building codes drive up the cost of construction, such that developers can't afford to build homes at prices people can afford without taking a loss. Non-profit developers (ie. those not making any profit off the construction) report costs upwards of $400,000 a unit even when they got the land for free. I work with one in Kingston. The difference between the 2022 Ontario Building Code and the 1999 Ontario Building Code is an extra $100,000-$150,000 of construction cost. If we went back to the 1999 Building Code we could build 30% more non-market housing for the same funding envelope.

It's not like homes built in 1999 were dangerous death traps. The main difference maker in these costs are tighter insulation rules and other energy-related requirements (which, as I pointed out in my post, have been shown to actually be a net negative to carbon emissions in provinces that use mostly green energy, as more efficient homes require more materials) but there are some niche rules in things like stair widths that also really drive up costs. Better to have a home that is built to older (and still perfectly adequate) standards than to have no home at all, which is the practical consequence of these excessive building codes.

We got here because the bureaucrats who write building codes, when evaluating updates to them, put basically zero consideration on how a change could impact the cost of construction. We have this icky mindset that assumes that costs borne by private sector don't exist (instead of acknowledging that every such cost is ultimately borne by everyone downstream of it). Instead of doing a proper cost-benefit analysis, they're assuming the cost is a non-factor. IMO, the correct way forward would be to roll back to the 1999 building code as an interim measure, and when the next round of full code changes are written, introduce a cost-benefit analysis mechanism.

It is complex. If making a home more energy efficient reduced energy costs, well over the lifetime of the building it may be cheaper even if it drives up the initial construction costs.

These standards are not written in isolation. Industry is involved every step of the way.

All said, perhaps we need to do a pass at seeing how to reduce cost of housing.

[shreddog]

Nm ...