Burnaby Updates

[Jebby]

The park also does serve as a good buffer between the residential and the railway and industrial area to the south. Hopefully the industrial area gets protected by zoning and gets densified to justify its existence.

[Vin]

Originally Posted by cairnstone

This is one development I wish would never get built. As the land is industrial/ warehouse now so you are going to force the existing tenants out and increase the rates in the surrounding business parks. Its going to be soon if you need a part for something will have to drive to Langley to get it as there will not be any shops to sell it.

So the overall cost will go up and also will increase the traffic on the roads. This goes for all the different municipalities. Richmond is doing this Vancouver barely has anything close.

I had a service call on thursday last week to service a HID lights. went to 2 wholesalers neither had the bulbs and said had to go to Burnaby. Whats next We will have to ship them from Hope.

Burnaby has already designated the entire swath of Brentwood to be an urban centre decades ago, meaning owners at the industrial areas should have prepared for this. Vancouver's inability to go high density at more neighbourhoods is driving people to the burbs, and unfortunately, industrial lands have to be used in this case of Brentwood area. It makes sense that the bulk of the density in the burbs should be concentrated around here and Metrotown as they are the closest town centres with skytrain to Vancouver.

This neighbourhood is starting to get really exciting!

[trofirhen]

Originally Posted by Spork

Yaletown Station Square vs. Yaletown Brentwood Concord vs. Yaletown Yaletown

Coming 2020 to a theatre near you.

[cornholio]

15 to 20 year build out in the current market is insane. They are restricting supply to increase prices which as a business is logical. However this negatively impacts the citizens and the city.

This being industrial land the city should rezone with the condition the build out is in 5 years for example and give heavy financial penalties for going over that time frame.

There is no reason to allow a community to face 20 years of construction when there is enough demand today to sell the entire community out in a year or two and build it in one mega project and still allow the developer to make a very good profit. Actually this is one problem we have in Vancouver, allowing developers create and market multiple communities at once and restrict supply to increase already good profits and drag out the build out for a few extra dollars. This is exactly where a government or a municipality needs to step in and get involved for the betterment of the community.

Anywhere else I have been and projects are 5-10-20 towers at once in one go. Be it Prague with little growth or Sao Paulo with lots of growth or anywhere else I am remotely familiar with outside of Canada the US and a few other commonwealthish countries.

[Infrequent Poster]

Originally Posted by officedweller

I don't think this video for Concord Brentwood has been posted:





Article from the Georgia Straight:
(I didn't know Burnaby had a first Yaletown!?!)


http://www.straight.com/news/658336/second-yaletown-coming-burnaby


http://www.straight.com/news/658336/second-yaletown-coming-burnaby

These things look girthy, as well as tall. Its almost like Burnabys town centers are competing with each other. Now if only downtown Vancouver would join in the competition as well.

[Jebby]

I think developers know the market a bit better than you, cornholio....

And do you realize the resources it takes to build a 10-tower development?

[cornholio]

Originally Posted by Jebby

I think developers know the market a bit better than you, cornholio....

And do you realize the resources it takes to build a 10-tower development?

Of course they know the market and they know they can have multiple projects in multiple communities at once and squeeze maximum profits out of them by restricting supply. I am not a idiot. They have the resources to build all towers at once, money contrary to popular belief does rain from the sky if you can guarantee a profit. Every tower in the area is sold out in a single day. 1 day. Not months but 1 day. They can sell this development out in pre sales in a matter of a year or two no problem. Sure the profit per unit will be lower but it will be a profit none the less. And that's why I said its the government that needs to step in. Look smaller cities then Vancouver with no growth can do it. Ultra capitalistic Vancouver can too. And all of us who live here will be better for it.

[domusile]

Originally Posted by cornholio

Of course they know the market and they know they can have multiple projects in multiple communities at once and squeeze maximum profits out of them by restricting supply. I am not a idiot. They have the resources to build all towers at once, money contrary to popular belief does rain from the sky if you can guarantee a profit. Every tower in the area is sold out in a single day. 1 day. Not months but 1 day. They can sell this development out in pre sales in a matter of a year or two no problem. Sure the profit per unit will be lower but it will be a profit none the less. And that's why I said its the government that needs to step in. Look smaller cities then Vancouver with no growth can do it. Ultra capitalistic Vancouver can too. And all of us who live here will be better for it.

No profit is guaranteed in the eyes of the banks who finance the majority of the construction on a project like this. One of these towers alone would take three banks to syndicate it. There is no way they would have the exposure to put construction financing on all of these buildings at once.

[scryer]

I do agree that the term "mixed use" needs to be more diverse. Does anyone know of any city planning strategies (for Metro Vancouver) in place to address the loss of industrial zoning? Because unless a strategy is put into place, later on down the road, we are going to suddenly see a huge cry for industrial zoning. Personally I think that this can be addressed by making mixed-use developments include industrial at-grade but no one is building it. And I guess it also depends on the industry as well because you couldn't have a coal or paint factory in a high-rise with residents or office workers .

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by scryer

I do agree that the term "mixed use" needs to be more diverse. Does anyone know of any city planning strategies (for Metro Vancouver) in place to address the loss of industrial zoning? Because unless a strategy is put into place, later on down the road, we are going to suddenly see a huge cry for industrial zoning. Personally I think that this can be addressed by making mixed-use developments include industrial at-grade but no one is building it. And I guess it also depends on the industry as well because you couldn't have a coal or paint factory in a high-rise with residents or office workers .

If by industrial you (partly) mean warehouses, then Burnaby has been moving them to the Big Bend area (along the Fraser over from 22nd St Station) for years now. The 116 bus route was changed to travel right through there.

[Spr0ckets]

Originally Posted by cornholio

15 to 20 year build out in the current market is insane. They are restricting supply to increase prices which as a business is logical. However this negatively impacts the citizens and the city.

This being industrial land the city should rezone with the condition the build out is in 5 years for example and give heavy financial penalties for going over that time frame.

There is no reason to allow a community to face 20 years of construction when there is enough demand today to sell the entire community out in a year or two and build it in one mega project and still allow the developer to make a very good profit. Actually this is one problem we have in Vancouver, allowing developers create and market multiple communities at once and restrict supply to increase already good profits and drag out the build out for a few extra dollars. This is exactly where a government or a municipality needs to step in and get involved for the betterment of the community.

Anywhere else I have been and projects are 5-10-20 towers at once in one go. Be it Prague with little growth or Sao Paulo with lots of growth or anywhere else I am remotely familiar with outside of Canada the US and a few other commonwealthish countries.

That's not the reason large construction projects of this scale tend to be phased out and built in phases rather than all at once.

And frankly speaking, a lot of the stuff you're saying regarding how the city should "handle" this is ridiculous.
"Imposing penalties" for going over time limits and construction schedules?
Are you joking?


The primary reason large scale projects are phased out is typically financial resources and funding, as has been pointed out to you by other commenters.
That and the fact that no developer, city, or expert can predict with any satisfactory degree of accuracy how the market conditions will be 5 years from now, let alone 10 years, and with enough precision that you would be able to calculate your profit.

What if there's a Real Estate and Housing market crash next year like the one that hit the US and the Global market in 2008?
Then what?
What happens to your 5 year schedule with 10 towers? And does the city still charge your "penalty" when the project fails to complete or do they take a hit too?
No bank in their right mind is going to guarantee that kind of coverage or financing.

There are other factors that go into restricting the amount of construction you can get done within limited time frames (and indeed land areas), and since you're wondering why what you're suggesting is more common in other countries and not so much so in North America and other commonwealth countries, it might have something to do with the fact that we have tighter building regulations and bylaws and laws regulating what you can do and how - a lot of which tend to be lacking or substandard in other countries.

Vancouver is already tethering on the edge of a market correction (or possibly an outright crash) within the next several years - which any developer or real estate expert would be well aware of, to the degree that you'll probably not (or never) find a 10 tower project being green-lighted to go in all at once with no phasing as is standard.

[officedweller]

Good overall summary :

http://www.vancouvermarket.ca/2016/03/18...-more-highrises-than-vancouver-way-more/

[Infrequent Poster]

Originally Posted by officedweller

Good overall summary :

http://www.vancouvermarket.ca/2016/03/18...-more-highrises-than-vancouver-way-more/

Thanks for posting that. Was a good read, and confirms what I've felt for awhile. Burnaby is shitting all over Vancouver (people can take that however they want).

This part I found interesting "Onni’s Gilmore Station (rumored to include BC’s new tallest tower)" never heard that rumour before.

Another interesting quote "With the height and scale of these projects in Burnaby, it will be interesting to see what, if any response the City of Vancouver has while it struggles to create even modest height and density in increasingly expensive and largely unaffordable areas." (hopefully I'm allowed to post that)

Other then Vancouver house, there isnt much being built or coming up in Vancouver that I'm all that excited about. The scale of some of these developments in Burnaby are just on another level, in my opinion. I realize this is partly because they have the space to do so.

[Spork]

Originally Posted by Infrequent Poster

Other then Vancouver house, there isnt much being built or coming up in Vancouver that I'm all that excited about. The scale of some of these developments in Burnaby are just on another level, in my opinion. I realize this is partly because they have the space to do so.

City of Burnaby: 91 km^2
City of Vancouver: 115 km^2

Nope, just love for SFH within 5 minutes of DT.

[urbancanadian]

I saw that earlier today, and even though I'm a fan of David Taylor's website (check it almost every day), I'm going to have to poke some holes in the analysis. I'll just keep it to number of highrises for now because this took me longer than expected to cross-reference with my own numbers.

First, I'm not sure what metric he is using, but the numbers seem to be somewhat off. I'll quickly add in my own numbers.

BURNABY:

In Burnaby's case, he is very close (could be some differences in counting).

Brentwood:
Missing are 2285 Willingdon Avenue (Amacon), the two Amazing Brentwood Office towers, as well as an optional 13th tower (rez?) on the eastern portion of the site.
But, as he noted Aviara and Stratus are complete.
Total = 46 + 4 - 2 = 48

Metrotown:
Missing is 6661-6709 Marlborough Avenue (Polygon), and Bentall's rental tower at 4758 Grange Street/4769 Hazel Street.
As noted, the first Met and Station Square towers are complete.
Total = 27 + 2 - 2 = 27

Edmonds:
Unless I'm mistaken, LedMac is proposing 20 towers for Southgate, so you can add one there.
Total = 22 + 1 = 23

Lougheed
While not technically in a part of Lougheed Town Centre, Burnaby Mountain's Centreblock and The Peak are also not included.
Total = 23 + 2 = 25

So Burnaby's total number of highrises under construction or proposed would be: 123

VANCOUVER:

I'm not sure where he got his number of 68 from, so I did a quick count. There are 66+ highrises under construction or proposed in the Metro Core (Burrard Inlet-16th Avenue, Burrard Street-Clark Drive), so he could be counting that.

For the entire City of Vancouver, the number would be 114+ highrises under contruction of proposed. I only counted official proposals too so many more were omitted such as
the Post Office development, Nelson on the Park and NEFC. Also, even though the Plaza of Nations proposal is "official" I didn't count it since it's going to change too much.

(+) I use the + sign because the definition for a highrise can vary. I'm going by 12 floors/35 metres. There are a couple more that are right on the boundary.

COMPARISON:

Using the numbers above we get 114 for the City of Vancouver, to 123 for the City of Burnaby. Burnaby still "wins", but it is much closer than the numbers in the article. Nevertheless, Burnaby's numbers are very impressive, especially given the population differences (~650k to ~230k). On a per capita basis, Burnaby certainly competes with anywhere in North America. (Richmond is doing quite well too, with close to 70 upcoming, IIRC.)

One thing to consider with Burnaby though, is that it has some massive land parcels that are able to accomodate large numbers of towers in one big proposal. So while you have 23 towers proposed at Lougheed, it'll take Shape a while to build all that. We will see dozens more towers proposed and built before these developments are complete.

Vancouver obviously doesn't have much like that. The closest would be the Oakridge and Pearson developments. So again, there will be dozens of individual towers completed before Lougheed ever finishes. That doesn't even include Langara Gardens, Oakridge Transit Centre, River District, Waterfront HUB, SEFC West lands, and several more, all which will complete by the time Lougheed does the same.

Also, Vancouver currently has more than three times as many towers under construction as of right now, compared to Burnaby. So while what Burnaby is doing is very impressive, it's not like Vancouver is going to stop building highrises. I see a nice little rivalry developing!

[officedweller]

The aspect I like about Burnaby's growth is that it is targeted in its town centres around SkyTrain stations.

Vancouver's seems more ad hoc - depending on where there happens to be a historically consolidated parcel - what I call "opportunistic rezonings" - which can often be far from rapid transit.

[officedweller]

VnacouverMarket.ca reports that the first 2 towers at the SouthGate project (former Safeway distribution site) are set to proceed:


http://www.vancouvermarket.ca/2016/03/23...southgate-village-approved-for-rezoning/

The first two tower phases include:

“Precedence” (Gateway Neighbourhood)
◾a 32-storey apartment tower and 4-storey lowrise
◾351 units
◾94 one-bedrooms, 205 two-bedrooms, 16 three-bedrooms
◾tower height of 330.5 ft
◾401 underground parking spaces



“Southgate Community Island 1 & 2” (Island Neighbourhood)
◾a 30-storey tower and 4-storey lowrise
◾282 units
◾69 one-bedrooms, 207 two-bedrooms, 6 three-bedrooms
◾a small park
◾310 parking spaces

A new east-west public road will be built as part of this phase and will connect 18th Street to 12th Avenue.

http://www.vancouvermarket.ca/2016/03/23...southgate-village-approved-for-rezoning/

[scryer]

Amazing analysis urbancanadian!

I would just like to say that, from reading that article, I like how the article took the angle of giving Vancouver "a run for their money" in terms of development. Hopefully that will give our city a nice kick in the ass to start lifting complicated regulations that actually hinder Vancouver's growth.

Another point that you mentioned was that Burnaby has large parcels of land that Vancouver doesn't, to develop from and I totally agree. Which is also another reason to lift (or abolish) some of the ridiculous view-cone bylaws. If Vancouver doesn't really figure out how it wants to develop itself in the future, then some of these suburbs may be attracting major companies to their urban cores. Already we have Surrey trying to develop itself as a secondary office node, Burnaby is already doing it with some of these developments, and surprisingly Langley actually is trying to attract more office buildings as well. And they may be successful if Vancouver doesn't defend its "crown" and use its land more efficiently (read: densify).

[Vin]

Originally Posted by scryer

I do agree that the term "mixed use" needs to be more diverse. Does anyone know of any city planning strategies (for Metro Vancouver) in place to address the loss of industrial zoning? Because unless a strategy is put into place, later on down the road, we are going to suddenly see a huge cry for industrial zoning. Personally I think that this can be addressed by making mixed-use developments include industrial at-grade but no one is building it. And I guess it also depends on the industry as well because you couldn't have a coal or paint factory in a high-rise with residents or office workers .

Easy: Make Industrial zones high density: multiple factories, usually light industrial, stacked on top of one another.

[Aroundtheworld]

Originally Posted by officedweller

The aspect I like about Burnaby's growth is that it is targeted in its town centres around SkyTrain stations.

Vancouver's seems more ad hoc - depending on where there happens to be a historically consolidated parcel - what I call "opportunistic rezonings" - which can often be far from rapid transit.

Yeah, it definitely seems like Vancouver tries to avoid NIMBY backlash wherever possible. I see this is gradually changing though. I think we should start to see more development around 29th Avenue and Nanaimo. My former business partner lived near 29th and her place was bought out by a developer.