Posted May 11, 2008, 8:16 PM
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Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: Panorama Ridge - Surrey
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Surrey dubbed Metro's second downtown
By Jeff Nagel - BC Local News - May 06, 2008
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Development is expected to intensify, particularly along frequent transit corridors.
File
Surrey's urban heart will be upgraded to the status of Metro Vancouver's second downtown in the new regional growth strategy.
That's one of the changes now emerging as politicians fine-tune the draft of the plan to guide growth to 2031, replacing the old Livable Region Strategic Plan.
Instead of being one of eight "regional town centres" marked with circles, the new map shows Surrey's City Centre area at the end of the SkyTrain as "Surrey Metro Centre" with a slightly smaller square than the one marked "Metro Core" in downtown Vancouver.
"We're recognizing Surrey's aspirations to establish a town centre that will be a focal point for the Fraser Valley," explained Burnaby Mayor Derek Corrigan, who chairs Metro's land use and transportation committee.
Corrigan said it's important the ambitious vision for Surrey as a new Metro core be realized, noting it's the region's second biggest city and destined to become the biggest.
"We can't continue to have people commuting into the core of the city and into Burnaby and New Westminster for their jobs," he added. "We have to establish a job centre in the Fraser Valley that will avoid that kind of commute."
Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts welcomes the change.
"It gives us the opportunity to be a significant city centre for the entire region that includes office towers, highrises and high density, coupled with cultural facilities," she said.
Rapid transit extensions that will fan out from Surrey's core will make the area a major transportation hub, Watts said, noting city hall may also move there.
The other regional town centres in Burnaby, Richmond, New Westminster, North Vancouver, Coquitlam, Maple Ridge and Langley City remain the same and will now be known as regional city centres.
But the 12 smaller designated municipal town centres – which include areas like Ladner, Port Moody, Guildford, White Rock and Aldergrove – are slated to grow to 16, with additions recognizing Surrey's Cloverdale area, Lynn Valley in North Vancouver, South Vancouver near 49th and Main, and northwest Langley Township near the 200 Street corridor.
The urban centres are to be the focus for jobs, services and high-density housing.
But in addition to those areas, the plan calls for heavy growth in Surrey, Vancouver, Coquitlam and Langley Township.
That's where most of the region's "priority development areas" are to be designated, mostly along corridors planned for frequent transit.
Gone is the old concept of "growth concentration areas" that the former Livable Region Strategic Plan set to focus high-density growth.
Much of the changes are being driven by the province's recently unveiled vision for transit expansion.
Metro's new plan will assume ramped up transit in traditionally underserved eastern areas of Metro Vancouver.
"Communities are very focused on the issues of climate change and peak oil," Corrigan said. "There's more recognition growth has to be intensive and it has to be transit served."
He stresses the new growth strategy is still a draft and won't likely go to public comment before fall or be adopted until after the November elections.
"We're not carving this onto one of the pyramids yet."
Land use committee members reviewed the latest progress at a May 2 meeting.
The draft had tentatively proposed to create separate zones for agricultural and rural areas, removing them from the current Green Zone, which also includes parks, watersheds and sensitive areas.
But some directors feared that gave the appearance of gutting the current Green Zone and giving the green light to rampant development in previously protected areas.
"There was no intent to delete agricultural land from the Green Zone," Corrigan said, adding the Green Zone has become such a recognizable "branding" the region can't risk sending the wrong signal.
Now staff will designate rural and agricultural sub-designations under the umbrella of the Green Zone.
The bigger issue is what pieces of land will come out of the Green Zone – cities like Maple Ridge have long argued lands were mistakenly included when the LRSP was created in 1996.
Cities are being asked to put all their proposed changes to the Green Zone on the table to be considered all at once this fall.
The changes would be part of the final growth strategy that would be an issue in civic elections this fall before going to a vote of city councils.
There's cautious optimism a new regional consensus will be reached to approve the new plan.
A new amending formula would require a two-thirds board vote to allow boundary changes such as land removals from the Green Zone or agricultural zone.
The Green Zone and its goal of protecting natural areas isn't the only part of the old LRSP that is being maintained.
The draft continues the old core strategies to concentrate growth, improve transportation choice and allow for mixed-use complete communities where more people can live, work and play without long commutes.
But now added is a key goal of supporting sustainable economic growth, a major gap in the old plan.
Also expected are policies to promote greenhouse gas reductions and energy efficiency.
Food security will be listed as a "key challenge" in the new plan and expanded policies are to be put in place to protect food-producing lands.
"There will be continued pressure, parcel by parcel, to expand the urban footprint," a Metro Vancouver staff report cautions.
But it argues growth can be accommodated within areas already designated for urban use.
An industrial land area is also proposed that officials hope will help stem the conversion of those areas to condos or other uses.
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