General Vancouver Updates

[giallo]

Judging by Feather Friend's comments, a lot of these people sound insufferable.

The design of the building notwithstanding, this is being proposed on West Broadway, not Yew and Cornwall. It's a very important arterial road that's only going to become more important in the future. This West Van gatekeeping needs to go away.

[SpongeG]

reminds me of this one in Tokyo


detail-online.com

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by giallo

This West Van gatekeeping needs to go away.

Yo, West Van NIMBYs are a different breed of ultra-reactionary. The a**holes in question here are West Side NIMBYs who can only wish they were West Van NIMBYs - think Knives Out.

[osirisboy]

Originally Posted by logan5

The colour and exterior patterns deviate from what we usually see, so I like it. Actually a nice looking building.

I agree. I like it too and I think it’s perfect for the area

[giallo]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Yo, West Van NIMBYs are a different breed of ultra-reactionary. The a**holes in question here are West Side NIMBYs who can only wish they were West Van NIMBYs - think Knives Out.

My bad. I meant Westside NIMBYs. They annoy me the most.

[scryer]

Originally Posted by giallo

Judging by Feather Friend's comments, a lot of these people sound insufferable.
[/I]gatekeeping needs to go away.

Hear ye, hear ye... All NIMBYism needs to die in this housing and environmental crisis (and they will in another decade).

As for the design; I welcome it. I think that the different design is a welcome one and I think that it is one of the few examples out there where the actual building could turn out better than the renderings. Kind of like the Main Street and Kingsway highrise.

[misher]

Originally Posted by giallo

My bad. I meant Westside NIMBYs. They annoy me the most.

I just love that they always push the "everything built will go to foreigners or money launderers" thing as a distraction.

Unfortunately many buy into it and I see several push anti-development agendas despite pretty much all development helping renters and the poor.

[officedweller]

Originally Posted by Changing City

Looks like it will be. The website also has the logo of Medica Devices (as well as Rize), who acquired the site years ago, and then discovered that they wouldn't be allowed to leave the Tim Horton's in place and build around it. Now that there's a Tim's under the station, maybe they've agreed to close down that location, or maybe their initial lease is running out.

UrbanYVR says it between Tim Horton's and Long & McQuade.
https://urbanyvr.com/the-grid-rize-alliance

[GenWhy?]

Originally Posted by misher

I just love that they always push the "everything built will go to foreigners or money launderers" thing as a distraction.

Unfortunately many buy into it and I see several push anti-development agendas despite pretty much all development helping renters and the poor.

Are the poor now those earning less than $80k? My new rentals start at like $1600 for 400sf.

[misher]

Originally Posted by GenWhy?

Are the poor now those earning less than $80k? My new rentals start at like $1600 for 400sf.

80k seems on the mark for a typical household (40k each) but high for an individual. Of course only an idiot pays the premium to get a new apartment, just like few buy a new car over an used one. I never paid over 1k to rent by myself in Vancouver/Burnaby up to 2016.

And btw isn't the rental market a tad soft right now? I've heard some agents mention they had to decrease rents slightly to get a tenant.

[djh]

Originally Posted by officedweller

UrbanYVR says it between Tim Horton's and Long & McQuade.
https://urbanyvr.com/the-grid-rize-alliance

Further down in the same article it says:

As the Tim Hortons is located on the corner of Terminal Avenue and Station Street, it appears it will be demolished to make way for The Grid.

[officedweller]

Thanks.

[officedweller]

From Lawrence Black twitter posted today:

425 West 6th Ave


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV

397 West 7th Ave.


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV

The Yukon


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV

[Jougho]

Originally Posted by Feathered Friend

https://cityduo.wordpress.com/2020/02/24...rest-amidst-a-rental-housing-revelation/

I love what Arno Matis Architecture is doing. I think that this Cambie project is brilliant, and absolutely love their proposed development on Bear Mountain in Langford, just outside of Victoria.

[Feathered Friend]

No Need For A Diet – Vancouver’s Running Ribbon Clinches Urban Design Panel’s Unanimous Support

8655 Granville Street
As this site in the heart of Marpole has sat empty for over 12 years, I would like to think this project’s open house was well attended. Unfortunately, we can’t say for sure, as Hannah and I had planned to be at what was likely a far more interesting event that night. The simple truth is neither of us expected this proposal to generate much attention, as its form is pretty much prescribed in the Marpole Community Plan.

The applicant team acknowledged that in their presentation to the Urban Design Panel, but believed the variation in the corner balconies and the running ribbon design masked the repetitive floor plates. The size of these slabs further illustrated why city staff might have required this review, as they seemed unsure whether they erred in allowing a two foot relaxation to the 80 foot width limit. The panel didn’t share this fear, but they did describe the massing as too bland.

https://cityduo.wordpress.com/2020/03/10...s-urban-design-panels-unanimous-support/

[officedweller]

Reminds me of this on on Alberni St.:


https://www.google.com/maps/@49.2909904,...ydi5cDTbct7sXhMFLmWYw!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

[GenWhy?]

Someone sent me this letter from the Coalition of Vancouver Neighbourhoods on the recent changes to the rental policy:

"CVN fully supports the need to provide more truly affordable rental housing. However, City programs to date have seen the construction of an extraordinary number of units without meeting that goal. As noted by SFU professor Andy Yan, only 12% of units approved over the past two years were affordable for the 39% of households earning less than $50,000 per year, while 66% of the units would require earnings above $80,000 per year. In the meantime, affordable low-rise buildings have been demolished and the need for truly affordable housing has risen to crisis level. It is City programs that need to change, not zoning criteria, with an emphasis on retaining units that are already affordable.

The former council’s Moderate Income Rental Housing Pilot Program (MIRHPP) should not be accepting new applications and should be suspended until the City-wide Plan is complete. It creates very large buildings, similar to STIR, that would set precedents of scale that undermine community planning processes.

The recommendations in this report show a clear bias towards new construction, while retrofit incentives for existing rentals are not nearly enough to be effective. The proposed new development incentives would place existing rentals at risk, undermine character house retention options, and put heritage buildings at risk."

[Migrant_Coconut]

For argument's sake, I'll go ahead and assume the Coalition knows a way to preserve and retrofit the entire West Side to house a hundred thousand newcomers every year, and that they aren't just flexing their provincialism.

[s211]

Originally Posted by GenWhy?

Someone sent me this letter from the Coalition of Vancouver Neighbourhoods on the recent changes to the rental policy:

"CVN fully supports the need to provide more truly affordable rental housing. However, City programs to date have seen the construction of an extraordinary number of units without meeting that goal. As noted by SFU professor Andy Yan, only 12% of units approved over the past two years were affordable for the 39% of households earning less than $50,000 per year, while 66% of the units would require earnings above $80,000 per year. In the meantime, affordable low-rise buildings have been demolished and the need for truly affordable housing has risen to crisis level. It is City programs that need to change, not zoning criteria, with an emphasis on retaining units that are already affordable.

The former council’s Moderate Income Rental Housing Pilot Program (MIRHPP) should not be accepting new applications and should be suspended until the City-wide Plan is complete. It creates very large buildings, similar to STIR, that would set precedents of scale that undermine community planning processes.

The recommendations in this report show a clear bias towards new construction, while retrofit incentives for existing rentals are not nearly enough to be effective. The proposed new development incentives would place existing rentals at risk, undermine character house retention options, and put heritage buildings at risk."

"Come see where our proposed cure is worse than the disease."

[cairnstone]

The big problem is who pays. Restoring vintage baby boomer era rentals is a very costly affair. The problem is that they are wood frame mainly and were built cheaply to begin with to house the post war boom. The cost to build or renovate in this market is to great to build housing for people with real low incomes. Maybe we should look at this issue in a different way. People need to own there choices in life and adapt to the changing market we live in.

We see that in many places. Example is new canadians are living more than 1 family to a house. This is part of the reason that a the mean income is low for homes as there is more than one family paying for th rent or mortgage.