Vancouver looks at new housing options in single-family neighbourhoods
City looks at adding homes to single-family neighbourhoods
Dan Fumano
The Province
Vast areas of Vancouver dominated by single-family houses could soon be opened up for different kinds of housing, including more duplexes and laneway houses, the mayor’s office announced Thursday.
Next week, Vancouver’s chief planner Gil Kelley will present options to city council that could potentially bring thousands of new homes into low-density neighbourhoods such as Dunbar and Kerrisdale.
The proposed changes, following months of consultation, are meant to increase the number of housing options geared to renters earning $30,000 to $80,000 a year, and couples and families earning between roughly $80,000, and $150,000.
“I am hearing loud and clear that affordability remains residents’ top concern,” Mayor Gregor Robertson said in a written statement. “These proposed changes from city staff respond to the desire for people to have more housing options in single-family neighbourhoods — neighbourhoods where they currently cannot afford to live.”
Anne McMullin, CEO of the Urban Development Institute, said even though the proposal won’t add a huge number of housing units, it represents a symbolically significant step.
“Single-family home neighbourhoods have been sort of sacred or untouchable, so we really need to have better use of our land,” McMullin said. “That’s where the difficulty has been, it’s not that we don’t have the land, it’s the zoning. So we’ve been building on 15 to 20 per cent of the land base. So symbolically, this is a very significant first step.”
But some observers were discouraged the proposals didn’t go further.
Adrian Crook, a co-founder of Abundant Housing, a non-profit group started last year by Vancouverites seeking to advocate for more housing, said he’d like to see those single-family neighbourhoods opened up for four- to six-storey apartment buildings, not just duplexes and laneway houses.
“The city seems to have chosen laneway housing, which is a very expensive housing form,” he said. “If you go on Craigslist right now, laneway houses rent for $3,000 and $4,000 and up … I know they’re sensitive to property value issues and the single-family homeowner voting base, but we need a bigger move.”
Reports will go to city council next week, and are expected to be referred to public hearing in the fall.
© 2017 Postmedia Network Inc.