Burnaby Updates

[chowhou]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Again though, what's the motive to rezone Ocean View? Can't be TOD, because the SkyTrain'll likely skip Imperial & Patterson, and it can't be general redevelopment, because there's literally hundreds of SFHs nearby that won't create as much toxicity.

I'd argue that Imperal & Patterson is almost a given for a future UBC - 41st - 49th - Metrotown station, personally. If Patterson is a station that makes sense on the Expo Line, then an "Ocean View" station makes just as much sense to me (possibly more).

[mcj]

Originally Posted by chowhou

I'd argue that Imperal & Patterson is almost a given for a future UBC - 41st - 49th - Metrotown station, personally. If Patterson is a station that makes sense on the Expo Line, then an "Ocean View" station makes just as much sense to me (possibly more).

A station somewhere around Boundary makes sense, next major street that could justify a station is Kerr, depending on the orientation of the connection with Metrotown, that would be 3+ km between Kerr Station and Metrotown station, absolutely justifiable to have a station in between that could also serve the Champlain Heights area (and if were really diving into fantasy territory, some kind of fixed connection to the River District too, like a gondola).'

It's also not like the whole cemetery would need to be moved, even if the area north of Victory Street was converted to other land uses that'd still be plenty of space for the cemetery and other uses.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Depends on how much budget TransLink has and how much they’re willing to value-engineer it; the R4’s got 17 stops, so if money’s tight and they don’t want to spend $1.7 bil on stations, Patterson’s one of the first stops on the chopping block. Metrotown to Imperial & Boundary is roughly equidistant to Metrotown and Royal Oak.

[madog222]

-snip-

[fredinno]

Originally Posted by FarmerHaight

IF they build on the Civic Square, I sure hope they leave the area bounded by the flower gardens (the space in front of the mini amphitheater) alone. That space is especially well used in the summer with live music, movie nights, etc. Although Central Park is very close, the Civic Square and Maywood Park are very well used and will be needed to serve the demands of 000s of additional residents in the near future.

Perhaps, as you suggested, city hall could be built on top of the library (with all the water damage and subsequent renovations in the past year, I am not sure if the library is set to be replaced anytime soon?). But I think another option would be building along Kingsborough and perhaps along McKay (although the sunbathers will be annoyed if the entire east lawn is built on).


Yes, graveyards do get moved and built on and it's happened in other North American cities with geographic constraints.

The library IS being renovated, and building on top of it would make the renovation a bit of a waste... but if we're building a new town hall, it's probably best to put it as close to the heart of Metrotown as possible next to all the other (existing and planned) civic buildings rather than some other outlying lot.

Originally Posted by Spr0ckets

To be fair (and a bit more accurate) Vancouver, for all it's housing crisis issues and affordability problems, isn't suffering the same dearth of land or prime real estate to build on, that would necessitate evicting the dead in graveyards, that those examples and other cities were suffering at the time.

It just happens to have...or have had....terrible zoning policies for the longest time that haven't helped in the past, and which more recent OCP's have began addressing in more substantive ways to allow more efficient use of the land that's available for development and could be available in the future.

In this discussion for instance, two of the graveyards and cemeteries being talked about as candidates for relocation or removal don't even sit on the type of land that would be able to be developed into high density multi-family residential or high-rise condos.
They sit on SFH zoned areas, so what exactly would be gained by moving them?
More SFH lots for single homes?

Unless the city changed the zoning and OCP designation (which isn't going to happen without a ton of justifiable pushback in a lot of those cases) then it's a moot thing to even consider.

Even the idea or notion of turning them into parklands, public parks and instead using parks in other areas for development in exchange still doesn't fly.
One of the cemeteries sits right adjacent to the one of the biggest forested suburban parks in the region, so it's not exactly like there's anything (more) to be gained from making that park area even bigger, and for the other pockets of parks that one would then "substitute" to allow development, aren't you then not hurting the surrounding communities that are served by those parks just so they have to drive halfway across the city to get to a new park (formerly graveyard)?

That doesn't make sense,....to me anyway.


It's also worth noting that a lot of the cases and examples of graveyards being moved for developments come from anywhere from 50 to 100 years ago or more.
It would be a much more difficult proposition today with the way public discourse gets shaped by local politics, optics, messaging and perceptions.

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

um.... that was 111yrs ago...

i wonder what you would say if i brought up 1950s/60s arguments to support freeway and suburban sprawl growth. those arguments would STILL be 50yrs more modern than yours.

but in the end, we have more than enough land around all these existing SkyTrain stations to develop. we even have land for park space that can be dedicated. this is such a ridiculous conversation. like holy crap.

Here is a pretty in-depth discussion about modern cemetery relocation:
https://eweb.irwaonline.org/eweb/upl...3_Cemetery.pdf


It's not as common nowadays, but it still happens.


Is Vancouver is suffering from a dearth of land to build on in comparison to 1900s San Fran? I'd say yes.

Vancouver house prices are actually less affordable than modern San Fran (adjusting for local income.)

They're not on SFH areas isn't true. 'Cemetery' is an entirely different zoning.
Also, the Brentwood cemeteries are part of Brentwood T. Center, while Central Park is part of Metrotown T. Center.


And to an extent, yeah, some people are going to be mad you're moving the park further away from the center.
But you usually don't put SkyTrain Stations on parkland (Patterson).

Because of this, half of Patterson Station is surrounded by Central Park within walking distance of it, which means it's one of the lower performing stations on the SkyTrain network (36/53).
Royal Oak has more riders.

It would also allow MetroTown to expand east into Joyce-Collingwood, especially if the Kingsway-Boundary 'ghost station' is built (assuming the provisions for it actually exist.)

You can build the housing further away, but most of the land within 10 min of a SkyTrain Station is already zoned 3.5 FSR+.
MetroTown still has a lot of space, so it's not necessary now, but still.
It's best to plan 30 years ahead for this sort of thing.

You could expand Central Park into SFHs east instead to achieve the same thing, but those lands are more useful for TOD from the Kingsway, 41st Ave, and 49th Ave buses, as well as any future 41st Ave SkyTrain that wants to terminate at Metrotown instead of Joyce-Collingwood (which would have to go through the same area, as well as Central Park, even if it's underground.)

Ocean View is more 'out of the way', and has very limited TOD potential unless you're building a line to River District.
Central Park is prime TOD land.


Meanwhile, Brentwood just lacks any good nearby urban parks.
The Concord Brentwood Park and Willingdon Heights Park will be overflowing with people, and the graveyards are the only obvious place to put a larger park in.
(Maybe building on Burnaby Lake Park south of Holdom would help, but that area's pretty environmentally sensitive.)

This is an unfortunate problem with the Brentwood Plan.

Going into the SFHs is less convenient because they're on a hill further up than the graveyards, so that's not a great option either.
This is also why the Brentwood Plan does not extend far north of Lougheed.

[fredinno]

Originally Posted by mcj

A station somewhere around Boundary makes sense, next major street that could justify a station is Kerr, depending on the orientation of the connection with Metrotown, that would be 3+ km between Kerr Station and Metrotown station, absolutely justifiable to have a station in between that could also serve the Champlain Heights area (and if were really diving into fantasy territory, some kind of fixed connection to the River District too, like a gondola).'

It's also not like the whole cemetery would need to be moved, even if the area north of Victory Street was converted to other land uses that'd still be plenty of space for the cemetery and other uses.

49th or 41st?
Imperial-Patterson is 49th, 41st is somewhere near the Swangard Stadium.
Swooping far south would make it much more difficult to have the tracks elevated (it not following any roads), causing the costs to ripple down higher.

Also, the River District is avg. 1.5-2 FSR.
The Port was mad for a reason.

Originally Posted by Spr0ckets

There's no way skytrain cars can climb that slope between BCIT and the Metrotown Ridge.

You can have the line above grade from the north until around that point, after which they will almost inevitably be forced to go sub-grade after that.

You're thinking the slope isn't that bad because you drive up it in a car or ride a bus that can climb it.

A train car (let alone 4 or 5 coupled together) is an entirely different beast and proposition, with much different mass and track friction issues.

Most of it is actually still under 6% slope, with a small, <680m section where you're peaking at 8% slope.

So it may be possible to still go elevated by having the track elevate higher around BCIT.

You might still want to build a tunnel though, just to get closer to Metrotown station for Metrotown transfers, though. There's not much room to get right next to the station.

Originally Posted by Spr0ckets

And in order to do that you would have to exhume and move the buried bodies from what you're proposing to turn into parklands, no?

This is where the problem lies with your idea.

Or are you envisioning that you're going ot have a park built on top of what used to be corpses of people's bodies, where people will be able to play, frolick and literally dance on the dead?

How do you think the families and living relatives of those deceased are going to react to such an idea?





Or it might have more to do with the fact that a significantly whole lot more people opt for cremation or burial at sea nowadays - which is far less financially imposing on their living relatives taking care of the funeral - rather than expensive cemetary lots.

Most of these cemeteries appear to be from the 'rural/park cemetery' era, when it was common for cemeteries to be public spaces, so people were also 'literally' dancing around their graves back then too.

[Klazu]

Originally Posted by djmk

this current conversation is hilarious

Tell me about it. I don't think we are anywhere close to needing to trade cemeteries for condos. Neither of the Burnaby location is also nowhere near any town center, so density or any construction at these locations is never going to happen.

[madog222]

Originally Posted by fredinno

49th or 41st?
Imperial-Patterson is 49th, 41st is somewhere near the Swangard Stadium.
Swooping far south would make it much more difficult to have the tracks elevated (it not following any roads), causing the costs to ripple down higher.

The penciled in route shows along 49th east of Cambie into Burnaby and along 41st west of Cambie.

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by fredinno

Because of this, half of Patterson Station is surrounded by Central Park within walking distance of it, which means it's one of the lower performing stations on the SkyTrain network (36/53).
Royal Oak has more riders.

It would also allow MetroTown to expand east into Joyce-Collingwood, especially if the Kingsway-Boundary 'ghost station' is built (assuming the provisions for it actually exist.)

Both stations only have one bus that stops at it so no wonder they're not top stations (Royal Oak at 30 and Patterson at 36). Also there's a school not too far from Royal Oak Station.

The Boundary station was moved to become Patterson Station. Any chance for a Boundary station would be on a new line along 41st / 49th.

Originally Posted by fredinno

49th or 41st?
Imperial-Patterson is 49th, 41st is somewhere near the Swangard Stadium.
Swooping far south would make it much more difficult to have the tracks elevated (it not following any roads), causing the costs to ripple down higher.


Most of it is actually still under 6% slope, with a small, <680m section where you're peaking at 8% slope.

So it may be possible to still go elevated by having the track elevate higher around BCIT.

You might still want to build a tunnel though, just to get closer to Metrotown station for Metrotown transfers, though. There's not much room to get right next to the station.

I suspect most Skytrain lines NoF will be primarily underground. For a line on Willingdon they'd likely have it underground at Brentwood and Metrotown and above ground in-between as the land is bowl shaped between them. Plus Metrotown is up on a ridge, making it one of the highest spots in Burnaby.

[fredinno]

Originally Posted by madog222

The penciled in route shows along 49th east of Cambie into Burnaby and along 41st west of Cambie.

Can you show me the pencilled route?
I don't think this is official- R4 uses 41st Ave.

Originally Posted by Sheba

Both stations only have one bus that stops at it so no wonder they're not top stations (Royal Oak at 30 and Patterson at 36). Also there's a school not too far from Royal Oak Station.

The Boundary station was moved to become Patterson Station. Any chance for a Boundary station would be on a new line along 41st / 49th.

I suspect most Skytrain lines NoF will be primarily underground. For a line on Willingdon they'd likely have it underground at Brentwood and Metrotown and above ground in-between as the land is bowl shaped between them. Plus Metrotown is up on a ridge, making it one of the highest spots in Burnaby.

It IS possible to add infill stations without the flat section of track intended for it. It's just more expensive and difficult, since it requires building bypass tracks.


129 (Patterson) is a standard bus line though, and 148 is a mini-bus line (and is overall much less used.)

Royal Oak is also technically not even in Metrotown.

But point is that Patterson has a lot of excess capacity, and the northern parts of Central Park split off Joyce and Boundary from Metrotown.
I doubt removing parkland is possible without some form of compensation.


There's less incentive to bore tunnels now since TransLink can use bought-out properties for revenue.
IMO, the high cost of the Broadway subway means that similar tunnels will be avoided unless there's absolutely no other reasonable way to build the tracks (eg. it would destroy too much property or is an area that's very built up).

Originally Posted by Klazu

Tell me about it. I don't think we are anywhere close to needing to trade cemeteries for condos. Neither of the Burnaby location is also nowhere near any town center, so density or any construction at these locations is never going to happen.

The Amazing Brentwood is literally on the opposite side of Willingdon from Beth Isreal Cemetery, and Central Park is literally right off Patterson Station.

[Spr0ckets]

Originally Posted by fredinno

......


Is Vancouver is suffering from a dearth of land to build on in comparison to 1900s San Fran? I'd say yes.

Vancouver house prices are actually less affordable than modern San Fran (adjusting for local income.)

You're conflating and muddling stuff, somewhat.
Not to mention over-simplifying things.

The affordability situation in Vancouver is nothing like what big American cities like San Fransisco are going through - particularly with regards to the causes.

Vancouver house prices are unaffordable NOT necessarily because there's a paucity of land on which to build new housing - certainly not in Greater Vancouver Area - (as would be the case in places like San Fran and New York), but because for years successive administrations in the various municipalities have badly mismanaged the zoning and housing policies and instead poured fuel into the fire of a runaway housing and real estate market rather than enacting policies that would have slowed it down.

The policies they began to enact only in the last couple of decades, such as upzoning regions close to transit hubs to encourage development around transit areas are policies that other cities that have had more robust transit systems have been enacting since the turn of the last century. And it's stuff that should have been happening from as soon as the Skytrain system went online in the 1980's.

There are other reasons why San Fran's unaffordability situation and housing crisis problem is different from Vancouver's and unique to them (like the presence of the Tech Industry and Silicon Valley that's paid out mega-high salaries fueling the ability of people to pay above market rate in other parts of the US, and thus skew their housing prices, for example. On the other hand, Vancouver's average and median wage and income come nowhere close to matching the standard and cost of living for most people that live here.)

But then again, on the one hand you're arguing that....

"Is Vancouver is suffering from a dearth of land to build on in comparison to 1900s San Fran? I'd say yes."

And then not long after that you're like,....

"MetroTown still has a lot of space, so it's not necessary now, but still."

So is there a dearth of land and space on which to build on or not?
Or does this paucity only exist for VAncouver but Metrotown is fine for the moment?

Make up your mind.

Originally Posted by fredinno

They're not on SFH areas isn't true. 'Cemetery' is an entirely different zoning.
Also, the Brentwood cemeteries are part of Brentwood T. Center, while Central Park is part of Metrotown T. Center.

You're splitting hairs here, and you know it.

Whatever the zoning is, you know darn well you can't develop high density housing or highrise on cemetery zoned land without a rezoning process that would have to upzone it.

The current zoning maxes out any buildings at 1-2 storeys
Same as SFH.

And as you can see from the plan below even the areas in Maywood district just north of Imperial are only zoned for 1-2 storeys.

Which is the same for everything south of Imperial including Ocean View - SFH zoned or not.





Secondly, Central Park is indeed part of Metrotown "core" per the OCP, but so what?
(the actual "Downtown" designated area is between Beresford to the south and Hazel to the North and between Patterson to the West and Marlborough to the East. See above.)

It's zoned as public park/open space. You can't redevelop high density on it either per the OCP so even your idea of exchanging some cemetary land for parkland still wouldn't fly without a major rejigging of the already established OCP.
And that's not happening either without major public pushback that would likely kill any attempt to do so.

Originally Posted by fredinno

And to an extent, yeah, some people are going to be mad you're moving the park further away from the center.
But you usually don't put SkyTrain Stations on parkland (Patterson).

Because of this, half of Patterson Station is surrounded by Central Park within walking distance of it, which means it's one of the lower performing stations on the SkyTrain network (36/53).
Royal Oak has more riders.

Royal Oak has more riders than Patterson because it's the last stop for quite a distance before you get to Edmonds, and as a result it has a larger collection radius for riders than Patterson does, which is sandwhiched between two bigger hubs (Joyce Collingwood) and one of which is the biggest suburban transit hub in the GVA (Metrotown Station),
So, it's not inconceivable that most riders who even live nearer to Patterson would get off at Metrotown Station (to do some shopping at the mall before walking home) or get on at either Metrotown or Joyce Collingwood (depending on which side they live) rather than at Patterson.

Royal Oak actually has a lot of riders who drive from their homes either from south slope or farther east, park in the area and leave their cars and then get on the skytrain to get to downtown or to other destinations.
That means they get more riders than people who live in the (immediate) area.

But Patterson's ridership won't always be low, since the Patterson area is the area that's currently undergoing most of the redevelopment in Metrotown with three under construction towers, and three more already proposed/accepted and a couple more in planning stages.

Originally Posted by fredinno

......

It would also allow MetroTown to expand east into Joyce-Collingwood, especially if the Kingsway-Boundary 'ghost station' is built (assuming the provisions for it actually exist.)

Why would they want to do this?

Joyce Collingwood is part of Vancouver City and an entirely different municipality with completely different imperatives that they're subject to.

Originally Posted by fredinno

......

You can build the housing further away, but most of the land within 10 min of a SkyTrain Station is already zoned 3.5 FSR+.
MetroTown still has a lot of space, so it's not necessary now, but still.
It's best to plan 30 years ahead for this sort of thing.

You could expand Central Park into SFHs east instead to achieve the same thing, but those lands are more useful for TOD from the Kingsway, 41st Ave, and 49th Ave buses, as well as any future 41st Ave SkyTrain that wants to terminate at Metrotown instead of Joyce-Collingwood (which would have to go through the same area, as well as Central Park, even if it's underground.)

Ocean View is more 'out of the way', and has very limited TOD potential unless you're building a line to River District.
Central Park is prime TOD land.

Again, good luck being part of the administration that proposes turning Central Park land into residential zoning for highrise developments.
It'll never fly politically or otherwise.

It also happens to be the one area in Burnaby that has a viewcone, I believe.

So yeah,....good luck with all of that.

Originally Posted by fredinno

......

Meanwhile, Brentwood just lacks any good nearby urban parks.
The Concord Brentwood Park and Willingdon Heights Park will be overflowing with people, and the graveyards are the only obvious place to put a larger park in.
(Maybe building on Burnaby Lake Park south of Holdom would help, but that area's pretty environmentally sensitive.)

This is an unfortunate problem with the Brentwood Plan.

Going into the SFHs is less convenient because they're on a hill further up than the graveyards, so that's not a great option either.
This is also why the Brentwood Plan does not extend far north of Lougheed.

Yes, this is indeed a problem where Brentwood is concerned and, surprise!! surprise!!, that's kind of what happens when you create a town center and residential neighbourhoods out of what used to be Industrial lands.
But I'm still not convinced that the solution to increasing that parkland would be to turn their graveyard or cemetery into a park, when they still have several options in the area and oppoturnities to encourage the development of public park spaces with new developments there.

[madog222]

Originally Posted by fredinno

Can you show me the pencilled route?
I don't think this is official- R4 uses 41st Ave.

No, it's definitely not official and won't be happening anytime soon, but I wouldn't take the R4 route as what to expect. The Evergreen Extension takes a different route through Coquitlam than the 97 and the Canada Line in on a different arterial through Vancouver than the 98.


https://www.translink.ca/-/media/tra...y_document.pdf

[Spr0ckets]

Originally Posted by fredinno

.......

There's less incentive to bore tunnels now since TransLink can use bought-out properties for revenue.
IMO, the high cost of the Broadway subway means that similar tunnels will be avoided unless there's absolutely no other reasonable way to build the tracks (eg. it would destroy too much property or is an area that's very built up).

Do you have any links or citation to support the assertion that Translink is looking to use bought out properties for revenue?
Because last I read, neither the city nor Translink are looking to be in the business of real estate or development and will look to sell off any land that was bought out for staging for construction as soon as the subway is complete, for developers to develop on them.

I would also be curious to know what you're basing your claim on that going the tunnel route was more expensive for them than if they had gone above grade, because again, last I remember the reason they settled on going underground - for as expensive as it is, it's still far less expensive than it would have been if they tried to build it above grade with all the land they'd have to acquire, the disruptions to business and traffic on Broadway which this was happening (even more so than is happening now).

One of the large reasons they are forced to go sub-grade now is that the proposed routes ARE through built-up areas.
Certainly for the current extension (the Broadway line) and a possibly UBC-Metrtown line.

The Evergreen extension was different because most of that route is through non-built up or low developed areas, and thus disruption is minimal.
Chances are that it will be the same for the Langley extension for a similar reason.

Originally Posted by fredinno

The Amazing Brentwood is literally on the opposite side of Willingdon from Beth Isreal Cemetery, and Central Park is literally right off Patterson Station.

Patterson station (and area) is not a Town Center.
Metrotown is the Town Center.

The designated "town centers" of Burnaby are Brentwood, Metrotown, Edmonds and Loughheed.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Also, just because SkyTrain can take a "steep" grade doesn't mean it should. Pushing uphill both ways when it doesn't have to wears it out faster and drives up maintenance costs, and that also offsets the $20m/km saved by going elevated over tunneled.

Originally Posted by Spr0ckets

Do you have any links or citation to support the assertion that Translink is looking to use bought out properties for revenue?
Because last I read, neither the city nor Translink are looking to be in the business of real estate or development and will look to sell off any land that was bought out for staging for construction as soon as the subway is complete, for developers to develop on them...

While TransLink is branching out into real estate, I highly doubt that it incentivizes cut and cover or elevated guideways.

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by fredinno

It IS possible to add infill stations without the flat section of track intended for it. It's just more expensive and difficult, since it requires building bypass tracks.

Yes it is possible to add infill stations - where it makes sense. A station at Boundary would only be about 1km away from Patterson Station and 800m from Joyce Station. Adding one there with those short distances doesn't make a lot of sense.

Originally Posted by Spr0ckets

It also happens to be the one area in Burnaby that has a viewcone, I believe.

Yes I'm the one who found that little tidbit. They want people in the Brentwood area to be able to see Central Park.

Originally Posted by Spr0ckets

One of the large reasons they are forced to go sub-grade now is that the proposed routes ARE through built-up areas.
Certainly for the current extension (the Broadway line) and a possibly UBC-Metrtown line.

Exactly. That's why I suspect most Skytrain lines NoF will be primarily underground.

[ecbin]

Originally Posted by Sheba

Yes it is possible to add infill stations - where it makes sense. A station at Boundary would only be about 1km away from Patterson Station and 800m from Joyce Station. Adding one there with those short distances doesn't make a lot of sense.

Not today but if that area keeps densifying (and gets further up zoned) they'd have enough traffic to put one up there. 800m is a 12 min for most people so which starts getting to the outer bound of what's "walkable" and adding a station there creates a new 800m circle around that area to allow for more density. The 28 bus could be re-routed to run to this station as well to make it more efficient.

[FarmerHaight]

Originally Posted by Spr0ckets

And as you can see from the plan below even the areas in Maywood district just north of Imperial are only zoned for 1-2 storeys.

Since others brought up the 49/41 Skytrain, do you think Burnaby came up with the Metrotown plan as-is with the intention of altering it when the Willingdon or 49/41 Skytrain is built? Because if there are rapid transit stations at Grange/Willingdon and Patterson/Imperial I think Maywood and The Ridge will be ripe for up-zoning.

Originally Posted by ecbin

Not today but if that area keeps densifying (and gets further up zoned) they'd have enough traffic to put one up there.

If what area keeps densifying? Boundary and Kingsway? AFAIK, there isn't a lot of development happening around that intersection.

[Spr0ckets]

Originally Posted by FarmerHaight

Since others brought up the 49/41 Skytrain, do you think Burnaby came up with the Metrotown plan as-is with the intention of altering it when the Willingdon or 49/41 Skytrain is built? Because if there are rapid transit stations at Grange/Willingdon and Patterson/Imperial I think Maywood and The Ridge will be ripe for up-zoning.



.....

They probably will revisit it (and possibly revise it) if and when such a Skytrain/Rapidbus extension line gets a go ahead, much like CoV did with the Broadway Corridor plan after the Broadway Skytrain extension was approved and given the go-ahead.

They'll have to.
Otherwise you end up facing the same sort of "gold rush" situation they did on Broadway with developers and real estate investors gobbling up properties along W. Broadway in anticipation of upzoning when the line was approved and making profits selling off those parcels for redevelopment afterwards.

I doubt you'd get that level of prospective buy outs of lots in the 49/41 corridor or the Willingdon corridors, but as pressure and demand increases for Transit oriented residential developments with the region's population growth, it's a no-brainer on the city's part that they'll have to upzone some of those areas.

But I still don't see them touching or rezoning the graveyards until they absolutely have to, even in the event of such an OCP update, and I don't imagine those neighbourhoods around them are going to be major nodes of redevelopment even if they get skytrain/rapidbus stations nearby them.

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by ecbin

Not today but if that area keeps densifying (and gets further up zoned) they'd have enough traffic to put one up there. 800m is a 12 min for most people so which starts getting to the outer bound of what's "walkable" and adding a station there creates a new 800m circle around that area to allow for more density. The 28 bus could be re-routed to run to this station as well to make it more efficient.

If they add a Boundary station then the walking distance 'circles' start to overlap and that would cannibalize the ridership (aka they'd be even lower than Patterson is now). TransLink is better off re-routing buses to provide coverage to existing stations instead.

[ecbin]

Originally Posted by FarmerHaight

If what area keeps densifying? Boundary and Kingsway? AFAIK, there isn't a lot of development happening around that intersection.

Back in 2020 a developer had said they wanted to redevelop the Telus boot but I haven't heard anything on it since - that spot is ripe for a redo.

https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/3777...the-boot-telus

In addition the areas on the north side of the track are just on the edge of the Metrotown plan and the Joyce neighborhood - there are no plans to redevelop that area or densify though BC might force enough density onto that area to someday make it worthwhile to have a stop along the way.

Originally Posted by Sheba

If they add a Boundary station then the walking distance 'circles' start to overlap and that would cannibalize the ridership (aka they'd be even lower than Patterson is now). TransLink is better off re-routing buses to provide coverage to existing stations instead.

I think if there's enough density then overlapping walking circles are ok if it also unlocks new areas for denser development - this is definitely not a problem for the next 10 years (maybe not even 20 years) but the areas north of that spot would make for good densification at some point I think (the province will probably force the matter later this year anyways). Having a station at Boundary could make everything up to Moscrop walkable.

Not today or near term though - I just think there's opportunity there (as there are on spots along the Expo line like between Commercial-Nanaimo) someday to get more bang for buck out of an existing line.