General Vancouver Updates

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by GenWhy?

Seeing quite a few rezoning applications up this year and the trickle in of SRP projects doesn't stop. Looks like folks are giving the new expanded program a-go. I think that's 2 dozen applications this year so far.

I think there are 18 so far on the City's website. There could be more yet to show - the E 41st project that was just advertised was submitted in July.

Originally Posted by GenWhy?

Predicting maybe 2,500 homes approved by Council through rezoning by April 2023?

There are plenty of projects waiting to head to public hearing. It'll be interesting to see if the new Council push them through faster - less grandstanding from some no-longer-elected councillors, and fewer questions of speakers, for example.

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by Changing City

There are plenty of projects waiting to head to public hearing. It'll be interesting to see if the new Council push them through faster - less grandstanding from some no-longer-elected councillors, and fewer questions of speakers, for example.

I wonder if they will take some steps to "streamline" this process in a similar fashion they are proposing for permitting.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

I wonder if they will take some steps to "streamline" this process in a similar fashion they are proposing for permitting.

I think that Council has already streamlined the process for Public Hearings quite a bit - so speakers only get 5 minutes. The number of speakers seemed to go up when covid meant that phoning in was introduced, rather than attending the meeting to speak. The time that some hearings took under the last Council was because some councillors asked a lot of questions, and added procedural motions that slowed things down.

If Council required in person attendance again, it could speed things up, but whether they'd want to be seen to be 'anti-democratic' (as it would be seen by some), and while the possibility of a covid resurgence still exists, remains to be seen.

We've yet to see how speeding up permitting will work - to meet the deadlines they were suggesting would certainly appear to limit the opportunities for public consultation.

[jollyburger]

Or just ask for written submissions.

[the_prof]

I think public hearings should be abolished and fully replaced with opportunity to submit written comments via the internet or email, which councilors can read and discuss and then cast their vote. Public hearings, either in person or via video, are a waste of valuable council time, biased and discriminatory. Only people with plenty of free time or strong agenda (e.g. NIMBYs) participate.

[jollyburger]

Director, Renovate the Public Hearing Initiative
position is open until filled

Employment Duration: temporary full time
Pay range: $94,000 To $112,000 annually, depending on experience
Location: Vancouver (hybrid)

Closing Date: open until filled

About Renovate the Public Hearing

Current public hearings requirements for housing developments result in low satisfaction, additional costs, lengthy delays, and sometimes trauma for those involved. The Renovate the Public Hearing initiative will identify improved laws and procedures that result in more housing that is affordable, support meaningful democratic engagement, advance principles of equity and reconciliation, improve the efficiency and quality of decisions and strengthen communities. Through activities such as visioning dialogues, demonstration projects, an “innovation exchange”, a recommendations dialogue, and a formal legal review process led by BC Law Institute, the initiative will support systems change in British Columbia and provide a potential model for reform in other jurisdictions.

Renovate the Public Hearing completed an exploratory phase of work in spring 2022, with major outputs now available at: https://www.democracydialogue.ca/publichearings. This work demonstrated widespread interest in public hearing reform and enabled the submission of a successful $2.5 million grant application (funder name has been withheld pending official announcement). The initiative now requires a dedicated Director and core team to scale up activities and deliver the scope of the successful grant in collaboration with other units at the Centre between now and the funding end date of March 31, 2024.

https://www.sfu.ca/dialogue/news/job-postings/director-of-public-hearing.html

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by the_prof

I think public hearings should be abolished and fully replaced with opportunity to submit written comments via the internet or email, which councilors can read and discuss and then cast their vote. Public hearings, either in person or via video, are a waste of valuable council time, biased and discriminatory. Only people with plenty of free time or strong agenda (e.g. NIMBYs) participate.

I think they're a legal requirement. Certainly in Vancouver they're in the Vancouver Charter, and I believe every other municipality also have to hold them. So it would have to be the Province that made any legislative changes, the City couldn't unilaterally change things.

"Amendment or repeal of zoning by-law
566 - The Council shall not make, amend, or repeal a zoning by-law until it has held a public hearing thereon, and an application for rezoning shall be treated as an application to amend a zoning by-law."

[gaviscon]

Does anyone know what's gonna happen here? (Across the former Toyota dealer on W. Broadway, and beside Staples.

https://www.google.com/maps/@49.2635614,...eT3M0EEzS5S_LpehuiEsw!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

[csbvan]

Originally Posted by the_prof

I think public hearings should be abolished and fully replaced with opportunity to submit written comments via the internet or email, which councilors can read and discuss and then cast their vote. Public hearings, either in person or via video, are a waste of valuable council time, biased and discriminatory. Only people with plenty of free time or strong agenda (e.g. NIMBYs) participate.

The BC government has changed the public hearing requirements. If a proposal conforms to the OCP, a local government can waive the hearing for a rezoning. Vancouver has it's own Charter and no OCP, so probably not applicable in the City.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Serious question: do the Vancouver Plan or all the various local OCPs not count?

Originally Posted by gaviscon

Does anyone know what's gonna happen here? (Across the former Toyota dealer on W. Broadway, and beside Staples.

Still up for sale at last check; best guess, the soil has to remediate a little more before they do anything with it.

[djh]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Serious question: do the Vancouver Plan or all the various local OCPs not count?



Still up for sale at last check; best guess, the soil has to remediate a little more before they do anything with it.

I don't get the soil remediation situation.

The polluted soil is going to be dug up and disposed of, anyway.
Why don't developers just dig the soil up immediately and let it remediate at a different location, so that development on the land plot can start immediately?

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by djh

I don't get the soil remediation situation.

The polluted soil is going to be dug up and disposed of, anyway.
Why don't developers just dig the soil up immediately and let it remediate at a different location, so that development on the land plot can start immediately?

If a developer were to buy the site, they might take that route. The problem would be that they're effectively buying an unknown liability (unless the former gas station owner is willing to assume the liability). No gas station is clean - there have always been spills and leaks, but how much? and how far? Even sites with a supposedly known history can end up in expensive litigation.

It is possible to treat hydrocarbons with bio-digesting organisms - things that eat hydrocarbons. That can be effective, but can take years. If there's any possibility of hydrocarbons having leached off the site, the liabilities go up even higher. Sometimes the neighbouring site is affected - sometimes some of the road and sidewalk has to be dug up and replaced, although the City introduced revised (lower) standards in 2015 to try to balance risks with the trucking and disturbance from removing contaminated material.

In the worst cases, the best practice may be to leave the polluted site alone, and cap it without digging it. There's a site on the Fraser River like that, and others along the edge of False Creek (which have been developed as parks). If the material is removed to be landfilled or processed it can be trucked a long way - which is in itself very expensive. (At one time material was shipped to Alberta, but I think that more local sites and treatment plants have opened up).

There are a couple of barrels on the site, so there have probably been test boreholes drilled across and around the site to assess the degree of pollution present.

[jollyburger]

There's some data about the site from Broadway Subway work but mostly old data from previous soil work done in the 90s

Search for Broadway Subway Contaminated Sites and Excavated Materials Technical Data Report

1398 West Broadway, approximately 50 m southeast of the Site
• Site Registry Detail Report (293) – Ordered November 5, 2017. BC MOE, last updated July
7, 2017.
o Broadway and Hemlock Esso Service Station, 1398 West Broadway, Vancouver,
B.C., Location No. 995456 (January 26, 1998). Notes – Report may be considered
notification of independent remediation. O’Connor Associates Environmental
Inc., February 6, 1998.
o Broadway and Hemlock Esso Service Station, 1398 West Broadway, Vancouver,
B.C., Location No. 995456. (March 6, 1996). Notes – Site Remediation Update
Report. O’Connor Associates Environmental Inc., March 8, 1996).
o Esso Service Station, 1398 West Broadway, Vancouver, B.C. Location No. 90305
(March 12, 1992). O’Connor Associates Environmental Inc., Marc 18, 1992.
o Proposed Redevelopment of Esso Service Station, 1398 West Broadway,
Vancouver, B.C., Station No. 995456 (January 10, 1992). O’Connor Associates
Environmental Inc., January 13, 1992.
o Esso Service Station, 1398 West Broadway, Vancouver, B.C. Location No. 995456
(January 8, 1992). O’Connor Associates Environmental Inc., January 13, 1992.
o Esso Service Station, 1398 West Broadway, Vancouver, B.C. Location No. 995456
(June 28, 1991). O’Connor Associates Environmental Inc., July 4, 1991.
o Esso Service Station, 1398 West Broadway, Vancouver, B.C. Location No. 995456
(March 8, 1991). O’Connor Associates Environmental Inc., July 4, 1991.
o Texaco Service Station, (s/s 5456), 1398 West Broadway, Vancouver, B.C. (June 7,
1988). O’Connor Associates Environmental Inc., July 4, 1991.

Broadway and Hemlock Esso Service Station, 1398 West Broadway, Vancouver, B.C., Location
No. 995456 (January 26, 1998)
• Liquid hydrocarbons were detected at the water surface between 1992 and 1993, but
have not been since the report date (1998).
• A groundwater recovery and treatment system was installed and since action,
monitoring of the site was conducted at regular intervals.
• The average depth to the groundwater table was 2.8 m in 1997 and the historical
groundwater flow has been to the north.
• Both offsite and on-site concentrations of dissolved hydrocarbon constituents have
declined to levels below the referenced standards (1998) except for ethylbenzene in
WP1. When compared to present-day standards, results did not exceed CSR Schedule
3.1 – Generic Numerical Water Standards.
• As of 1997, 366.6 m³ of water has been recovered and treated.
• The consultant recommends replacing the pump and treat system with bioventing and
hydrogen peroxide additions to reduce the concentrations of residual hydrocarbons in
the subsurface soils.

2019 Esso station sale in Salmon Arm and the provincial environmental conditions

Imperial Oil plans to sell former 7-Eleven site in Salmon Arm
Environment ministry must okay plans to ensure contaminated soil remediated

MARTHA WICKETTApr. 17, 2019 6:00 a.m.NEWS

Imperial Oil plans to sell the site of the former 7-Eleven convenience store, once any environmental work needed is done.

A spokesperson for 7-Eleven assured Mayor Alan Harrison recently that the burned building at 371 Trans-Canada Hwy. will be demolished before the tourists arrive in May. 7-Eleven has been leasing the site from Imperial Oil.

Jon Harding, Imperial Oil spokesperson, said on April 12 that the company’s plan would include doing an environmental assessment once the demolition is done. Remediation would take place, if necessary.

“Typically we’d go to the province to get a certificate of compliance. When we have that, we plan to market the property for sale.”

He notes all of the work will take time.

According to the city, the demolition must be done in concert with the B.C. environment ministry.

Kevin Pearson, the city’s director of development services, says in an email that because the site was once home to a gas station, the provincial Contaminated Sites Regulation requires the owner to deal with any contaminants on-site at the time of a demolition permit.

“They don’t need to keep us updated… without a Demo Permit application, but it does needs to be dealt with and MoE (Ministry of Environment) would need to authorize favorably before a Demo Permit can be issued by the city.”

The ministry provided an update on the site, which identifies contaminant migration, but not high risk. It states in an April 12 email that Imperial Oil notified the ministry on Aug. 21, 2007 of site decommissioning and its intention to carry out independent remediation.
“The service station was to be decommissioned in September 2007 and Keystone Environmental was retained to conduct the environmental investigation; a preliminary site investigation (was) required in connection with these notifications.”

Since then, states the ministry, petroleum hydrocarbon impacts to soil were identified on transportation ministry property adjacent to the Imperial Oil property. On Dec. 13 of last year, what are called ‘Notifications of Likely or Actual Offsite Contaminant Migration’ were issued to the transportation ministry and to the city, the city because it has utilities under the sidewalk within the highway property.

Risks at the source and to affected properties were then classified.

“Results of these classifications showed that the properties were not high risk.”

The ministry states it’s been advised that detailed site investigations are currently underway at the source and at the adjacent property.

“As a result of ENV’s (the ministry’s) requirement for site investigation, issuance of any local government land use authorizations will remain restricted until site remediation has been confirmed as complete, or the ministry has been contacted for further advice.”

The Observer was unable to reach a spokesperson for 7-Eleven.

https://www.saobserver.net/news/imperial-oil-plans-to-sell-former-7-eleven-site-in-salmon-arm/

Article on the sale of the Davie Esso station

Whatever development winds up on the site, the property will first need to undergo remediation to remove contaminants.

Peter Reid, an environmental engineer and vice president of the Contaminated Sites Approved Professionals Society, said there are a lot of site-specific variables that could affect how much work will be required. But he doesn't expect the property to sit idle for long before it's redeveloped.

Just over a week after closing, the Chevron station on Georgia Street in Vancouver has already had the pumps removed. (Christer Waara/CBC)
"In downtown Vancouver, it would cost too much money to leave the site for 10 years to remediate it with in situ techniques, so usually it fits right in with the development schedule," he said.

"When you dig out your soil for your underground parkade, then you start getting your reports ready."

Reid said he'd worked on gas stations with remediation costs ranging from $20,000 to several hundred thousand dollars, and it all depends on factors like the gas station's age and what sort of soil, clay, sand and rock lies beneath it.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-c...uver-last-gas-station-for-sale-1.4066658

[officedweller]

1477 West Broadway

From Lawrence Black twitter Oct 28th:


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV


https://twitter.com/LawrenceBlackTV

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by Changing City

If a developer were to buy the site, they might take that route. The problem would be that they're effectively buying an unknown liability (unless the former gas station owner is willing to assume the liability). No gas station is clean - there have always been spills and leaks, but how much? and how far? Even sites with a supposedly known history can end up in expensive litigation.

It is possible to treat hydrocarbons with bio-digesting organisms - things that eat hydrocarbons. That can be effective, but can take years. If there's any possibility of hydrocarbons having leached off the site, the liabilities go up even higher. Sometimes the neighbouring site is affected - sometimes some of the road and sidewalk has to be dug up and replaced, although the City introduced revised (lower) standards in 2015 to try to balance risks with the trucking and disturbance from removing contaminated material.

In the worst cases, the best practice may be to leave the polluted site alone, and cap it without digging it. There's a site on the Fraser River like that, and others along the edge of False Creek (which have been developed as parks). If the material is removed to be landfilled or processed it can be trucked a long way - which is in itself very expensive. (At one time material was shipped to Alberta, but I think that more local sites and treatment plants have opened up).

There are a couple of barrels on the site, so there have probably been test boreholes drilled across and around the site to assess the degree of pollution present.

Certainly explains why we have some old gas station sites that seem to be taking forever to develop: Main at 49th, Oak at 23rd, Cambie at 16th (though the last seems to finally be ready to start construction).

[VancouverOfTheFuture]

Originally Posted by whatnext

Certainly explains why we have some old gas station sites that seem to be taking forever to develop: Main at 49th, Oak at 23rd, Cambie at 16th (though the last seems to finally be ready to start construction).

its also why you should check for an oil tank when buying old homes prior to closing. it can get very expensive, very fast. i knew someone who got stuck and ended up having to pay about 60k in removal and remediation of the property. and its non-negotiable, must be done.

[SFUVancouver]

The longest-vacant gas station I know about is at Oak and 23rd Avenue. I was part way through elementary school around 1990 when I think the gas station at this location closed. It has doubtlessly been at least 30 years now that it has been "airing out". It's worth noting that it is immediately adjacent to Emily Carr Elementary School and there's been no shortage of infill development in the area over the years, so that site must be a nightmare below grade to have remained vacant since the USSR was still a thing.

https://goo.gl/maps/PnsKhBJH4oZyTUq77

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by SFUVancouver

The longest-vacant gas station I know about is at Oak and 23rd Avenue. I was part way through elementary school in the around 1990 when the gas station on this location closed. It has doubtlessly been at least 30 years now that it has been "airing out". It's worth noting that it is immediately adjacent to Emily Carr Elementary School and there's been no shortage of infill development in the area over the years, so that site must be a nightmare below grade to have remained vacant since the USSR was still a thing.

https://goo.gl/maps/PnsKhBJH4oZyTUq77

The land probably isn't taxed enough to incentivize development.

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

The land probably isn't taxed enough to incentivize development.

It's next to a school too.

[hollywoodnorth]

Originally Posted by SFUVancouver

The longest-vacant gas station I know about is at Oak and 23rd Avenue. I was part way through elementary school around 1990 when I think the gas station at this location closed. It has doubtlessly been at least 30 years now that it has been "airing out". It's worth noting that it is immediately adjacent to Emily Carr Elementary School and there's been no shortage of infill development in the area over the years, so that site must be a nightmare below grade to have remained vacant since the USSR was still a thing.

https://goo.gl/maps/PnsKhBJH4oZyTUq77

I think as well the former Gulf station at Hastings & Commercial was closed in the late 80's (or early 90s) and has sat vacant since >> https://searcharchives.vancouver.ca/commercial-drive-and-hastings-street-looking-south