The Missing Middle Housing Plan

By admin | 2023-09-04

The Sept. 14 Public Hearing is fast approaching with only 11 days left to get the word out.

People will be getting back from summer break without any idea that most of the city is about to be rezoned.

Here are reference materials and information on how to participate in the public hearing.

There are many issues with the proposed RS rezoning that negatively affects livability, sustainability, and affordability. Some examples are:

Lack of neighbourhood planning and meaningful stakeholder involvement limited to developers interested in building new multiplexes.
These rezoning changes are just the beginning, with staff indicating the next steps will be to apply similar changes and consolidation of all RT zones citywide.
no required on-site parking that puts more pressure on street parking and undermines the shift to electric vehicles with no place to park for charging
loss of trees and green space, both onsite and for street trees due to reduced front yards that impacts street tree roots
lack of infrastructure to serve growth including sewers, water supply, electrical grid, schools, daycare, community centres, recreation facilities, medical services, social services, etc.
impacts of new requirements for onsite underground water holding tanks and electrical transformers (PMT) required for an onsite 12 ft x 12 ft easement on each lot to mitigate lack of infrastructure
loss of affordable secondary suites through demolition, and with no requirement to have a suite with a new single family house
no design guidelines for development quality and contextual design
development pressures on land affordability and lack of affordability of new units not much if any less than the original units demolished.
This proposed plan will undermine character house and heritage building retention incentives and should be revised to be equal to or greater than new construction to be an incentive.
Properties listed on the Vancouver Heritage Register should be exempt from multiplexes, and instead have viable incentives for increasing density and multifamily through retention options.
For character house retention, with a renovated addition or suite, density is reduced from the current 0.75 to proposed 0.65
Character houses with infill only are at 0.85 while multiplexes are proposed at 1.0 FSR.