From a Reddit discussion. Spot the difference: shadows on sidewalks at the equinox. This is one reason why getting new rentals built takes years of bureaucracy.
Someone responded to the post:
Yeah let's just stop thinking about impacts of stuff. That will turn out okay. God forbid we actually try and do things well.
It's a question of priorities.
We have people who want to live and work here, and other people who want to build housing for them. The problem is, we regulate new housing like it's a nuclear power plant, and we tax it like it's a gold mine.
Land in Metro Vancouver is both scarce and underused. It's underused because it takes so damn long to get approval to build. And it takes so long because there's a million regulatory requirements that are all more important than new housing. If any of them aren't met, the projects cannot proceed. An example.
This isn't a question of fire safety and building code - that's entirely separate. This is primarily about aesthetics. Some examples:
Urban design panel
Form and massing (i.e. making a building look like two smaller buildings)
Public realm
Neighbourhood character
Height and density limits
Shadows are bad
Shade is good, trees must be protected
View cones
And then we wonder why housing is so scarce and expensive, resulting in younger people being crushed and driven out of Metro Vancouver by housing costs, and the healthcare system under increasing strain because hospitals can't hire nurses and doctors.
It's like Vancouver is turning into an increasingly fancy, increasingly expensive country club.
A common prioritization rule of thumb: assign a priority of A, B, or C to each item. Housing should be priority A. Right now it's below C.
Someone else asked:
Interesting idea with a ranking system. How would you rate the importance of things that make Vancouver attractive to live in? And in what order would you sacrifice them in the name of density?
Good question. If I had to prioritize, I'd say something like this:
A - housing (housing scarcity is making us all poorer, it's a terrible situation)
A - water/sewer infrastructure (should be planned proactively instead of on a site-by-site basis)
A - transportation
A - schools
A - site coverage and impermeable area coverage (affects stormwater runoff)
B - view cones (based on Reddit feedback)
B - public realm, specifically pathways open to the public
C - urban design panel
C - form and massing
C - neighbourhood character
C - shadows
C - trees (allow them to be replaced rather than requiring them to be preserved)
C - public art requirements
C - setbacks
For the A priorities, like water/sewer infrastructure, transportation, and schools, we should be planning them proactively, instead of doing it piecemeal as individual sites are redeveloped. (On King Edward, there's bike path segments that aren't connected to anything - they only exist because a project happened and the city could require the project to put a bike path segment in front of it.)
Regarding height and density limits, my general view is that the city of Vancouver should allow small apartment buildings everywhere (at least as much as the city of Burnaby's four floors and 50% site coverage), and it should allow high-rises to be somewhat taller. When people are building right up to the regulatory limits, the limits are too tight.
The current requirements for front and side setbacks don't make much sense to me. I think it'd be better to allow for relatively small front setbacks (front lawns are rarely used) and more outdoor space at the back or in the middle (courtyard style).
More
Port Moody decided to disband its advisory design panel in March 2024.
A comment from Oh the Urbanity!: “Aesthetics should be secondary to providing enough housing. Some of the most charged language (‘soul-sucking ugliness’, ‘dystopian development’) reinforces the idea that the main purpose of housing is to look a certain way.”
Utah Code 10-9a-534 prohibits municipalities from regulating building design elements for one- and two-family dwellings (with some exceptions for historic areas), including the following:
(a) exterior color;
(b) type or style of exterior cladding material;
(c) style, dimensions, or materials of a roof structure, roof pitch, or porch;
(d) exterior nonstructural architectural ornamentation;
(e) location, design, placement, or architectural styling of a window or door;
(f) location, design, placement, or architectural styling of a garage door, not including a rear-loading garage door;
(g) number or type of rooms;
(h) interior layout of a room;
(i) minimum square footage over 1,000 square feet, not including a garage;
(j) rear yard landscaping requirements;
(k) minimum building dimensions; or
(l) a requirement to install front yard fencing.
This was picked up as a recommendation in the October 2022 report from the Montana housing task force.
Vancouver's planning department has a long internal document of unofficial design rules, what's it called again? I wanna say "Book of Porches" but my memory's bad.
It’s a 44-page document called the “Big Book of Porches and Decks,” with so many rules that they have to be listed alphabetically. It was released in February 2022, in response to a Freedom of Information request.
Make it make sense. All in one morning, I read Douglas Todd in the Sun, saying that developers are getting away with murder on Broadway, no requirements for nice streetscapes, parks, open spaces, etc - going to be a dark forest of towers, "like Metrotown".
Then I come here and read nobody can build because of all the requirements.
Do small-building developers need to band together into some sort of powerful lobby, like the Broadway guys presumably put together?
Thanks again. Good read. I agree we need to prioritize the outcomes. I think if view comes and shadowing are indeed the priority A outcomes, then city should be allowing density in more places. The TOA policy was a missed opportunity to do so.