Stephen Rees’s blog

The Province

“The Fraser Valley is sitting on probably the best agricultural land in Canada, and perhaps even in North America,” says David Hull, Abbotsford Chamber of Commerce’s executive director.

“Now we’re worried that some of these lands are being taken out of food production.”

One of the primary threats to the Valley’s productive agricultural land base comes inadvertently from the so-called “gentlemen farmers,” Hull explains.

Many smaller farms in the region — especially in the Abbotsford area — are bought by well-heeled individuals who subsequently build very large homes, swimming pools, tennis courts, and so on, on the properties, thus converting them into country estates.

This practice is not confined to Abbotsford. It is very evident in Richmond. On No 3 Road south of the Steveston Highway there are now several of these. One built a few years ago now hosts an annual horse show. Not that there is anything wrong with that but it is no longer land in use for food production. Fields in the same general area produce a variety of crops including soft fruit and green vegetables. Indeed one of the great benefits of living in Richmond is that the variety of dark leafy greens (which as you know are very important to human health and must be consumed soon after harvesting) available is much greater than the standard supermarket fare. Usually the choice is spinach, broccoli or kale - but we see at least half a dozen types of choy alone.

Another was under construction when I was employed by StatsCan on the 2006 Census preparation. It looked to me like a very large development, so I was obliged to go onto the building site, to determine if it would be occupied on census day and how many forms would be needed. Just one, but no it would not be occupied as the construction schedule was for nearly a year. If it had been ready by census day I would have to have probed about the servant’s quarters, but that was not necessary. I was tempted recently to take its picture as I cycled past but I was deterred by the presence of someone trying to look like a gardener.

Like the house next door it is now concealed from casual passers by. And not only are there automatic gates but an array of cctv cameras.

Another one on No 4 Road has a drive which curves at 90°, so the approach to the house is behind not one but two rows of cedar trees, which will eventually fill in to make impenetrable 10′ hedges, but between them runs a substantial fence. There is less security at federal prisons.

As the Province article notes, no one can force you to farm your land. Indeed even though permissions to build churches, temples, gudwaras, mosques and schools along the east side of No 5 road was conditional upon the land at the back, along the freeway, being used to grow food, there is very little actual cultivation going on. I can even recall applicants explaining to Richmond Council that Buddhist monks, being vegetarian, would be growing much of their own food for the monastery associated with the temple. From what I can see, most of the land is actually used as a parking lot.

This is the difference between the intention and the letter of the law. “Agricultural Land Reserve” does not actually mean retention of land for agriculture and the production of food . As we have also seen in Delta, it also does not mean preservation of soils and open land. And anyway short term political considerations always trump long term sustainability - and that is not confined to the ALR either.

It might be easier to take if the provincial government did not keeping banging on about how green it is.

Sun

This is in the Business section

The newest store lies in the heart of a Cambie corridor that’s experiencing a massive retail transformation, with new stores like Best Buy, Home Depot and Whole Foods open or about to open soon.

Store manager Bruce Brown said the 42,398-square-foot outlet will be a “full-size, full-scale, full-service” grocery store.

“It’s a true Save-On-Foods store, not a boutique store,” he said in an interview. “Our consumers can come here and do a primary shop — fill their baskets with whatever they need in their household.”

It is actually Cambie and 7th so it is some way north of the area that had really got everyone’s attention “Cambie Village” which is up in the teens. Now I do not pretend to know much about this area and what is happening there. But at first reading these stores do not seem to me to be the sort of places you pop into on your way home from the transit station. Home Depot and Save On in my experience are car oriented retailers - at least the ones I have used. And I would expect that they will be very attractive to the car owners within the 20 minute “isochrone” (drive time) that I used to draw on maps back when I did retail impact analyses many years ago in another city. Mind you, back then a store half this size was a “superstore”.

Fortunately we do have a number of regular commenters now, and I look forward to reading their reactions, but I must start out with my guess that this area will not be much like TOD as I know it

Brown said all the new residential developments nearby ensures a lot of people will walk to the store while it’s proximity to the Canada Line — with a station about two blocks away — will also attract more business.

“Also” - in other words people who walk in are a bonus - it’s the drivers they really want!

UPDATE April 1 2008

The development has a number of retailers - including Home Depot - and housing on the top. Mixed use is a Good Thing - but is this too much of a Good Thing? I also blogged about this on the Metblog.

Georgia Strait

 Herbert has argued for years that TIF offers TransLink a way to obtain billions of dollars in transportation funding without imposing parking taxes or jacking up homeowners’ property taxes.

“It’s not adding a new tax,” he said. “It’s taking an existing tax, which grows naturally, and dedicating that growth to TransLink. The only disadvantage is that it requires politicians to agree that they’re going to take that increment and dedicate it to transit.”

There are not many politicians who like dedicating future taxes. It looks like a “hostage to fortune”. Dedicated gas taxes are used in the United States to fund transportation - initially it was only interstate highways but the disadvantages of that became apparent soon enough. And now it look slike gas tax will have to be replaced as a source of revenue much sooner than anticipated.

If you go to the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy we page you will find 34 papers on TIF. It seems to me that the jury is still out on this technique. In my opinion politicians will always feel that future increases in revenue should be theirs to divvy up as they see fit - not be bound by the priorities of earlier administrations. And I seem to recall many municipal assurances  at reassessment time that simple increments in valuation did not mean that property owners were obliged to pay more tax.

Vancouver Sun

This is a new power that previous transit providers here did not have. In fact, neither GVTA nor BC Transit were very much involved in the rail rapid transit projects. There was always a special agency created by the province, and their interest stopped at the “dripline of the station house”. About all the transit provider had the resources to do was put in a bus loop. And the bus loops of this region are some of the dreariest places on earth, as anyone who has missed the bus at Phibbs Exchange or Ladner can testify. Deliberately set apart from other development to limit the impact of those nasty noisy buses on sensitive ears, they are as far from desirable urban places as I can imagine.

The other thing that I think I have mentioned before was the completely misleading knowledge that the head of security brought back from a visit to Paris, where his fellow cops convinced him that allowing shops and cafés in the metro had just given the pickpockets an easier life. Which SkyTrain management took on board without any kind of critical analysis and is why there were so few facilties in the Expo line stations. Or any transit facility come to that.

I would hope that they get some good real estate people in who understand placemaking - which may not be the same thing as maximum revenue generation. Transit Oriented Development does need to happen, but it will not be like the MTR in Hong Kong. No-one is going to allow a high rise office building on the top of 29th Avenue Station. The BCTel “boot” was dropped down next to the anticipated Boundary Road station which never happened. The MTR had to acquire land in order to build its system. Ours is already in place - and as the piece points out, opportunities missed. About the only good example I can think of is Broadway and Commercial. And what is there now on the north side of Broadway is supposed to be just the start

Buying land now is not going to be cheap - and some developers are beginning to see opportunties. There was one developer who tried to do the right thing at Gateway Station in Surrey - but it has taken a long time for that area to take off commercially, for a wide variety of reasons. And more office towers were planned at Metrotown, but Burnaby decided to allow office parks, which killed that idea.

So it is fine for the new improved Translink to exercise its new powers, but talk to the local municipalities first and ensure they understand what is needed to support TOD. It is not something that a developer can do against the tide. And it will need partners with deep pockets and a very long term view of returns on capital employed. This is by no means a quick fix for an $18m revenue shortfall!

And there is also a thoughtful opinion piece by Pete McMartin which quotes both the conversation yesterday with the Sun editorial board and Jane Jacobs.

Miro Cernetig talks to Larry Beasely

The ostensible reason for the article is that we have moved up another of those best city lists.

These rankings take our attention off the question that’s really at hand: With a million more people expected to be here by 2030, how are we going to stay on the cutting edge of urban planning that’s put us in the livability big leagues?

Larry of course is building not one but two cities in the dessert of Abu Dhabi and

“I’m learning we’re not as far ahead on some of this stuff as I thought we were,” he says.

Which is refreshing. The problem with these rankings is they have gone to our head - or at least to the collective heads of the planners. And upstart furriners like me who keep saying “The Emperor has no clothes” are simply not listened to. But Larry, with his OC and new perspective will be.

The trouble I have is that they think it is about buildings and especially cultural institutions. Which seems to me to reflect the priorities of Marie Antoinnette.

There are some very basic things we need to be doing - and architects are not going to be the most important component of that, neither are the problems or their solutions the exclusive domain of the City of Vancouver. No doubt working for a Crown Prince with few budget constraints is a heck of a lot easier than herding cats, but in a metropolitan area being run (and ruined) by the province, that is what has to be done.

For starters, there is the problem of housing, and the related issues of mental health and welfare. These are basic social problems - and in my mind the quality of society is measured not by its glitzy buildings or cultural institutions, but by the way it treats its most vulnerable citizens. And right now the only thing that seems to be grabbing our attention is how to conceal the extent of our social policy collapse during the weeks of and around the 2010 Olympics. Lack of affordability of homes to buy is actually the least of it. We are supposed to have free at the point of service for public health, yet people with multiple diagnoses are simply turned away from treatment. We shy away from creating more and better public spaces for fear that the homeless will move in. We cannot buy a decent bus shelter or bench in case somebody finds it a better place to sleep than a doorway. And instead of building more public housing, we simply buy up a few more roach infested SROs, and do a half hearted job of trying to clean them up, displacing more people in the process. And actually destroying some of the best public housing we have, and rebuilding it to provide more marketable homes!

It is not the buildings that are the problem. They simply reflect what we are willing to pay for. And the answer here at present seem to be not much since the land costs so much. But it is the spaces in between the buildings that matter - and in the words of that tired old cliché we have private affluence and public squalor. We devote more space to car parking than almost any other activity. Our streets may be broad, but the sidewalks are mean. And public places where people gather are few and inadequate. And we concentrate on Vancouver - and especially downtown - as if that were the only place worth considering.

And I haven’t even started on our infrastructure. “World class” cities surely need good waste disposal (liquid and solid) as well as reasonable movement alternatives for goods as well as people.

Oddly enough there is no need to “push the envelope” with any of this, the solutions have been around for decades. We have just turned our back on them in our obsession with finance and profitability, as if that is the only way to measure worth. How can we boast of our GDP per capita - when so many of those heads have no pillow?

but not much more. There was supposed to have been a public meeting this week. It is reported extensively in both the Richmond News and Richmond Review. Basically nothing happened. The City of Richmond and its partners in development are really not at all interested in hearing what anyone else wants to say. So, as usual, they tried hard not to have to listen.

You would not think it was election year, would you? Expressing open contempt for voters is not, in my opinion, a way to endear yourself to them. But the Mayor and Council cannot see beyond the temptation to be property developers. I am afraid that a great deal of the coverage and the letters are a bit intemperate, but I am not surprised. This “process” is deeply flawed, and appears to be incapable of resolving any of the issues that have been raised in any satisfactory fashion.

I am glad I decided I had better things to do than go to this event.

Douglas Farr Public Lecture

Tuesday, March 11, 7:30 pm SFU Harbour Centre

Streaming video

Doug Farr is a pivotal figure in sustainability today, leading and practicing at the crossroads of urbanism and green building. His firm, Farr Associates, holds the global distinction of being the first and only firm to design three LEED Platinum buildings.

At the same time, he has served as Chair of the LEED Neighborhood Development Core Committee, leading the development of sustainable performance metrics for urban development.

His new book, Sustainable Urbanism: Urban Design with Nature, is a leading text on enhancing the sustainability of urbanism and his lectures are essential to understanding the pending sustainability convergence.

Doug Farr talked about integrating sustainable urbanism and agriculture on the urban edge. Having evaluated the sustainability of East Fraserlands, a project along Vancouver’s river edge planned by DPZ, Farr has been commissioned by Century Group (this evening’s sponsor) to consider opportunities for sustainable solutions at the suburban/rural edge in the Southlands of Tsawwassen.

Doug Farr is a Chicago architect. The mission of his practice is to design sustainable human environments. He has been closely involved in the leadership in to create LEED ND. Some of their developments include Lake Pulaski Transit Oriented Development (TOD) 1998 on the west side of Chicago. In 1999 they produced the first LEED platinum building, the Chicago Centre for Green Technology. “Urbanism did not come up at all in the first LEED standards” and there was no mention of building around transit. It was basically a systems integration approach – heating, lighting ,waste water and so on. Most clients really did not see the need: for instance at Orland Park TOD they were told to “remove the green stuff”.

Minneapolis at 46th & Hiawatha, a development relayed to a new LRT system there was a fight over density. Initially buildings had to be 1½ storeys, but after discussion it was agreed that four storeys could be accepted and an extra storey could be added if it was a green building. In Normal, Illinois he produced an Uptown development around a traffic circle: the area within the circle was used for stormwater detention, all the buildings were LEED certified.

LEED ND means “LEED for Neighborhood Development”. It is based on the observation of how much Americans drive and how far, for example, fresh produce has to travel to market: 1,500 miles on average. Children of middle class white families in up scale California developments spend 89% of their time indoors, or in vehicles.

He was sharply critical of Al Gore’s recommendations for action at the end of “An Inconvenient Truth”. He thought that Gore had“punted” the issue of transportation. What he wrote was not a mandate: that means “if the bus hits you, get on it”. By not directly tackling land use and transportation he had missed the single biggest greenhouse gas issue. We have seen in recent years the “tragic irony of efficiency” - per capita vehicle miles travelled had increased 5% which more than offset any gains due to Corporate Average Fuel Efficiency (CAFE) standards imposed on the automobile industry by the US government. At the same time average dwelling size grew 60% (from 1970-2005) but household size in the same period was declining. The Environmental Building News pointed out that even at present practices, transport to and from an office building uses 30% more energy than the building itself: and if that bldg meets LEED standards that rises to 130%.

The pillars of sustainability were set down in April 1996 when the 10 principles of Smart Growth were agreed. These can be grouped under four headings:

settle in the right location, create compact places, offer more choice and a fair transparent process.

In Atlanta, GA the average distance people drive is 35miles per day. But that is very heavily weighted by the suburbs. In the city centre residents driving distances average less than 10 miles.

The Charter of New Urbanism (also 1996) co-evolved with transit. The US Green Building Council was also formed in that year. All these institutions have become “Silos of Sustainability” promoting half measures, and each devalues the work of others. Conservation or LID development concentrates on issues like storm water and native plantings. He showed an image of an Arby’s at a suburban intersection. This could be a LEED Platinum Eligible building: “a unwalkable fatty food shack”. He also had an advert for a green building that proved hard to let that now offers free parking. He also took a swipe at Seaside – the first New Urbanist development. There the air conditioning condensers rust out every 5 years due to the sea air and the buildings also have to be painted every five years. The a/c units are located in between the buildings. This means that as soon as anyone turns one on, the house next door has to shut its windows to keep out the noise, and turn on its on a/c … and so on.

“We need to evolve to sustainable urbanism”. This has to be based on neighbourhoods that are walkable and have transit service. We need to establish relevant “weights and measures”. This what LEED ND does: its determines what where and how. A smart location is a pre-requisite: it is usually infill or adjacent to existing transit. On exception in the urban edge is where there is to be a projected transit extension. Land stewardship is central to the concept expressed as the neighbourhood pattern and design. No gated communities are permitted and the minimum density is 7 units per net acre (the US average now is 2). It is also includes erosion control and similar protection for water courses.

It is expected that there will be zoning code version, but so far 371 projects have expressed interest in certification in 42 states and 8 countries. The area covered in total is “bigger than Boston” and 80% of the projects are on brownfield sites or or infill. Many of the standards adopted have a carbon base and measurable public health benefit demonstrated by research. Even so the National Association of Homebuilders (NAHB) asserts that there is an “unproven connection between health and walkability”. They also accuse the proponents of a sociological agenda, as though building low density car orient4ed sprawl had no sociological effects.

He was critical of LEED ND. He pointed out that the prerequisites are a poor tool to balance competing trade offs, and they have had limited influence at the sprawling edge of the suburbs. So far they have had no discernible effect on sprawl. He gave the example of the East Fraserlands in Vancouver (on the Fraser North Arm at boundary. This was a former saw mill but included some woodland. The requirement of LEED ND is that 75% had to be previously developed and there also had to be a 100 ft set back of all development on riparian lands. So this site failed to qualify.

The “Southlands” in Tsawwassen are built up on all sides but have had no development on them, so they would also fail the LEED ND test. It is hoped that the current process will actually protect a lot of the green area from construction, unlike the original proposals which would have been a low density subdivision.

“LEED ND will not design a project” but he showed a simple, and familiar, diagram of a triangular site, based on earlier standards. This is now being used with a 10 minute walk circle to show how a dense neighbourhood can work, and reduce the meed for motorised trips.

He talked about “emerging thresholds” and something called the “80% rule”: apparently you need 2000 houses to build a TOD. (I may have this wrong as my typing could not keep up with the speed at which he was flipping through his slides). He introduced the idea of “biophilia” - people respond to nature and “nature shouldn’t be something you have to drive to”. So his developments have dual use stormwater retention and high performance infrastructure. The trip reduction potential stems from clustering buildings, but it also enhances neighbourhood health and security. The neighbourhoods are then linked into a “sustainable corridor” based on a transit line.

Most of our current planning codes should replace minimums with maximums – e.g. street width. “The current regulations are backwards.” He sees the need for a national campaign. It is a curious fact that Richard Nixon created all the US environmental agencies – and that very little progress has been made since.

“It’s the placemaking, stupid!”

LEED should apply to land use as well as buildings. The 2030 Architectural Challenge is to gradually move towards carbon neutral buildings by adopting progressively tighter restrictions each year - “like a slow burn fuse”. His practice has shown that the targets is completely possible and they will have built a 120% efficient house next year, that is one that feeds power back on to the grid.

He is now proposing a similar 2030 Community Challenge. This will be based on reducing the average driving distance – less than the 8,150 miles per person per annum which Americans now drive which is equivalent to the North Pole to somewhere in Brazil. For a family this is now 21,500 miles a year, which is very nearly like driving around the whole world. “When you experience a city at 50 mph you don’t care what it looks like.” He aims for a 2% reduction pa in VMT which would produce a 50% reduction by 2030. You can do this by “planning to drive less” - for instance simply eliminating that trip you wish you had not made last year to your in laws. But by designing “resilient communities” we can make the US less reliant on fossil fuels and hence more able to withstand the uncertainties of the future. Essentially the Challenge is a call to invest in land use and transportation integration.

In one development called Atlantic Station the average drive distance is now 8 mpd, a 75% reduction over the Atlanta average. The big gains will be achieved in the suburbs, where the driving distances are greatest will be where the highest percentage of projects need to be LEED ND platinum.

Changing the type of light bulbs we use took 5 years: changing our neighbourhoods will take 20 to 50, corridors take 20 -100 years. “We started at the wrong end.”

He endorses the view of Bill Clinton that this change represents a large economic opportunity.

Q&A

• Isn’t there a correlation between poverty and VMT? What is the role of legislation?
  A – Zoning is the way to make change. Vancouver is ahead of the curve. But in existing neighbourhoods there are “always bits being replaced” and it is here that the main opportunities will be found

• The standard of 7 units pda is about ⅔ of what is needed to make transit viable.
  A – It’s a compromise but you can exceed the standard and it probably ought to be 10 to 12.

• The Spetifore Lands is the correct name for the site in Tsawwassen. There has been little public process. Is there a way that we can have a development that encourages individuals to experiment? Will your development end agriculture on this land? After all, it was this site that spurred the creation of the ALR
  A – The first plan was sprawl. We now expect to have a charrette. There is no plan yet but we expect to set aside ⅔ of land either as green space, agriculture, or conservation. the basic question we are now asking is “Can we complete the town and make it a better place?”

• An advocate for affordable housing asked if LEED ND requires mixed income, and given current building costs of around $1,000 per sf, how can that be achieved
  A – It is essential to end segregation by economic strata. In 1990 we reformed on “CNU ideals”(?) “LEED ND is the duct tape that solves every urban problem.” Usually they insist on 10 % each for sale and rent at affordable levels. The response is convincing the powers that be that it is doable. The private sector is currently not building to the market, and often all they have to do is right size it.

• Are car co-ops just a gadget?
  A – NO. See the VTPI 2005 shared car study. Reducing car ownership actually increases wealth [note: I think he should have said “disposable income”] LEED houses cost more but the savings from redcuing car ownershop will pay for better houses.

• Why don’t the politicians get it?
  a – In places that have a planning culture – like Tsawassen and Portland – they do. And the public’s involvement in the process is crucial. Mostly it is the local plans that do not help. You must remember that sprawl is legal – it is mandated and approved by certified Planners. Chicago is not a plan town but a deal town. The question there is, can we make neighborhoods and corridors?

• Municipalities in Canada do not have the freedom of US cities, and they are bound to be concerned about the impact on property tax
  A – LEED ND is good government and fiscally responsible. the cost of infrastructure is much lower in dense, contiguous neighborhoods.

Vancouver Sun

At long last.

Townline president Rick Ilich announced on Tuesday his plans to redevelop the Fantasy Gardens site with a mix of retail and residential development.

But the actual plan is some way off as he is going to do some very necessary public consultation. The biggest issue at this location is traffic congestion. Firstly because of the massive development of “Riverport” - a multiplex, bowling alley, ice rink, swimming pool, hotel yada yada - and now housing too! - just outside the distance which would have given the MoT some leverage. But mostly becuase of the evening peak hour tail backs from traffic trying to get to the tunnel which causes problems for the equally large retail developments at Ironwood and Coppersmith (a big box anchored by Canadian Tire) strip malls.

The Steveston Highway overpass of Highway #99 is one lane each way - which has been grossly inadequate for many years. And this intersection has also caused problems as traffic leaving the freeway northbound and trying to get into the industrial area also lines up - and the tail back can delay traffic attempting to get through the tunnel. Some recent “improvement” has been seen as the DoT has closed the scale at the north tunnel entrance. No doubt much to the relief of the tipper truck and container haulers, who were regularly prevented from moving further until they put their decrepit and neglected equipment back into roadworthy condition before being allowed to proceed. It may have helped reduce the conflict from merging trucks at the tunnel entrance but I do not feel any safer as a road user, knowing that these trucks will now be inspected much less frequently.

It will certainly be a welcome change from more temples and schools on this strip of land between No 5 Road and the Highway.

While I am scanning documents I thought I should also pass along those from the community groups opposing EcoDensity, since that is a subject which has generated discussion here recently

February 24, 2008

Mayor Sullivan and City Councillors City of Vancouver
453 West 12 Avenue
Vancouver, B.C. V5Y 1V4

Dear Mayor and Councillors:

Re: Draft EcoDensity Charter and Initial Actions - Report to Council dated Nov. 20. 2007

Neighbourhoods for a Sustainable Vancouver is a citywide ad hoc organization of 30 groups that includes residents associations, CityPlan committees, ratepayers associations, civic groups and coalitions. Please accept for your information and consideration, the attached group summary statement dated February 19, 2008 and the detailed letter dated December 19, 2007 (with updated list of groups represented).

We understand that the proposed recommendation to Council from staff is for “…Council (to) instruct the Director of Planning to report back with revisions to the draft Charter and draft Initial Actions, in response to public input received.” Concerns remain that the revised documents will not reflect the fundamental changes required.

In order for staff to do their job, they must be also directed by Council to change it from a density charter where density is the number one tool, to one based on a holistic approach to sustainability where density is one of many means but not the goal. Density must not take priority over affordability and livability. We request that Council do the following:
1. withdraw the charter and initial actions;
2. engage communities in an open, democratic, and extended process to devise effective strategies for managing growth;
3. create a comprehensive and balanced plan for Vancouver founded on a holistic approach to environmental, economic, social, and cultural sustainability, where density does not take priority over affordability or livability.

Regards,

Neighbourhoods for a Sustainable Vancouver
(See page 2 for a list of the supporting groups.)

Cc: Brent Toderian, Director of Planning
Ronda Howard, Assistant Director of Planning - City-Wide and Regional Planning
Kent Munro, Assistant Director of Planning - Community Planning Division
Rob Jenkins, Assistant Director, Current Planning Initiatives Branch
Thor Kuhlmann, Planner, City-Wide Regional Planning

Page 2

Group contact email: agroupofvancouverneighbourhoods(at)hotmail.com
Neighbourhoods for a Sustainable Vancouver
Supporting Group names:
• Arbutus Ridge Concerned Citizens Association
• Arbutus Ridge/Kerrisdale/Shaughnessy CityPlan Vision Implementation Committee
• Britannia Neighbours in Action
• Building Better Neighbourhoods
• Burrardview Community Association
• Citywide Housing Coalition
• Douglas Park Residents Association
• Dunbar CityPlanVision Implementation Committee
• Dunbar Residents’ Association
• East Fraser Lands Committee - Sharon Saunders **
• Friends of Southlands Society
• Grandview Woodlands Area Council
• Hastings Sunrise CityPlan Vision Implementation Committee *
• Kensington Cedar Cottage CityPlan Vision Implementation Committee
• Kitsilano Arbutus Residents’ Association
• Kitsilano Point Residents’ Association
• Marpole Oakridge Area Council Society
• Norquay Neighbours - Joe Jones **
• North West Point Grey Home Owners’ Association
• Reinstate Third Party Appeals
• Riley Park / South Cambie CityPlan Vision Implementation Committee
• Shaughnessy Heights Property Owners Association
• South Hill Initiative for Neighbourhood Engagement (SHINE)
• Southwest Marine Drive Ratepayers’ Association
• Upper Kitsilano Residents Association
• Victoria Fraserview Killarney CityPlan Committee - Andrea Rolls **
• Victoria Park Group - Gail Mountain **
• West End Residents Association (WERA)
• West Kitsilano Residents Association
• West Point Grey CityPlan Vision Community Liaison Group *
* Members of the group indicate support for the letter, but have not voted on it yet due to
timelines.
** Signed as an individual member

Flyer

Neighbourhoods for a Sustainable Vancouver is a city wide ad hoc organization of 30 neighbourhood groups that includes residents associations, CityPlan Vision implementation committees, ratepayers associations and community groups. This is the first time in the city’s history that such a diverse, broad representation of neighbourhood groups from across the city have come together to carefully consider and address a City initiative. We oppose the Draft EcoDensity Charter and Initial Actions. The summary of our recommendations are outlined below:

Sustainability - We support the concept ofcreating a truly sustainable future for Vancouver based on a holistic balanced approach that accommodates the full definition of environmental, economic, social,
and cultural sustainability. EcoDensity as currently proposed does not accomplish this.

Process - To date, the community consultation process leading up to a public hearing on February 26,
2008 has been inadequate and imposes an impossible timeline. At this point many still feel that the
meetings and workshops staged by the City are more about selling the EcoDensity initiative than
engaging the public in a dialogue to bring genuine community input into creating the Charter and
Actions. Although staff has indicated they will be recommending substantive changes in a third draft of
the Charter and Actions, any revised proposal should be released for additional community dialogue
and feedback prior to consideration by Council. We need a new process that is democratic,
transparent, and community-based. The process must be extended over a reasonable timeline, not
just rushed through. Many feel that the City should put the Draft EcoDensity Charter and Initial Actions
to referendum as part of the November 2008 civic election.

The Charter - The question of whether or not the city needs an EcoDensity Charter has never been
debated publicly. There are many who feel that it is not required at all and object to the use of the
word ‘charter’. Its role in this context and what its powers are in relation to other city policies has never
been clearly defined. If we do proceed with one, we need it to use a balanced sustainability approach,
not making density the main priority and tool. This must NOT be a direction-to-policy document that
may be used to change inconvenient policy or to circumvent due process. Even if it would not
immediately change existing policy, Council could at any time approve ‘Actions’ under the Charter to
selectively alter existing policies, such as Initial Action 2 that would override existing Community
Visions. This erodes confidence in the public process and discourages public participation. The draft is
an overly prescriptive document that mostly lists actions or opinions, and fails to establish a higher
level statement of principle for sustainability. The only section in the entire proposed draft Charter that
we support keeping is the “ECO-CITY” section as follows:

“AN ECO-CITY
• Champion new, holistic ways to align density, design, and land use with other tools for
environmental, economic, social, and cultural sustainability, to achieve mutual benefits - including strategies for transportation and parking, green building strategies, heritage conservation, affordable housing strategies, urban agriculture and food policy, recycling, new energy systems, social development planning, and the many other related City initiatives.”

We recommend adding the following text:

“Density is one of many tools for sustainability, but density must not take priority over other City objectives, including affordability and liveability. Conserving embodied energy through the retention of existing buildings is an important element for achieving sustainability, with particular emphasis on retention of character and heritage buildings.”

And, finally, there must be adequate accountability, conflict resolution and public appeal provisions,
including restoration of the longstanding right of third-party appeals to the Board of Variance.

Draft Initial Actions - There are so many initial actions proposed that it is impossible for the public to
properly understand and consider the actions with all their complex implications. It is therefore,
premature to be proposing their adoption or implementation. The City should first be engaging in a
comprehensive planning process for both the short term and long term, including improved community
consultation that is democratic, transparent, and community-based. The community must be part of
creating the concept with their opinions incorporated. The initial actions should be limited to a very
small number for further consideration only, with much more time for consultation. A summary of a few
of our recommendations regarding the initial actions include the following:
• Sufficient and sustainable public transit must be in place prior to increasing densification.
• Green buildings should be required, not bonused.
• LEED is not an adequate rating system for sustainability. It does not give enough weight to the conservation of the embodied energy of retaining existing buildings, with character and heritage buildings of most concern.

Vancouver Sun

I did not go to the Metro Vancouver sustainable growth and the economy public dialogue yesterday. The panel was different to the one I did go to at West Vancouver. But what really surprises me is that Randy Shore did go to Surrey. The press has not been at many of these meetings in that past, so far as I am aware. And so was Brian Lewis of the Province who has this wonderful quote from Gordon Price

“Can someone give me an example where this kind of road has worked elsewhere?” he said.

“We’re spending a billion dollars on a road without any working examples of success [elsewhere], yet when we’ve made commitments to build rail systems we have seen the benefits.”

He quipped: “It’s curious that when we know it doesn’t work, we do it, but when we know it does work, then we don’t do it.”

Darn, wish I’d said that.

The road he was referring to is the South Fraser Perimeter Road, and the idea is that if the containers were moved by barge instead of truck, then we would not need this road.

The plan to load containers on to barges is not of course new and has been discussed here before - though the mention of Hope is new. Up until now I had expected that the ecological significance of the gravel reach would have been a block to navigation by large barges this far upstream.

“Most of what we need to make this happen is there already,” Badger told The Sun. The highway — in this case the Fraser River — and the railroad tracks run side by side all the way to Hope.

What isn’t there of course are the terminal facilities. And proposals by the port to buy up land along the river front for terminals are already a cause for concern among the local communities.

The cost of transferring containers more than once — from deep-sea vessels to short-haul vessels and then to trucks or rail — in their trip from port to market has been prohibitive until now.

As the cost of transport goes up “it makes this kind of operation much more viable,” Badger said.

But it still does not make any sense at all. The container terminals all have rail access. And the plan for the expansion of Deltaport is to add even more rail. So for long distance shipments across North America, most of the containers taken off ships go onto trains at the marine terminal. This can also happen at Surrey Fraser Docks where the container cranes have now been standing idle for some time. In fact at Deltaport I have never seen all the cranes in use at once. This is not, of course, a scientific study but casual observation suggests that at the moment there is a lot of spare capacity. The Burrard inlet terminals are all rail connected too, of course - though a sneaky suspicion lurks in my mind that they could be very desirable redevelopment sites.

Now I have heard it said that CN Intermodal does operate trucks between Deltaport, Vanterm and its Thornton yard. Quite why that would be cheaper than running trains I have no idea. Perhaps it is something to do with the CN/CP agreements on track use.

The big deal that generates truck movement is the volume of traffic that gets resorted here. Imported containers are stripped of their contents, and the goods reloaded onto other containers or trailers for onward transmission by companies like Hudson’s Bay and Canadian Tire. Very few stores need an entire container full of rubber duckies, so the trailers carry a variety of goods from various sources. It is this activity that generates so many truck movements as it is very poorly co-ordinated, with a lot of movement of empty equipment. If that could be combined at one site with packing containers for export there is a real potential for savings. But double handling full containers, to load them onto trains up the valley just adds cost and delay to what can be done now - putting them on to trains at the port.

Many of the approximately 50 attendees were exasperated by the expansion of the car and truck based road system when the region is trying to encourage denser residential growth and promote transit.

More highway capacity without tolls will encourage more sprawl, more driving and more pollution, speakers complained.

Well at least he did report it, even if it was buried at the bottom of the article.

David Fields on the Livable Region blog has these observations

Environment Canada has requested that an alternative scenario on the same scale as the current Gateway scheme be developed that would meet the same goals of moving people and goods but could possibly have a lesser impact on our environment. We here at the LRC have been clamouring for the same. The Minister of Highways has so far refused to do so, claiming that his Gateway is the only option that will work. It is interesting that highway schemes everywhere else have failed. Even after these few years when we have seen the public switch on climate change and the Premier’s response with the Carbon Tax and promised future action, the details of Gateway have not changed in kind. Well, not entirely true- the price has gone up.

A re-think of Gateway is long overdue. There is an incredible amount of expertise and determination in this region that would enable us to realize a vision of moving people and goods while lessening our impact on the natural environment and enhancing our communities. A process of developing a full scale Greenway to replace Gateway could be undertaken swiftly and would be cost effective. The obstacle, of course, is the extreme arrogance of this current government.