Thank you for this. That's what I thought too, a vacuous document with not much substance. If someone were to use this to decide where in the city they wanted to live (or move to to get away from all the new towers), there would be no guidance found here. This Plan entirely evades the whole point of zoning; zoning is necessary to let people decide what sort of neighbourhood they want to live in and with some assurance their neighbourhood would stay that way.
This document is so vague, even the maps contradict each other at least for my neighbourhood. I live within a block of Dunbar/Alma between Broadway and West 16th Avenue. The map on p. 39 shows that area as a neighbourhood center (I breathed a sigh of relief), while the map of p. 45 shows this same area as a Rapid Transit Area (not where I want to live).
All their aerial schematics of what each neighbourhood type will look like show a ton of green space in a three or four block area. We know that won't be left green, it'll be developed. To get that green space every few blocks, we'd have to demolish just about every existing building in the city!
This whole thing is just a license for city staff to put whatever they want wherever they want it. Very very dangerous!
"..seminal document. In order to evaluate the 150-page Plan it becomes necessary to eliminate the extraneous content.." -- Can Brian please minimize the words and for really simple people (and foreigners who need to look up words like 'seminal' and 'extraneous'). We need to REACH MORE people FASTER, MORE EFFICIENT, please. -- I read your post about 2x before and found that it requires GREAT PATIENCE to read and understand. I'm a detail oriented person and formed an impression that I can't spend the time to get into reading your posts. -- So, please keep them to BARE BONES and what's really priority. T.I.A.
The authors apparently are unaware that each community in Vancouver is different. I will bet that none of them has actually gone out, been in, and experienced these neighbourhoods.
It is a very complex issue - the need for homes vs 40-storey towers that eliminate our mountain and sea views and make us look and feel like any other over-populated city! Our beaches will be cut off by highrises; our mountains will too. The Burrard Inlet will be Tanker City, some of them towering the equivalent of 6 stories or more over the foolhardy sailboats that still dare to use the space. Forget gathering on the shore to watch fireworks - the oil slick on the water will make anything like that way too dangerous! And we'll be pushed onto small containers to make our transits around the city making an epidemic like covid back into a pandemic! We need an ARCHITECT on the City Council Brian!! Just saying....
I have a question about the map: To my eyes, some of the cream-colored 'multiplex areas' on the map include neighborhoods with Vancouver’s biggest mansions, including Shaughnessey and Dunbar-Southlands. Are these areas being protected from densification? If so, why? I live on a street with exclusively 4-story apartments, mostly renters some owners, and I am seeing it rezoned here for 12, 18, and 25-story buildings. Meanwhile, all the mansions around Granville between 16th and 33rd, for example, … they won't see new towers in their neighborhood? It looks to me like a lot of renters and condo owners are going to being squeezed - accused of NIMBYism if we speak out - while the ultra-rich enclaves are protected. I would love to be corrected if I'm wrong ...
Dazed and confused. I just started to take the city survey on the Vancouver Plan but was immediately struck by the intention to spread development and density all over the city rather than concentrating it along a few corridors. Doesn't the Broadway Plan exemplify what the Vancouver Plan says it doesn't want to do?
I read [most] of the Vancouver Plan and while I do NOT totally agree with you that their "big ideas" are not worthwhile (very confusing double negative but I could not come up with another way to express it), I DO agree that there is little to suggest that they will come to fruition. I do believe there is a way, but I do not see it in this plan. . My biggest take-away from this is more of the same. Transit nodes with buildings that nobody really wants to live in surrounded by areas that are a far cry from livable neighbourhoods.
I believe that your point about Paris and London is the essence of where we are going wrong in Vancouver. Those cities recognize that businesses need people to flourish. They also recognize that those people must be out and about, adding life to the neighbourhood, not concentrated in towers directly above transit so that there is no need to get out into the community. Finally, and most importantly, they realize that people want ground orientation - they may think they like to live in a box 30 stories above the city with a view, but, as you say, studies show that this is the least sustainable or desirable residential typology - AND THERE ARE BETTER WAYS TO ACHIEVE THIS!
The question is, how does one get from the single family neighbourhoods of Vancouver that once were sustainable to the Europeon model? Those cities have the luxury of centuries of growth... transit going through many stages...streetcars to busses to trollies to subways to combinations of all of the above...housing going from low density to mid to higher...Vancouver wants to somehow jump from where we are mostly at to where we need to get to, and most occupants of such neighbourhoods are not ready for such change - they do not even want 4-storey buildings on their streets.
So, I am hoping that the answer lies in discourse like this, maybe in the people on a team like "team", or maybe by getting people with like ideas to come together. I know that neighbourhoods like Kitsilano, Mount Pleasant and others can all be very livable with housing designed in a way that adheres to established livable principles. One thing I do know is that the answer is not Brentwood or Oakridge or even Cambie St (although Cambie is a step closer).
Thank you for this. That's what I thought too, a vacuous document with not much substance. If someone were to use this to decide where in the city they wanted to live (or move to to get away from all the new towers), there would be no guidance found here. This Plan entirely evades the whole point of zoning; zoning is necessary to let people decide what sort of neighbourhood they want to live in and with some assurance their neighbourhood would stay that way.
This document is so vague, even the maps contradict each other at least for my neighbourhood. I live within a block of Dunbar/Alma between Broadway and West 16th Avenue. The map on p. 39 shows that area as a neighbourhood center (I breathed a sigh of relief), while the map of p. 45 shows this same area as a Rapid Transit Area (not where I want to live).
All their aerial schematics of what each neighbourhood type will look like show a ton of green space in a three or four block area. We know that won't be left green, it'll be developed. To get that green space every few blocks, we'd have to demolish just about every existing building in the city!
This whole thing is just a license for city staff to put whatever they want wherever they want it. Very very dangerous!
You need to put your material onto YouTube coz it's too slow to read and keep an overview otherwise. Thanks in Advance
"..seminal document. In order to evaluate the 150-page Plan it becomes necessary to eliminate the extraneous content.." -- Can Brian please minimize the words and for really simple people (and foreigners who need to look up words like 'seminal' and 'extraneous'). We need to REACH MORE people FASTER, MORE EFFICIENT, please. -- I read your post about 2x before and found that it requires GREAT PATIENCE to read and understand. I'm a detail oriented person and formed an impression that I can't spend the time to get into reading your posts. -- So, please keep them to BARE BONES and what's really priority. T.I.A.
The authors apparently are unaware that each community in Vancouver is different. I will bet that none of them has actually gone out, been in, and experienced these neighbourhoods.
It is a very complex issue - the need for homes vs 40-storey towers that eliminate our mountain and sea views and make us look and feel like any other over-populated city! Our beaches will be cut off by highrises; our mountains will too. The Burrard Inlet will be Tanker City, some of them towering the equivalent of 6 stories or more over the foolhardy sailboats that still dare to use the space. Forget gathering on the shore to watch fireworks - the oil slick on the water will make anything like that way too dangerous! And we'll be pushed onto small containers to make our transits around the city making an epidemic like covid back into a pandemic! We need an ARCHITECT on the City Council Brian!! Just saying....
Thank you for doing this work, Brian Palmquist.
I have a question about the map: To my eyes, some of the cream-colored 'multiplex areas' on the map include neighborhoods with Vancouver’s biggest mansions, including Shaughnessey and Dunbar-Southlands. Are these areas being protected from densification? If so, why? I live on a street with exclusively 4-story apartments, mostly renters some owners, and I am seeing it rezoned here for 12, 18, and 25-story buildings. Meanwhile, all the mansions around Granville between 16th and 33rd, for example, … they won't see new towers in their neighborhood? It looks to me like a lot of renters and condo owners are going to being squeezed - accused of NIMBYism if we speak out - while the ultra-rich enclaves are protected. I would love to be corrected if I'm wrong ...
Dazed and confused. I just started to take the city survey on the Vancouver Plan but was immediately struck by the intention to spread development and density all over the city rather than concentrating it along a few corridors. Doesn't the Broadway Plan exemplify what the Vancouver Plan says it doesn't want to do?
I read [most] of the Vancouver Plan and while I do NOT totally agree with you that their "big ideas" are not worthwhile (very confusing double negative but I could not come up with another way to express it), I DO agree that there is little to suggest that they will come to fruition. I do believe there is a way, but I do not see it in this plan. . My biggest take-away from this is more of the same. Transit nodes with buildings that nobody really wants to live in surrounded by areas that are a far cry from livable neighbourhoods.
I believe that your point about Paris and London is the essence of where we are going wrong in Vancouver. Those cities recognize that businesses need people to flourish. They also recognize that those people must be out and about, adding life to the neighbourhood, not concentrated in towers directly above transit so that there is no need to get out into the community. Finally, and most importantly, they realize that people want ground orientation - they may think they like to live in a box 30 stories above the city with a view, but, as you say, studies show that this is the least sustainable or desirable residential typology - AND THERE ARE BETTER WAYS TO ACHIEVE THIS!
The question is, how does one get from the single family neighbourhoods of Vancouver that once were sustainable to the Europeon model? Those cities have the luxury of centuries of growth... transit going through many stages...streetcars to busses to trollies to subways to combinations of all of the above...housing going from low density to mid to higher...Vancouver wants to somehow jump from where we are mostly at to where we need to get to, and most occupants of such neighbourhoods are not ready for such change - they do not even want 4-storey buildings on their streets.
So, I am hoping that the answer lies in discourse like this, maybe in the people on a team like "team", or maybe by getting people with like ideas to come together. I know that neighbourhoods like Kitsilano, Mount Pleasant and others can all be very livable with housing designed in a way that adheres to established livable principles. One thing I do know is that the answer is not Brentwood or Oakridge or even Cambie St (although Cambie is a step closer).