Trevor Boddy: The New Seattle (versus Vancouver)

[JiminyCricket II]

Originally Posted by Hot Rod

Seattle/Tacoma/Everett/Bellevue/Bremerton/Olympia: 3.6M residents
Greater Vancouver Regional District: 2.4M residents

not quite 50% eh? More like 1/3rd bigger.

Oh, and look at the area of the "Greater Seattle". A comparable area for Greater Vancouver would yield more residents. In fact, I think it is wholly appropriate for the census to include more EXURBS into Metropolitan Vancouver than JUST Abbotsford area (which today will push Metro Van above 2.7M by the way). There are MANY commuters from Vancouver Island, which is also the case in the Seattle/Tacoma Consolidated Area.

I think, if you want to compare apples to apples, then you need to compare like area/population/concatchment to like. If this were the case, Seattle couldn't hold a candle to Vancouver other than corporate offices - and that is mainly due to no-income tax for WA state.

the seattle cmsa was at 3.9 million as of july 2006, it's over 4 million now... and I don't know how you think that if you would do a comparable area for Greater Vancouver would yield more residents... there are more people in the Puget Sound basin than all of British Columbia.

[JiminyCricket II]

Originally Posted by mr.x2

Seattle has public transit? where????

2nd highest ridership west of the Mississippi River in the U.S. Of course, that's not saying much, but good enough to rank very high compared to the rest of the u.s.

[JiminyCricket II]

Originally Posted by tintinium

Seattle biggest employers are Microsoft and Boeing. Both of which are nowhere NEAR downtown.

no, Seattle's biggest employer is the University of Washington... by far.

[LeftCoaster]

Originally Posted by JiminyCricket II

2nd highest ridership west of the Mississippi River in the U.S. Of course, that's not saying much, but good enough to rank very high compared to the rest of the u.s.

WOOHOO!! Thats like being top of your class in the remedial course!

Seattle has grown rapidly lately eh? i was definetly under the assumption it was still around 3.7 million.

Originally Posted by Jared

actually, 3.6M/2.4M = 1.5, or 150% the size of Vancouver.
Hence, 50% bigger.

At least someone around here knows how to do math!

[SpongeG]

well if one included nanaimo and the sunshine coast as suburbs...

[vanman]

Originally Posted by Western Spaghetti

It depends on what you would consider as downtown boundries. Calgary has more than 22k living downtown. It seems hard to believe that's all there is in Seattle's downtown.

I guess that's true, but you could then argue that the growing Broadway/Cambie area is part of downtown Van.

[raggedy13]

Originally Posted by smasher000

He says we need to follow Seattle's public transit.. AND LOOK AT THEIR FAILED MONORAIL that nobody even USES!!!!

If you reread the article you'll see that he told Seattle to follow our lead in terms of public transit.

I think a few people here are overreacting a bit to this article. His criticizing of Vancouver isn't because he doesn't like the city but because he sees there are a number of areas that need improvement (most specifically the resortification of downtown). He's just a concerned citizen trying to use his position to gain attention on issues that need to be addressed by the City. He also uses a bit of exaggeration for emphasis (ie making Coal Harbour seem representational of all neighbourhoods). I'm sure he loves Vancouver just as much as us but he has no issues with pointing out its problems in hopes that people will take note and do something about it. Personally, I largely agreed with him. I think (and I know I'm not alone here) that downtown is beyond saturated with condos and has already met its goals in regards to making the city a vibrant place for "living first". Vancouver definitely does need to do something to attract more business to the city if it wants to remain a healthy and balanced city with a diverse economy (not to mention if it wants to get some nice, shiny, tall office towers). If you read carefully you'll see that he essentially says Vancouver is as good or better than Seattle in every way except for when it comes to attracting business (and the related resort-like trends that continue to occur downtown).

[Canadian Mind]

Originally Posted by raggedy13

If you reread the article you'll see that he told Seattle to follow our lead in terms of public transit.

I think a few people here are overreacting a bit to this article. His criticizing of Vancouver isn't because he doesn't like the city but because he sees there are a number of areas that need improvement (most specifically the resortification of downtown). He's just a concerned citizen trying to use his position to gain attention on issues that need to be addressed by the City. He also uses a bit of exaggeration for emphasis (ie making Coal Harbour seem representational of all neighbourhoods). I'm sure he loves Vancouver just as much as us but he has no issues with pointing out its problems in hopes that people will take note and do something about it. Personally, I largely agreed with him. I think (and I know I'm not alone here) that downtown is beyond saturated with condos and has already met its goals in regards to making the city a vibrant place for "living first". Vancouver definitely does need to do something to attract more business to the city if it wants to remain a healthy and balanced city with a diverse economy (not to mention if it wants to get some nice, shiny, tall office towers). If you read carefully you'll see that he essentially says Vancouver is as good or better than Seattle in every way except for when it comes to attracting business (and the related resort-like trends that continue to occur downtown).

Kudos.

I'm all for continuing to fill empty lots outsde the central buisness district with multi-use developments, but we need to start replacing old buildings with new ones in the primary downtown. if we can tear down bodell and replace it with a 660 footer, do it. Same with the RBC building (the big white thing with black lines) and the teresen building. Surely with incentives someone will buy. Its not liek their isn't demand... its just that most companies. are demanding only one or two floors of space, but there is 150 of those companies demanding that space, just none of them can afford to finance a whole tower.

Is it possible that the city funding the construction of a building and re-gaining the monies through leases??

[vanman]

^^^Nobody is going to start tearing those buildings down, they are what, 20-30 years old at most. There are plenty of older, shorter office buildings around that occupy primo site within CBD.

On another note, I was wondering what is planned for that huge site by the Bus/Train station near main st. The one that was supposed to be a massive tech centre. Why don't developers build more office space there? The land would probably be somewhat cheaper than downtwn and they could build enough sq ft to last Van another 5-10yrs

[squeezied]

i love the rbc! it always looks very prominent. sometimes i think its the tallest in vancouver from certain viewpoints, naturally because my eyes are drawn toward the center of the cbd, thus i dont even notice one wall which is way out of "nowhere". terasen is also one of my favorite buildings. its just too bad it wasnt taller. owell, doesnt matter now that shangri-la is being built right infront it. hopefully some day a tall office building will be built near the center of the cbd, as none of our really tall buildings are near the center.
here are the obvious ones that come to mind:
one wall-south
shangri-la -west
1133 west georgia - west
shaw - north
fairmont pacific rim - north
hotel georgia - east

SOMETHING NEEDS TO BE IN THE CENTER!!!

[Hot Rod]

Originally Posted by JiminyCricket II

the seattle cmsa was at 3.9 million as of july 2006, it's over 4 million now... and I don't know how you think that if you would do a comparable area for Greater Vancouver would yield more residents... there are more people in the Puget Sound basin than all of British Columbia.

nope, the puget sound basin, aka Seattle/Tacoma/Everett/Bellevue/Bremerton/Olympia Consolidated Metropolitan Area (uh, out of breath) IS 3.6M as of 2006; check the census estimate. And ALL of BC's population is in the lower mainland and opposing points of Vancouver Island, so shouldn't that be Metro Vancouver? Especially since there is HUGE commuter patterns in this area to vancouver for jobs, entertainment, shopping, etc?

Besides Jiminy, we dont need to debate the size of Seattle or Vancouver - my point was to mention that Vancouver is just as big (if not bigger) if Canada used the same concatchment as the US.

The ONLY thing Seattle currently has more of than Vancouver is the number of "world-reknown" hq and only ONE of them is in downtown Seattle (WAMU)!! Also, Seattle's numbers aint much when you compared to Chicago and NY.

Any foreign banks? Van has some. Dare I continue??

Get your chip off your shoulder dude you should "stick" to the sticks out in E-Washington!

[SpongeG]

Originally Posted by vanman

^^^Nobody is going to start tearing those buildings down, they are what, 20-30 years old at most. There are plenty of older, shorter office buildings around that occupy primo site within CBD.

On another note, I was wondering what is planned for that huge site by the Bus/Train station near main st. The one that was supposed to be a massive tech centre. Why don't developers build more office space there? The land would probably be somewhat cheaper than downtwn and they could build enough sq ft to last Van another 5-10yrs

rumour has been st pauls will be moving there and a police station

but i think its all about zoning - it was a big deal to change it a few years ago and than the dot com thing fell through and the city was stuck with the rezoned land

and the city really doesn't want to lose more industrial land - it really has none left - there is an article about the situation in this months BC business report which brings up this land

[seaskyfan]

Originally Posted by Hot Rod

nope, the puget sound basin, aka Seattle/Tacoma/Everett/Bellevue/Bremerton/Olympia Consolidated Metropolitan Area (uh, out of breath) IS 3.6M as of 2006; check the census estimate. And ALL of BC's population is in the lower mainland and opposing points of Vancouver Island, so shouldn't that be Metro Vancouver? Especially since there is HUGE commuter patterns in this area to vancouver for jobs, entertainment, shopping, etc?

You're wrong. The estimated Seattle CSA population as of July 1, 2006 is 3,876,211. This is based on the new county numbers that were recently released.

[SpongeG]

does that include tacoma?

i was under the impression if tacoma was included it would be over 4 million

[Hot Rod]

Originally Posted by squeezied

i love the rbc! it always looks very prominent. sometimes i think its the tallest in vancouver from certain viewpoints, naturally because my eyes are drawn toward the center of the cbd, thus i dont even notice one wall which is way out of "nowhere". terasen is also one of my favorite buildings. its just too bad it wasnt taller. owell, doesnt matter now that shangri-la is being built right infront it. hopefully some day a tall office building will be built near the center of the cbd, as none of our really tall buildings are near the center.
here are the obvious ones that come to mind:
one wall-south
shangri-la -west
1133 west georgia - west
shaw - north
fairmont pacific rim - north
hotel georgia - east

SOMETHING NEEDS TO BE IN THE CENTER!!!

squeezy, I agree about RBC - definitely very prominent in the city and actually a pretty pleasing building to look at. Instead of being just your typical box square, I like the flanges on the sides which give it character and makes it modern looking.

As for your top scrapers per skyline view, I contend - that RBC is also prominent in most if not all skyline views. It really is in the CENTER of downtown and anchor of the financial district.

I agree with earlier - that there are WAY TOO MANY smaller buildings in the cbd to be talking about tearing down a prominent 37-storey signature office building. We need to be talking about tearing down the MANY 5-15 storey eyesores that litter the cbd - then reclaim the land with 6 or so architecturally significant 700+ footers. I say, rezone the central CBD as in get rid of the view cones for that area, then allow the old ones to tumble.

Any heritage facades could be saved and integrated into the new scrapers.

[seaskyfan]

Originally Posted by SpongeG

does that include tacoma?

i was under the impression if tacoma was included it would be over 4 million

It does include Tacoma. The CSA includes King (Seattle, Bellevue), Snohomish (Everett), Pierce (Tacoma), Kitsap (Bremerton), Island (Oak Harbor), Thurston (Olympia), and Mason (Shelton) Counties. The whole thing is likely over 4 million now. The State of Washington numbers for the April 1, 2007 estimate will be available in July.

[SpongeG]

ah ok

loves seattle

[Hot Rod]

Island and Mason are included?

I didnt include them in my calcs.

That is a HUGE ass area. Mason county folks commute regularly to Seattle/Tacoma/Bellevue for jobs/shopping???

Is this an exaggeration?

[Hot Rod]

Here is a good resource just in case you all are wondering where these freaking numbers come from.

http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/DTG...e=PEP_2006_EST&_lang=en&_ts=193520461616

I like this one because you can go in and put in the cities/counties yourself. Of course, you'd have to know what they are but hey - I think its more accurate (but still inflated usually, as US Census's estimates usually are) than some other methods.

[seaskyfan]

Originally Posted by Hot Rod

Island and Mason are included?

I didnt include them in my calcs.

That is a HUGE ass area. Mason county folks commute regularly to Seattle/Tacoma/Bellevue for jobs/shopping???

Is this an exaggeration?

The threshold for inclusion into a CSA is based on things like commute patterns between the adjacent counties. From my personal experience of living in Kitsap County for a while I know there are a lot of folks in Mason County who commute into Pierce County, Kitsap, and Thurston Counties. There are also a lot of folks in Island County who commute into Snohomish and King Counties (Snohomish in particular).

I'm sure you've seen the info from organizations like the Sightline Institute (formerly NW Environment Watch) that illustrate how Metro Seattle covers a lot more land area than Metro Vancouver or Metro Portland.