Selling off School Lands while Welcoming the World

City Conversation #108: apparently folks moving to Vancouver won’t have kids—just like in False Creek!

School capacity in Vancouver—the blue bars are what VSB says will be available in 2032, the orange is what we may need if we build just what’s currently planned

I was pondering the Vancouver School Board’s (VSB) upcoming deliberations around closure and possible sale of the Queen Elizabeth Annex (QEA) lands at their April 5^th meeting at 7pm—the first of an unknown number of  “surplus” school sites that may be sold or leased over the next while—I can’t be more accurate because VSB’s 2022-4 Land Asset Strategy has redacted the list:

Excerpt from Table of Contents of VSB Land Asset Strategy

The strategy document does allude to as many as 40 sites that it identified as surplus to VSB’s needs, but none are identified in detail.

I will be speaking at the April 5^th meeting via VSB’s Teams software. You should be, too, as the potential sale of QEA school and other lands is breathtakingly backward looking. Let me explain:

Using VSB’s own historic data, wherein 5.6% of Vancouver residents are school age children, I constructed the simple bar chart at the top of this post. The blue bars represent VSB’s current projected excess student capacity nine years from now, in 2032—that’s how many seats in schools that they suggest will not be filled by students—VSB claims 11,693 such empty seats as partial justification for disposing of school lands. But that number and these modest blue bars are based on history—who’s come and gone in the recent and more distant past.

“Wait a minute!” you (hopefully) say, “What about the impacts of all the new plans hatched by city staff and Council over the past decade? Are Council and VSB not talking? Aren’t they from the same (ABC) party?”

Once Again, the Numbers

You would be right in your questioning. As some of you may know, I have been collecting data about spot rezonings starting from 2018 (434 to date, mid and high-rises planned all over the city), as well as Area Plans (think Jericho Lands, Skeena Terrace, etc.) and, of course, the biggest kids in the sandbox, the Broadway Plan and Vancouver Plan. The numbers ebb and flow (mostly flow) currently stand at 125,000+—that’s homes, not kids. Add up the four right hand columns below:

Homes and student data as of today

Now multiply that 125,000+ times 2.2 people per home, the Stats Can average for Vancouver, then again times the 5.6% of those people who are historically school aged children and you get 15,405 additional students by 2032. VSB staff have stated in their analyses that only 3% of the folks in the Broadway Plan will be school age, barely half of our history—no explanation but an interesting indicator.

I track all these proposed developments by neighbourhood, so it was easy, if frightening, to add into the chart the orange bars representing the distribution of the children of these 125,000+ around the city’s neighbourhoods. For the data geeks:

2032 Numbers by the Neighbourhoods—red means not enough space in half the neighbourhoods

Lest you look at your own neighbourhood, for example Dunbar, where QEA is located, and see an apparent surplus of spaces in 2032, please note:

• Overall, the deficit is at least 3,712, that is, almost 1/3 less spaces than will be needed.

• As a more specific example related to QEA, VSB forecasts declines in enrolment at both Queen Mary Elementary and Lord Byng High School through 2032—elsewhere these are identified as the schools that will service the Jericho Lands with their (minimum) 8,000 homes.

• Recent school placement history (e.g., False Creek North, Olympic Village) has parents driving their kids to other neighbourhood schools when theirs are full (if they exist—sorry, Olympic Village)—think West Point Grey driving to Dunbar, Downtown and West End to Strathcona and Grandview-Woodlands, Kitsilano to Arbutus Ridge, etc.

My critics will be quick to point out that my 125,000+ includes the full buildout of the Broadway Plan and all those Area Plans, whereas VSB projections only go to 2032—and you would be correct. But given City Council’s recent Let ‘er rip decision about no pace of change constraints for the Broadway Plan, I am confident making these observations:

• The 125,000+ already include more than 31% (38,982 homes) just in spot rezonings. I am sure their proponents look to a +/-10-year buildout, that is, by 2032.

• More spot rezonings outside of the Broadway Plan area appear at city hall each month—they have accounted for 7,500+ additional new homes proposed in each of the past four years that I have been tracking—that’s 900+ students per year, pretty close to the provincial government’s forecast of 1,000 more students for each of the next forecast years. Yes, VSB and the province are 12,500 students apart in their estimates! Despite city staff admitting there have been more Broadway Plan inquiries (90+) than the entire city usually gets in a year (70+) I have not added more than what’s current, so my numbers are conservative.

• The Vancouver Plan (VP) benefits from city staff’s lack of clarity—many refer to it as a “plan to make a plan.” Okay, I’ll play that game and just limit the VP outcome by 2032 to: laneway homes, duplexes and secondary suites at current rates of development; and formless RR zone rental buildings, which comprise a rising percentage of rezoning applications since the 2022 election. The VP calls for way more than that, so my numbers are again very conservative.

I think this is the moment where YIMBYs and other “Build it and they will come” apologists say, “There won’t be any kids in those mid and high-rises.”

Sadly, History Repeats

Funny thing—that’s what VSB said when False Creek North (FCN, a.k.a. Concord Pacific/ Expo lands) was approved. I was the Managing Architect for that project, sat through many meetings where VSB said with a straight face that there would be no kids in FCN. Vancouver’s planning staff of the day were aghast at this attitude, and the developer simply said, “We will provide school sites and pay for the school construction whenever you are ready.” Which they did. And to this day, due to VSB’s under estimating, parents in FCN line up overnight every year to try to enrol their children in the too-small schools that VSB didn’t want to build.

By the way, the current plans for the Jericho Lands and the Broadway Plan include no land set aside for any schools. Period. So maybe we should think more about the wisdom of selling the school lands we have in hand, lest we have to buy them back in future at market prices.

VSB has apparently targeted a redacted number of sites they own, including QEA, for sale. If they proceed with that agenda, I can guarantee that there will be not hundreds, but thousands of parents lining up in at least half of the city’s neighbourhoods (per the chart above), desperate to enrol their children in public schools.

Perhaps “Build it and they will come” should be replaced at VSB and in Vancouver with “Sell it and they will go elsewhere.” Families with children, that is.

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If you wish to speak at the April 5^th VSB meeting about this issue, you have until tomorrow to sign up by emailing engage@vsb.bc.ca and dgreen@vsb.bc.ca . For some reason you need to include both email addresses. VSB advises, “Please include your name and a copy of the brief and/or presentation you intend to make. Requests must be received (preferably electronically) by April 3 at 4:30pm. As per standard delegation practice, all delegates will have five minutes to present to the Board.”

I read and respond to all comments, also capturing them to relevant neighbourhood files for more detailed future conversations. 

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Brian Palmquist is a Vancouver-based architect, building envelope and building code consultant and LEED Accredited Professional (the first green building system). He is semi-retired for the moment, still teaching, writing and consulting a bit, but not beholden to any client or city hall. These conversations mix real discussion with research and observations based on a 45+ year career including the planning, design and construction of almost every type and scale of project, including schools. He is the author of the Amazon best seller “An Architect’s Guide to Construction.” and working on a book about how we can accommodate a growing population in the Vancouver we love.