Public Hearing — January 27, 2026 — Transcript
← Public Hearing January 27, 2026
Good looking individual there.
Okay. Good evening, everyone. It's 6 o'clock. Perfect. I'm now going to call, I'm, I will now call the reconvening public hearing of Tuesday, January, the 27th, 2012, 26th, order. This meeting is being held in person by electronic means. Council members and the public may participate by either method. Any council members joining electronically are reminded to enable video to confirm quorum. This meeting is being live streamed at the city's website and you two, sorry, on the city website and YouTube and meeting progress will be updated regularly on X at Van City Clerk. In case of an emergency requiring an evacuation, there are two exits located just past the doors and to the left. And if those doors are blocked, please note that there are four exits on the sides of this chamber. If you need mobility assistance, please stay in place and one of our super friendly security team members will come and help get you out of the building. and please don't use the elevator. Please walk down the stairs. The fibrillator is also located at the end of the hallway chamber, if you so need it. I do want to acknowledge that we're hosting today's reconvening of the public hearing on the traditional territories of the Muscoim, Squamish and Squabletooth First Nations. And I do want to thank them for their generosity and hospitality and the love and care they show this great land that we get to live, work and play on. I also want to acknowledge our incredible team members, throughout the city of Vancouver. He work incredibly hard every single day to make this city a better place for all of us. And they are pretty amazing. And so with that, can we please get a roll call?
Yes, thank you. Mayor Sim is in the chair. Councillor Kirby Young. Councillor Domino. Councillor Bly. Councillor Fry. Councillor Montague?
Present.
Councillor Klassen? Councillor Meisner.
Present. Councillor Zhoue.
Councillor Orr? Councillor Maloney. You have quorum, Mayor Sim.
Thank you very. very much. So before we begin a few announcements, the public may speak in person or by phone or may submit written comments to Mayor and Council. Speakers may only speak once and we'll have up to five minutes to comment on the merits of the application. Please state whether you support or oppose the application and if you are a resident of Vancouver. Those representing four or more individuals or groups, including themselves, may speak for up to eight minutes. Each person being represented must confirm their name and presence in person or by phone and may not speak. separately. Please follow the live stream on, follow the live stream or at Van City Clerk on X to track meeting progress and know when your turn to speak is approaching. Please note the live stream has a slight delay. Written comments can be submitted through the mayor and council public hearing feedback form linked on X. If you pre-registered with presentation, please say next to have the clerk advanced your slides. A reminder, at public hearings, counsel acts as a quasi-judicial body and must focus solely on the merits of the rezoning or heritage application. Members may ask clarifying questions of team members or speakers, including the applicant, but should reserve debate until after the speaker's list has closed. After hearing from speakers, Council may one approve the application in principle. Two, approve the application in principle with amendments. Three, refuse the application or four, refer the application to team members for further consideration. Please note that a new public speaker podium has. has been installed on the left side of the public gallery. At the moment, podium heights cannot be adjusted by the clerk. Staff and public speakers, please adjust the podiums as needed using the controls on your right-hand side. Finally, if not all speakers are heard this evening, the public hearing will recess and reconvene on Wednesday, January the 28th, 2026 at 3 p.m. Okay, item number four, CD-1 rezoning 320360 West 2nd Avenue. At the public hearing on January the 22nd, 26. Council completed items one through three, heard the staff and applicant presentations, asked questions to staff and applicant, and began hearing from speakers on item four. Council subsequently recessed and will now continue hearing from speakers on item number four, CD-1 rezoning 320 through 360 West 2nd Avenue. Any registered speakers in the council chamber, please come forward to the left podium when your name is called. Phone in speakers will be unmuted when your name is called. Speakers will have up to five minutes to make their comments and should limit their comments to the merits of the report being considered. Okay. Before we proceed, I'd like to offer a brief clarification. Because the staff recommendation on this item is to refer the application back to our team members, there has been some confusion as to whether the public comments relate to the team member recommendation or to the application itself. For clarity, when we refer to public support or opposition this evening, we are referring to support of the application itself, not the team member recommendation to refer. Clerk's office team members have reviewed all public correspondence received and adjusted categorizations if needed, and I will confirm each speaker's position for the record, so it is reflected accurately for council's clarity. and recorded in the minutes. Our next, or sorry, our first speaker today is speaker number three, Christina DeMarco. Is Christina present? Great.
Good evening. My name is Christina DeMarco. I live in Vancouver and I support staff recommendation A and I oppose the application. Strong, prosperous cities protect urban space for a diverse and evolving economy. As a retired urban planner, I'm going to tell the story about why the city's industrial land, reserve was established over 30 years ago and why it would be a grave, short-sighted mistake to change direction now. Mayor Gordon Campbell felt that residents did not understand the tough trade-offs that council face in their decision-making. Here's council's resolution from 1992. Inform citizens about the issues facing the city and create from their advice a shared sense of direction for the city and its place in the region. One of the big issues of the time was how to use the remaining industrial land, which had shrunk from about 2,400 acres in the 1970s to 1,700 acres by 1990. Campbell asked, should we continue to use our industrial lands for housing such as we did around Falls Creek, or should we look for other places to build housing? There was wide support from both residents and businesses to keep the remaining industrial land. A survey of businesses asked why a city location was important to them need to be near customers, near suppliers, and transit access for employees were the top answers. Shortly after council adopted industrial land protection policies in 1995, I got a call from Council Puehl. He told me, in a gruff voice, as he speaks, that one of the city's top developers just called to complain that I had said to him that it was a city's policy to no longer process housing rezoning applications in the industrial areas. Did you say that? He asked me, and I said, yes, I did. And he replied, keep up the good work. That is how we protect our jobs, services, and property tax base. We heard from many industrial business owners who were relieved to have industrial land protection in place. At that time, about 66% of the businesses were tenants. Mount Pleasant had about 10,000 jobs back then in the mid-90s, and now has 13,000 jobs, thanks to evolving industry and industrial zoning. The city sent clear messages to the development industry that the remaining industrial lands were reserved for the other important sectors of the city's economy. These messages were reinforced with the 2011 regional growth strategy. Mayors, counselors, and staff across the region could explain to developers why region-wide industrial land protection was a law. This policy was also reinforced. by the recent Vancouver plan. So why is the city processing a rezoning application when industrial land has been protected since 1995 in the city and from the region since 2011? The reason is that a hole in the fence was made in July 2025 by council directing staff to process rezoning located on exceptional sites. Unfortunately, there's nothing exceptional about this site. Strand bought the site 2015 over 10 years ago, they received approval for a fine seven-story industrial and office building in in 2024. Sadly, they could not find enough market interest, and like many other office developments, they were victims of the post-pendemic fall in the office market. This rezoning is in direct collision with regional growth strategy policies. The city has no rationale for removing industrial land in advance of the work staff. undertaking now. So what is the value proposition for the city? On the plus side, the city gets a cash payment and some housing, which staff advise is not worth the trade-off in advance of the work that they are doing. On the minus side, the city gets undesirable, impractable, impractical industrial space, residential land speculation in industrial areas, and incompatibility with industrial uses. If you create new housing but lose business and jobs, What kind of win is that? What messages are you sending to your businesses, your residents, and the regional partnership? In closing, council needs to repair that hole in the fence and let staff complete their work. You have asked staff important questions on last Thursday, such as if the boundaries of Mount Pleasant are still in the right place. That will be looked at carefully. A new boundary will create a new edge. By saying yes to staff's recommendation, council has asked to council. asking advice on the best way to steward the future of our small but precious industrial land base, hundreds of city-serving businesses, and tens of thousands of jobs. Thank you.
Great. Thank you very much, Christina. And right on time. The next speaker, speaker number four, Russell Wong.
Hi, my name is Russell Wong. I'm a volunteer with the Vancouver Area Neighbors Association. I live in Vancouver. I don't work in real estate or development. I'd like to speak in support of this application. Like a lot of hard decisions, this application requires weighing costs and benefits. Industrial firms primarily produce and distribute goods as opposed to services. They typically require more land and need to be located close to transport hubs, like Amazon's facility at the port of Vancouver's Richmond Logistics Hub. Land in Metro Vancouver is scarce and therefore expensive. The pattern is that we get major offices and hotels in the center, higher density residential and central locations, and lower density residential and central locations, and lower density, residential further out. There's a natural tendency for specific industrial uses which are sensitive to the cost of land and congestion costs to also move further out where land is cheaper. The underlying challenge in the city of Vancouver is that we have a chronic shortage of housing. The result is that residential use is the most valuable use of land because people want to live and work here. The policy response so far, as described by Christina, has been to set up an industrial land reserve and forbid residential there, kind of like the agricultural land reserve, or like a zoo. This acts as a subsidy for production and distribution of goods because it lowers the rents for industrial uses. Parenthetically, I would point out that it's pretty important to pay attention to prices. If the price that people are willing to pay for residential use in a centrally located area is really high, that's a clear signal. Trying to suppress prices seems to me like trying to drive while closing your eyes. The problem of limited land is only going to grow more acute over time, but there's nothing stopping us from building a lot more floor space, both for light industry and for housing. For several years, people have talked about the idea of multi-story buildings for light industry, or in this case, buildings with light industry on the lower floors and residential on the upper floors. This seems like a reasonable solution. The previously approved zoning allows for two FSR of light industrial space with four FSR of office spaces. above. The current application includes the same amount of light industrial space, 2FsR, with 6 FSR of market rental above it, and 5.5 million dollars in cash to pay for below market housing offsite. The cost or trade-off is that some industrial uses will be excluded because there will just be too much friction with residents, whether from noise, smells, or operating hours. Honestly, that seems reasonable to me. The city's already defined restrictions like this for the low-density MC1 and MC2 zoning. It's possible that future projects in the Mount Pleasant industrial area will require a mix of light industry and residential to be viable, with the residential cross-subsidizing the industrial space. This also seems reasonable to me as long as future residents have the clear expectation when they move in that this is a light industrial area. It's not a suburb. One idea would be to provide a clear visual indication, perhaps by painting the roads in the same way that West 10th in front of VGH is painted. It seems that where we're going to get in the end is intensifying land use by including both light industry and residential in multi-story buildings. Council has already set this direction clearly in the July 2025 motion. I haven't seen any arguments saying that this particular project doesn't make sense, that it'd be better to leave the site as a whole in the ground in order to reserve it for future industrial use. It's just a matter of timing. Thank you.
Thank you very much. The next speaker is speaker to be able to. Number 5, Elliot Klein.
Yes, hi. I'm in support of this development. I live in Mount Pleasant quite close. I walk by this area pretty frequently. I think that introducing some more residential housing units in the area, in addition to maintaining the existing industrial, would do a really good job of improving the kind of cohesive feel of the area. I know, from my own experience, sometimes walking around at night, where you just have all of these. industrial buildings nearby with kind of no like, I know the term that's used as kind of like eyes on the street when there's a lot of residential spaces nearby, it can kind of give it a bit of a harsh feeling. And I think introducing residential units in this area while also maintaining the industrial unit stock kind of serves a dual purpose. We get to maintain the existing industrial area. It's not really being changed, but you're adding housing units that are much needed. And I think that in this area where there's so much land, but there's not. not really a lot of residential units nearby. I think it could do a good job to kind of creating a mixed use area, makes it more attractive for people to be in around that area. And I think that it'll do a good job to, in generally, just revitalizing the area. Because I think, like I said, sometimes walking around this area has a feeling of kind of emptiness. And I think bringing in another occupancy use there could really do a good job to making it more attractive. and also, as mentioned, maintaining the existing industrial use.
Great. Thank you very much. The next speaker, Speaker, number six, Stephen Bowhouse. That's not the first slide, but I'll start with it.
Okay. That's great. Thank you. My name is Stephen Boas. I'm a Vancouver resident. I'm a post of this rezoning. Please reject it. Of a degree in landscape architecture, and I'm currently working in the visual effects industry. Pictored here is a massing model I built using the posted drawings. It took me a day over my holidays. Contexts is in Google Earth. Other cities like Toronto, which they have this data available for free download as well as the context. Next slide. There have been comments about the hole in the ground, and the hole did not appear on its own. It was created by the applicant. If the applicant cannot finish their approved office and industrial building, maybe they should consider selling it. But the question is, what do you do with a hole like this? Well, there is a rezoning at 111 East 5th Avenue to convert an entire building, including all underground levels, to a data center. Here you could put, let's say, four levels of data center underground, one level, underground, one level underground parking, and a few levels of office space above grade. Problem solved. Next slide. And a data center could be used for AI trading, mining, cryptocurrency, render farm for visual effects, and for general compute. These are needed tasks in the next generation economy. Next slide. This is the rezoning sign, and it has the date of the public hearing, but there's no indication that the rezoning has been updated. It still says 19 stories. Still says there's office space, so there isn't even a sticker. So I'm a little bit concerned about the notification. Next slide. So this is another view, also in the Google Earth context, showing near street level, and you can see the scale of what's being proposed compared to the existing space around it. And we have a lot of, like, this area provides a much, needed job space for our economy. Next slide. And one of the uses of the 3D master model is the ability to create a shadow study. And the shadow studies for the equinoxes in the summer solstice that are included in the staff report are actually incorrect. And I have this computer model here. We can look at it together. But I'm pretty confident that those shadow studies, for those times, are incorrect. And any conclusions that were drawn would be false because of that. Next slide. So I'm just going to ask. a few questions and this is a little bit rhetorical so bear with me a little bit of patience here but is there anyone around this table who wants to kill jobs? Would you vote in favor of supporting killing jobs? Well of course not. You would vote against killing jobs. This rezoning threatens a very important job space in the city and voting in favor of this rezoning would significantly impact employment in the Mount Pleasant industrial area. Simple as that. Next slide. This is This is a view from the balcony of the top floor, and that essentially is very expensive rentals without any BMR units. And rezoning to residential uses could cause a surge in land prices and that, quote, highest and best use taxation policies that we currently have in BC would force businesses and art spaces to leave. And this is the result of land price inflation. Next slide. Here's a view near ground level looking west along 2nd Avenue, and it's worth noting that the Olympic Village Skytrain, that has been mentioned by staff. and it's been operational since 2009 and there hasn't been a very big impact apart from allowing people to commute to work like they're commuting to work downtown they can commute to work for accessing jobs in this area next slide and finally uh this is the masking model as seen from city hall in the right location and height and the site was previously under uh view cones but it has been amended and there are no view cones right over this site at least that would have limited the height to something lower. And I'm a little bit concerned to see one of the options put forward by staff to increase the height to 27 stories while lowering the podium because the taller tower would increase shadows that would go further and also increase view impact. So I don't think that's a good option either. So, council, I would urge you to reject this proposal. You know, we have to really keep this job space, save the job space. You need it for future use and you could put a data center and other use. is there. The applicant has not made that hold on the ground. That is the reason why they want an approval. So thank you for your time and patience. Thank you very much. Speaker number seven, Louis Velagos, Lagos. And go to the first slide, please. My name is Louis Vileges. I am a resident of Vancouver, practicing urbanism in the U.S. and Canada for over 40 years. Next line. I oppose this tower and towers generally because towers belong downtown, not in the neighborhoods.
By building just eight kilometers to sky train in 40 years, by inflating land values, giving away density and height,
or what the yes culture calls landlift, government has made the housing crisis. Canada's largest democracy in the world by landmass. We are not running out of room. Rather, government seems to have run out of ideas. Next slide, please. Let's compare a very of anxiety. to New York City. 6% of Vancouver is owned industrial versus 6.9% in Manhattan. Does that mean that we're low in industrial land? Vancouver's footprint is twice of Manhattan's. So maybe we're just confusing industrial uses with job space. Manhattan has 1 million more population, 8 million when we add in all six boroughs. This turns New York City into a case study for good transit. One, where most of the city. industrial uses locate on the periphery, hardwired to the core by transit, and two, then add artisanal jobs or job space in the core. Good urbanism puts high-density uses in the core and noxious ones on the periphery. Next slide, please. Next slide? Thank you. Planning concepts on the left in blue become urban design principles on the right in red. 50% of 2nd Avenue right-of-way is apportioned to pedestrian use. buildings in the local vernacular preserve village character and scale. We add village squares. We name the place and add gap, guaranteed affordable housing in perpetuity. That's CMHC's tool that registers affordability on title in perpetuity or for always. Next slide, please. Since the Bartholomew Plan in 1928, Granville Island, South Falls Creek, the Olympic Village, and Chinatown Square are not one. was standing. Vancouver has been planning by crisis. First, we had to stop the freeway. Now, we must end the housing crisis. Only good government will end the housing crisis. Outside downtown, projects complete in 18 months by building faster, better, cheaper, with renewable value-added forestry products, preserving the vernacular village character and scale, adding gap doors, in sufficient quantity to meet or exceed demand. Finally, all submissions under a neighborhood form-based code would be guaranteed approval within 14 business days or less. Next slide, please. Council, build a Confederation Streets District complete with a form-based code, not another tower district. The site under consideration can build at four stories on top, filling the big hole with a server farm, recycling heat to the residences or pumping it into the Olympic Village heating grid, or self-storage for the downtown's tiny puny condos. Council, keep the sky train as is operating as a gold-plated people mover. Add LRT streetcar linking to places where the sky train can never reach. Deliver gap in sufficient quantity to meet or exceed demand. And finally, become a lot of the sky train. a beacon of democracy, not a perpetrator of social sink holes. Thank you for this opportunity to speak. Great. Thank you very much. Speaker number eight, Miriam Amadi. Good evening, everyone. My name is Mariam Amadi. I'm an urban designer, and I am in the support of the staff recommendation and opposition for the rezoning. The site is protected, is a protected industrial land in the heart of Mount Pleasant. We all know that. one of the five exceptional industrial sites identified in the Vancouver for further study. Yet, it has been derided as a hole in the ground. That phrasing is not an accident. It is a strategy. Once you accept that framing, anything built here becomes an improvement. Anything is better than a hole in the ground. Yet we are not debating a mere hole in the ground. This is one of the last remaining pieces of industrial land in Vancouver. Scan 6% of our land base is available for the productive.
industries that keep this sitting running. 6%. And here we are considering chipping away it added before even your own staff have finished their dutiful study of the site.
The hole in the ground was a result of strand intention to build an approved industrial office building in 2024. Will any future industrial development in Mount Pleasant get permission for a switch to residential development once they dig a hole? This proposed development erase industrial opportunity at a time when it's needed the most contrary to the developer's assertion. What kind of operations can really take place beneath 20 plus luxury stories of residential housing? No noise, no vibration, no odors, no early mornings, no late nights. The potential tenants, this will not be seen as a real industrial space. It is boutique office space with an industrial label. We already know how the story ends. Should we continue this because the other cities have written it for us. In fact, precedents, including the ones that applicant used, offer as evidence for the country, serve as proof that this model does not work. Strathcona Village, for instance, the industrial space that exists in that development is currently occupied by retail tenants. Not manufacturers, not producers, not city-serving industries were told this model will do. That is not a success story. story. Wick Lane in London has not secured industrial tenants nor any commercial tenants, despite a very densely populated neighborhood. Hockney Wick, no secured industrial tenant, only commercial tenants below residential. Let's get bigger. San Francisco tried a policy called PDR and UMU, requiring industrial space and mixed-use developments, exactly like this proposal before us here today. Over one million square feet of industrial space were permanently lost in 20 years. And employment fell by two-third. The spaces sat vacant or converted into offices because real industrial tenants could not afford the rents or operate with residents above them. Brooklyn, New York created MX mixed-use zoning in 2005 in Greenpoint and Squamishburg. Within a decade, only eight of 32 manufacturing businesses remained. 5 million square feet of industrial space, gone. Los Angeles tried blending, living and making in the arts district, AIR zoning, in 2000. Today, the makers are gone. Noose complaints from new residents drove away legacy businesses that had operated for decades, see just since early 2000. The pattern is always the same. Always. Small manufacturers are actively displaced through buyouts, lease refusals, zoning changes, and increasing rents.
Industrial tenants cannot compete with their residential counterparts. Complaints mount. Leases are not renewed. Businesses leave. And within 5 to 20 years, the industrial space exists only on paper, if it ever exists at all. When Metro Vancouver developed its 2011 regional growth strategy and the 2023 update, it was clear that industrial land could not be protected if each of the 21 member municipalities made unilateral decisions about conversion. member municipalities made unilateral decisions about conversion. The regional designation exists precisely because individual cities face intense pressure to convert industrial land to higher value residential uses. If Vancouver, with its sophisticated planning apparatus and decades of industrial land stewardship, abandons these protections for spot rezoning, what message does that send to Surrey, Burnaby, Richmond, and other municipalities facing identical pressures? pressures. The answer? That regional compact is meaningless when convenient. Every municipality will have its own exceptional circumstances. The cumulative result will be the erosion of the regional industrial land that serves the whole region. The staff do not support this
No worries. Thank you. Thank you very much for coming in.
Hi, everybody. My name is Brianne and I'm speaking as a Vancouver resident in support of the rezoning application. I know that rezoning industrial land can raise concerns, but in this case, I don't believe that that's an issue. This site has already been excavated and hasn't delivered jobs, activity, or usable space. Keeping the current zoning in place hasn't protected employment here. It's simply left the site vacant. Mount Pleasant is well connected by transit and close to jobs, schools, and everyday amenities. Creating more housing in this area would make it easier for young people like myself to live close to where we study, work, and spend time, rather than being pushed out farther of the city. This site is immediately adjacent to the Olympic Village SkyTrain Station, making it an ideal location for additional housing that reduces car dependence and makes better use of existing transit investment. What also matters to me is that this proposal combines housing with employment space in a thoughtful way. Bringing these uses together supports local businesses and adds life to the neighbourhood. The original plan for industrial lands is still maintained and the job space will still be created. The area has changed and new projects can be put in place that supports how Mount Pleasant has evolved over the past decades. I know that protecting industrial land is incredibly important, but what I like about this proposal is that it's preserved industrial lands while adding housing, which leads to an increasing amount of local customers, employees, and community members in the area. This is a small site right next to rapid transit. It's not a large or sweeping conversion of industrial land. The city has the ability to make targeted decisions like, this without undermining the broader industrial land base. And this project is a great example of this approach. Overall, approving this rezoning would allow this site to finally contribute housing, employment space, and public benefits to this neighbourhood. And that's a better outcome for the community and for the city. Thank you so much. And I hope that you support this rezoning application.
Mayor and Council. My name is Parker Jang and I'm a Vancouver resident and a UBC student living in the West End. I'm calling in tonight to speak in favour of the development at 320-360 West 2nd Avenue. As a student, finding a place in Vancouver is incredibly stressful, and so this project is important to me because it provides new rentals in a part of the city where it's actually possible for someone in my position to build a life. The main reason why I support this development is the location. It's just three minutes from the Olympic Village SkyTrain Station and it's also really close to other major transit hubs like the 99 B-Line. I believe that having housing so close to these transit hubs would really incentivize tenants to use public transit rather than having to resort to cars. Personally, I currently rely almost entirely on public transit and the occasional Evo when I need it. And I think this development perfectly supports that lifestyle and that transition towards car-free living in Vancouver. I also believe that putting more housing within walking distance of the Olympic Village Station advances the city's transit-oriented development goals and if we want to advance TOD, I think we should be approving more projects like this. Currently, the station feels underutilized and adding more residents right next to it helps maximize that efficiency for our existing transit network. What's great about this site is how extremely well located it is. It's right on the edge of downtown, but it also provides easy access to the rest of Vancouver by the SkyTrain and major bus routes. I also really like that it's located so close to these emerging creative spaces in Mount Pleasant and employment centres that they create. Knowing that there are job opportunities right in this neighbourhood makes me feel like I could actually stay in this area long term after I graduate. And I think that if we want to keep young people and students living in Vancouver, we need to create more opportunities and more housing for them that is close to jobs, transit, and leisure. So I hope that you'll move this forward. Thank you for your time.
Good evening. I'm speaking in opposition to the application and in support of the staff recommendation to send it back to them for more study or alternatively to reject it outright. I've lived and worked in Vancouver since 1975. I'm a son and lifelong student of the urbanist Jane Jacobs. These comments draw heavily on her knowledge and insights. regarding city land use and the nature of economic development and growth. It is crucial now for Vancouver to preserve our remaining industrial lands in order to enable business startups and spinoffs, the new ideas that are necessary to ensure that our economy can diversify and replace work that is inevitably lost. Cities that failed to do this or overly rely on too few industries or on attracting outside investment at the expense of local startups fall into decline. Cars in Detroit, luxury housing in Vancouver, or ordinary housing at luxury prices. It is also necessary to maintain both diversity and redundancy in the production and supply of basic goods and services, many of which are located on land zoned for industry and provide a web of support for other enterprises. Residential real estate is cannibalizing our economy, doubling up capital that otherwise would be available to support local business startups and now is poised to invade our industrial lands, making them too costly for startups to take root. Fact is that every big city developer in Canada must be dreaming of getting a bailout of one sort or another. This allows them to remedy a problem that is largely of their own collective making. They have ignored the cautionary principle en masse, resulting in unsustainable inflation of land costs, which has drastically reduced demand because most residents simply cannot afford to purchase or rent space in new developments as the pro formas were based on over-exuberant assumptions. This is commonly known as a real estate bubble. The truth, though, is that rescuing them from their self-inflicted wounds, in vain attempts to re-inflate the bubble is a road to civic ruin, whether by shifting the entire burden of new public infrastructure and amenities onto taxpayers, or, as is the case here, inflating the value of land by shifting it from one permitted use to another without regard for why those uses were designated in the first place. Whether this particular proponent is in difficulties or not, they are, in effect, asking council for a bailout. The development industry is watching closely, and a consequence of granting them this bailout is that many others will have reason to argue that their property is also exceptional and demand that they be gifted similar treatment. And why not? Because of the reasons that are clearly stated in the staff report, concern that development sites in the broader area will begin trading at higher values with landowners and developers speculating that residential will be permitted throughout the area, potentially precluding the ability for employment industrial developments to move forward while impacting rents. The proponent is proffering a CAC valued at 5.5 million. CACs are not normally required or negotiated for rental housing, but in this instance is being dangled in exchange for the rezoning, and no doubt was carefully calculated to not threaten a handsome return on investment. A win-win? Not at all. It may be a win for the proponent, and it may be spun as a win for Vancouver taxpayers, but this is a slippery slope that leads to an avalanche and the loss of capacity to fulfill crucial economic functions, including replacing imports with domestically produced alternatives and providing jobs for a more diverse and stable economy and a greener, more sustainable future. Protecting the industrial land reserve is arguably even more important than protecting the agricultural land reserve. In closing, if you were going to approve, you might as well fire the entire planning department without cause and gift Vancouver's future last sentence to the schemes of private developers because that is the signal you will be sending.
Oh, hi, yes, it's Patricia Barnes, and I'm the executive director of the East Village BIA. I live in Vancouver. and I oppose the rezoning of industrial land to allow residential. I've been coming to council since 2001 advocating for the protection of industrial land. East Village BIA has advocated continually the importance of these goods and employment-producing areas and were very pleased when resources were provided by the Council of the day and staff commenced to work on an extensive plan to ensure what little industrial land was left in the city of Vancouver would be protected. Staff has explicitly noted that they are working on the Mount Pleasant plan to ensure that industrial lands are protected and that the development meets the needs of the city and the area. I understand the need for housing. However, industrial occupies a mere 6% of the land base in Vancouver, and this use is also of critical importance to the continued health of the city. Both the city and Metro Vancouver recognize that industrial lands are strategic and finite resources that for the health of the region should be protected. This has been reinforced by a number of studies and reports, as it appears, dating back into the 1990s and has continued with the work that the city has done on employment areas and also on what Metro Vancouver has done and it was further enshrined in the Vancouver Plan in 2022. Yet here we are in 2025 discussing one-off residential rezoning for an industrial zoned site. I understand it will have some industrial space. However, it is majority residential. We heard reference to the Ironworks development in my area. It is an amazing development with zero residential and 100% compliance to the light industrial zone in which it is situated. Should this proposed rezoning be approved, we are again putting this valuable resource at risk. We've experienced the impact of one-off rezoning and the speculation that it can create. The building standing empty and dilapidated, as there is hope for rezoning to more expensive uses. The loss of space for city-serving industrial space, the loss of industry to suburban areas, the loss of employment and the impact on the environment. Never mind the loss of maker space and artist spaces. Industrial lands are home to a myriad of businesses, all providing irreplaceable benefits to our city. Staff explicitly stated in their report that the development before you today does not meet city policy, Metro Vancouver policy, or provincial policy. Let's not go back in time. Let's move forward and ensure that residential uses are not allowed in industrial lands. Remembering that more often than not, residential use and industrial use are incompatible, and it is the commercial owners who suffer as their subjective complaints for undertaking necessary and compatible operations for the benefit of our city and our region. Never mind the increase in property assessment that accompanies rezoning to residential. Please continue to protect this valuable resource. Thank you.
Good evening. First of all, I want to thank those of you who are in the council chamber. And I'm hoping I can do something that most of the previous speakers have not been able to do, and that's to get you off your phones and stop looking at your computers. And I hope the guy who prepared those beautiful graphic images of what this development will look like will come back because I noticed that most of you did not even look at the screen. I think that's a bit disappointing.
Right. Thank you for clarifying that.
By the way, just, I don't know. I'll pause you for a sec, because I remember when I was observing before I was elected, I had the same comment. And what is actually going on, the vast majority of the time, we've stopped the clock here, if we can stop this, because this is a good announcement for everyone. There is a lot of work going on on the screens, paying attention to the presentations. I have seen councillors research, fact-check what is being said, and they're working. Okay, and I would personally hold them accountable as well. So people are actually working. They're being present. We're taking this seriously. People are showing up here. They're not mailing it in.
I wouldn't have made the observation, Your Worship, except I did take a look at the screens during Mr. Vigilus's presentation, and it didn't appear on the screens. But anyway, I come to you with a background of redeveloping industrial lands with residential uses. and as you know, I was involved with South Shore False Creek, industrial to residential. I live on Deering Island, industrial to residential. I worked on Coal Harbour, industrial to residential. Staff will tell you that on a couple of occasions, I've come to them to advocate for mixing residential and industrial uses on industrial land. And so I'm fully conversant, I think, with the opportunities and the best benefits of putting residential uses on industrial land. There's no doubt that in many instances it has worked. But I'm here today to oppose this application and to support what I thought was a well-reasoned and well-presented staff report as to why you should either send the application back to staff or reject it. I think the point is that over the years I've come to appreciate that it is important to keep industrial land for industrial uses. So the question is, why are we considering this application? And I've heard some people, and by the way, those of you who are phoning in, it's almost impossible for people like me anyway to understand fully what you're saying. But I think I heard a number of people talk about the fact we need land for housing. At the risk of astounding some of you, we do not need any more land right now for high-density residential. We have, as a result of the actions of this council and previous councils, enough land zoned for high-density residential. In fact, I understand from staff, there are 78,000 units currently in the pipeline in various stages of approval. And so the other thing, having met with CMHC last week, I also know there are literally dozens of projects that you've approved that can't get financing. We don't need more land for high-density residential. This site is not needed for high-density residential, but it is needed for industrial uses. Your Worship, I watched your Global TV interview in which I think quite rightly pointed out the nature of industry is changing. And we're seeing it in the area where this proposal is going forward. Some beautiful, new, high-tech and related uses. And yes, we've got to get the balance of light industrial and commercial right. But some good things are happening. I also read Frances Bula's article in which you and Trevor Linden talked about the fact that there may be some exceptional opportunities where residential and industrial can be combined. I agree entirely with that. But as somebody pointed out already, this is not one of those exceptional sites. So why am I so strongly opposed that I keep coming here? Because this goes against so many key policies. It goes against your own industrial land policy. It goes against Metro Vancouver's industrial land policy. It goes against the Broadway Plan, the Vancouver Plan. But there's another reason. And it's a reason that people don't seem to talk about anymore. Although that gentleman who had the graphics, which I'm glad you did get a chance to see, I think highlighted. I'm 5 foot 11 and I weigh 190 pounds. If I was 5 foot 11 and I weighed 380 pounds, I would look very different. I have been concerned about new buildings along the Broadway Plan at 6 FSR, and this Russell Vong is not 8 FSR, it's almost 12 FSR. This is a building that's going to be a monster. I would like to conclude with a thought that I know you won't appreciate. But if you approve this project, you're signaling to the development community that in Vancouver now, anything goes. You want twice the density? Fine. You want to put residential on industrial land? Fine. The rules have all kind of disappeared. So I do truly hope you will seriously consider the advice that you've got from your staff. with whom I so often disagree. But on this one, they're absolutely right. And I hope you will agree with their recommendations. Thank you very much.
You know, always just such a joy to hear from you, Michael. So I actually have questions because I'm curious if your comments are strictly around this. Obviously, the applicant had first come forward with commercial on top of stacked industrial, now shifting because commercial doesn't pencil out. and residential apparently is the. Now, would your issue be the same with the commercial as opposed to residential?
No, I think mixing commercial with industrial, which is permitted in this zone, is absolutely right. I think, in fact, if Eric Adernack was here, but he's presenting in Maple Ridge, I believe, he would tell you that the line between what constitutes light industrial and what constitutes commercial is blurring more and more. And so mixing industrial and residential, mixing industrial and commercial, I think, is entirely right. Okay. Both are job creating. And I think that we're not here just to sort of protect land. We're here to create jobs. And this is me just borrowing your expertise a little bit,
because I know you've been around the block on some of these issues. Live-work, that sort of industrial, commercial, kind of make, where does that fall into this kind of scheme? And I realize it's maybe not
a standardized program today. Well, I think there are many instances where live-work works, but it doesn't work very much now because so many of the live-work units that are being used for work are being taxed under your empty home tax program. And so people are having to go back to BC Assessment and get their residential live-work unit classified as business. It's good for you. You get four times the taxes. But that's why people are not building live-work anymore because of the empty home tax, which didn't know how to treat these units.
Fascinating. Okay. Thanks, Michael. I just want to conclude if I could. I have a great deal of admiration
for Strand. I've known the principals for 40 years, but the truth is they dug this hole for themselves, and you shouldn't allow them to fill it in with residential uses. Thank you very much, Michael.
Good evening, Mayor and Council. My name is Katie Finley. I'm the owner of Vancouver Performing Stars, a performing arts studio and theatre located at 102 East 4th Avenue. And I am in support of this rezoning proposal. Every week, our Performing Arts Centre serves over 2,000 children and teenagers. We are proud to be part of this neighbourhood. The south side of 2nd Avenue has become a dead zone, full of empty for-lease buildings due to stalled projects and restrictive zoning limitations. After work hours, the south side of the street becomes a ghost town. For my students, many of them teenagers walking from bus stops or the SkyTrain station, that short walk feels isolated and frankly unsafe. What good is the industrial space if the spaces aren't being used and sit empty? The use of this area has shifted drastically, and if left as is, safety concerns will continue to grow in this area. I'm in support of this rezoning proposal, not only to bring 200 new residents to the neighbourhood, but more importantly, we're asking for populated streets. Residential density means 200 households, walking dogs, coming home from work, and patronizing local restaurants and services at all hours. This natural surveillance is the most effective way to protect vulnerable populations. A vibrant, populated street is a safe street and a strong community. The reality is that under the current industrial-only zoning, this project, like many in the area, is being stalled. Without the residential component to make it viable, zero industrial space will be built, and we will be left with a fenced-off hole for years to come. Residential use here is the engine that actually allows the industrial and creative use to be delivered. While industrial use has traditionally been important in this location, the area has naturally evolved. Our neighbourhood is situated in the heart of the city, and now, home to countless local businesses and services. The site needs to transition to support the community that has developed around it. The Mount Pleasant Industrial Area has all the ingredients to be one of Vancouver's most dynamic neighbourhoods, creative arts organizations, thriving diverse businesses, excellent transit access, and a strong community spirit. What we need now is the residential population to activate our streets in the evenings and weekends to support local businesses and to create the safe, livable city we deserve. I strongly urge council to approve this application. It often feels like this area is sitting in limbo and not living up to its full potential. The hundreds of children, teenagers, and families who are part of Vancouver Performing Stars and the Mount Pleasant community stand to benefit immensely from the transformation this project would bring to the neighbourhood. Thank you for your consideration and for your continued commitment to making the changes required to build a Vancouver that works for everyone.
Hey, can you guys hear me okay?
All right. Hello. Hi, I'm speaking as a Vancouver resident who spends a lot of time in this area, and I would love to see it function even better as an actual whole neighbourhood. This part of Mount Pleasant is well located near transit, jobs, and everyday amenities, and it feels in my mind really aligned with what the city proposed of creating more kind of villages that have access to a variety of things and allows people to really thrive in specific areas. My only thought is that what's missing is more housing in that area. As a young renter, I see the value in being able to live here, and I believe additional housing would be meaningful and benefit the broader community. I also think the mix of industrial and creative spaces would add strength to the neighbourhood and more character and bring more vibrancy. Overall, I think the proposal is really positive and a practical step for Mount Pleasant. And I encourage council to support it.
Thank you very much. Speaker number 17, Dario, um, um, Gerozian, and I hope I pronounce your name properly. Is Dario there?
Mayor, Speaker 17 is not on the line.
I'll turn it on. It's on. It is on. Okay, great. Good evening, Mayor and Council.
My name is Louise Schwartz. I'm a Vancouver resident and I'm also an industrial business owner of two businesses operating in the Flats, employing over 70 people across both organizations. And I'm speaking in opposition to the rezoning and in strong support of the staff's recommendations. This large-scale residential use proposal, using an unproven industrial-residential mix is no small adjustment. It really carries permanent and long-lasting risks to industrial land stability in our city and the existing businesses and jobs that go with it. City staff have outlined the risks, and I'd like to reinforce a few more from the perspective of the person who operates industrial businesses in the city. First, the so-called industrial space that's proposed in this mixed-use development and in many others is often, they're often not viable as industrial spaces. They are typically limited to very small, highly constrained uses, and they often function only on the ground level. So they generally don't meet the needs of industrial business owners, and as a result, they're really not in demand. So we see these vacancy rates. They're difficult to lease because all industrial land is not equal. There are certain things that industrial businesses require. And so often these spaces get demoted to retail commercial, which is what you see in some of the developments. Secondly, industrial and residential uses are fundamentally incompatible. Industrial operators don't want to be located near residential buildings, even adjacent to them. It's simply far too risky for us. We've learned over time that repeatedly when there are conflicting needs, the residential right to quiet enjoyment, rightfully so when you're living somewhere, always prevails over the industrial operating needs for reasons that other speakers have outlined — the scheduling, noise, machinery, et cetera. And for a couple of local examples, Archetype, just down the road, which I think Councillor Meiszner mentioned the other day, is an example of a development that hasn't been able to tenant its industrial spaces on the ground floor. And if you look at even the loading bay as you drive by it right behind the Midas, you'll see that the loading bay itself is totally impractical for any kind of truck access. So it's no wonder that industrial operators are not interested in these spaces for their own operations. Strathcona Village is another one where the intention was to have the mixed use.
And of course, once residents started seeing what that would look like, their priorities ultimately were imposed upon the operations rendering it inoperable as an industrial space. So this zoning, this rezoning really opens the door to land speculation. You know, once council signals that industrial zoning can be overridden on a site-by-site basis, land values, the escalation and increases in taxes and rents are going to drive businesses out who cannot observe those costs. This decision tonight is not happening in isolation. There's a number of other, I think there's 12 other industrial sites that are waiting to watch what goes on tonight. So spot rezoning of this really will send a signal that longstanding industrial land protection policies can be overridden, let's say. This rezoning really represents, goes counter to everything, and other speakers have spoken about it. I think Michael Geller spoke about it against all other direction that the region and municipalities are taken and have agreed to take together to protect industrial land. It really risks sending messages to businesses like my own that there is no protection of these policies. policies, and it's very difficult for us to operate in that kind of environment. If we cannot rely on what the policy has already indicated, the direction we'll be taking. I think just before I close, I'd just like to say, you know, people always talk about transit being so close to residential and where we live. It's just as important for where you go, when we're coming and going from work. So I really would like counsel to take that into my eye. All my employees are on commuter subsidies that we support, and hardly any of them, the majority do not own cars. So that's a direction we're going. I would say tonight, we're not asking for a no forever. Staff isn't asking for a pause to take careful consideration for a direction council has already given them to look at the impacts and assess what this might mean, to see what could work in this area. But we really need to take a moment and look at a pause. Other cities are lamenting. They're overriding of industrial land. There's no downside to a prudent, measured approach tonight, pausing this rezoning, and taking the staff's recommendation to be able to go back. And if we think residential can, and industrial can work, let's try it in a residential district, rather in the 6% remaining industrial that we have. Thank you. Thank you very much.
Okay, Speaker number 18, Alia Kirby.
Mayor and Council, and thank you for the opportunity to speak. I am a long-term Vancouver resident and wish to voice my strong opposition to the proposed rezoning of industrial lands. I am supporting the staff's recommendation and opposed to the rezoning of 320360 West 2nd Avenue. I'm speaking to you tonight as a business owner and employer operating within the city of Vancouver and the flats for the last 24 years. Great Northern West Seen Shop operates out of an industrially zone building and employs 37 full and part-time staff and up to 200 additional casual staff throughout the year. We are a B-to-to-B business supporting arts. artists, arts organizations, and other businesses with custom fabrication and production services. You might be forgiven if you assume that we were a cultural organization as we work in creative industries, employing artists, engaging in artistic endeavors. However, we are a classic light industrial business. We make noise, dust, need space for waste bins, require an area for our trucks to deliver and load up goods and materials, and we operate from seven a.m. to late at night. In short, we cannot easily cohabitate with residents, retail, or the general public. We require industrial space, not CD1. Being within the city of Vancouver is important to us, most of our staff, many of whom are artists and creative entrepreneurs live within the city. At least 50% of our work is with clients who also operate within the city. We also hire and collaborate with other industrial B2B businesses that operate in Vancouver. We are providing jobs in the city of Vancouver, decent, middle income jobs that are the backbone of a city's economy and tax base. My company alone produces $2 million worth of jobs. As the founder of the company, I can testify to the challenges that emerging entrepreneurs face and developing a new business. It is hard. Full stop. What is hard is the struggles to succeed in the face of all the challenges, getting the capital, securing clients, finding staff, and most significant. these days, finding suitable space to operate the business. It is almost impossible to find suitable space for industrial businesses in Vancouver. And I'm not just talking about affordable space. I'm talking about appropriately zoned spaces that is not immediately adjacent to residential, commercial, otherwise and compatible neighbors. Mount Pleasant has been the historical center for emerging entrepreneurs and the creative industries for years. Re-zoning the already limited space for these emerging businesses will diminish future Vancouver creative industries who will stop looking for suitable space within the city of Vancouver. I will also note that CD1 zoning is a Trojan horse. While on its surface, it purports to support the very activities that I mentioned my business doing. The reality is that CD1 pretends that industrial and commercial or a residential can cohabitate. And my lived experience and many others, this does not happen. Residents and commercial tenants complain and restrict the ability of the industrial activities to operate, and eventually the industrial businesses will leave. CD1, by its very nature, also tends to be more expensive to produce and thus more expensive to lease. This cycle pushes young, creative, risk-taking entrepreneurs away from the city. Vancouver will no longer be a home to small and median-sized businesses. Many of the supporters to this motion confused the lack of affordable residents, with the rezoning of industrial land. Solving one crisis, the lack of affordable residential, by creating a second crisis, the lack of employment lands, is short-sighted. Yes, we do need affordable housing, and yes, we do need affordable commercial real estate, but not at the expense of industrialized zoned land. This motion to rezone 320-360 West Second or any other industrial zone land in Vancouver is a big mistake that I trust council will not make. Thank you for the opportunity to speak.
Great. Thank you very much. The next speaker is number 19, Yario Eunice.
My name is Hira Yunis. I'm the director of policy at the Business Council of British Columbia and a Vancouver resident. BCBC is a non-partisan organization representing the largest and leading employers and institutions across the province. We focus in advancing long-term economic prosperity through evidence-based policy work. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today. We've been consistent in raising concerns about industrial land availability, because it has become one of the most binding constraints on capital investment in Metro Vancouver. Research shows that industrial lands account for roughly 4% of Metro Vancouver's land base, yet they support about 27% of all regional employment and close to 30% of regional GDP. These are some of the most productive lands in the region, and they underpin everything from goods movement and advanced. manufacturing to life sciences and technology. At the same time, demand for industrial space has far outpaced supply. Vacancy rates have stayed below 2% for years and firms are increasingly expanding or relocating outside the region because they cannot find viable space here. Research shows Metro Vancouver needs approximately 250 to 300 acres of industrial land every year just to keep pace with economic activity. Against that backdrop, one of our messages today is that changes to the industrial land base should be approached carefully and considered within a clear framework that accounts for cumulative impacts over time, particularly in the current economic context. BC's economy has slowed meaningfully, business investment remains weak, and rising uncertainty around U.S. trade policy is to reinforcing the importance of domestic industrial activity. Now, that being said, it's also important to recognize a second reality, which is that destination alone does not guarantee delivery. In some parts of the city, the industrial zoning framework is structured in a way that makes project viability reliant and dependent on achieving higher densities through non-industrial uses, such as office space. In the current market, those uses can be very difficult to finance. And when that happens, otherwise, well-located industrial sites can remain stalled for years, producing no job space, no economic activity, and no benefit to the region. Idle sites can constrain investment and job growth, particularly when demand for industrial space is strong, but projects are unable to finance and to move forward. Taken together, this points to a broader system level issue. Preserving long-term industrial capacity on paper is important, but so is whether policies are actually delivering industrial space in practice. Therefore, decisions affecting industrial lands should be guided by a clear city-wide framework that accounts for cumulative impacts and balances long-term industrial capacity with real-world delivery. Now, how that balance is struck will be critical to maintaining Vancouver's competitiveness, resilience, and ability to support high-value jobs in the years ahead. Thank you.
Great. Thank you very much. The next speaker is number 20. Luke Whitburn. Speaker 20 is not on the line. Thank you. Speaker number 21, Benjamin George Zummet Mimple.
Thank you, Mayor and Council, for hearing. comments. I have to say, I was really impressed with all the questions that the council had for the applicant and the staff last week. I'm a resident of Vancouver, a new resident, but I just want to add one thing to the conversation, and that's that the economic trade-off between industrial and residential. We're hearing a lot about how industrial lands are the constrained one, but really we're in at housing, crisis. One is a higher priority than the other, and there are significant economic implications of not allowing housing to be built when the price signals are coming in so significant that that's where the desire is. That's really the main thing. It's slowing down labor mobility. New residents coming to the city looking for jobs. It's also going to slow down the businesses that are looking to locate themselves. If they're looking at which cities to locate in, are they going to look at cities where the average cost of housing is much lower and that will be reflected in their wages or Vancouver where the wages have to be much higher to compensate their staff? So that's just the one sort of element that I thought was missing. I think there's a lot of good arguments on both sides when it comes to that specific trade-off, but it's clear to me that one of these issues is really, really pressing, and the other one is much less so, given the amount of vacancy that exists in the in the Mount Pleasant area for industrial uses. Thank you.
Great. Thank you very much. Speaker number 22, Danielle Annan.
Good evening. Mayor and Cattle. Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak today and I want to speak in favor of the development and the application. From my perspective, as a student of Vancouver, access to secure and long-term rental housing and locations that are close to school, work in transit is critical to long-term affordability. I think this particular project directly responds to those needs and it delivers secure rental homes in a part of the city where people can realistically live without having to rely on a car. I also think that one of the big boons of this proposal is that it pairs new housing with employment generating space, and that also allows people to live closer to where they work. The reduction of pressures on commuting is something that proximity will provide. It will support nearby businesses, and it will contribute to a healthier, more complete neighborhoods that I think we all want to see in the city, especially for students and young workers like myself, who often find themselves priced out of well-located areas. I think the site itself is also extremely well-suited for additional density. It's within walking distance of rapid transit. It has nearby medidies, and it's also connected to major cycling rooms. And I think from a planning and economic perspective, that's the kind of location where growth should be directed to make the most efficient use of infrastructure. This proposal also clearly aligns with a lot of the city's current plans. I think it aligns with the Vancouver plan by delivering secure rental housing. It aligns with the Broadway plan by intensifying nearby transit. And I also think that it advances the Metro 2050 regional growth strategy. And overall, I think it's a good balance. of a policy consistent approach while adding housing in Vancouver. And I just want to speak in favor of this application.
Thank you. Thank you very much. Speaker number 23, J.S. Scott.
Thank you, Mayor and Council. Good evening. I'm, my name is J.S. Scott. I'm a resident of Vancouver and I'm here to speak in support of the application. You've heard many April submissions from staff, the applicant on Thursday, many speakers and ordinary citizens who have appeared before you. And I appreciate it. your attention in weighing this choice so carefully. I don't have much to add, really just one point, which I think that the context here is important. So when we think about the Mount Pleasant neighborhood, which I have walked along this street and noted, it's at a unique turning point. The future is really knocking at the door of this neighborhood. Young people are going there to enjoy the businesses and their offerings.
At the same time, you have both the Olympic Village and the Science World Sky train stations. You've got a variety of mixed use already happening. You're close to Olympic Village. People are living there. And this area is, we're seeing, we heard from staff or someone on Thursday, that there's no heavy industry in the area at this point. It's all medium to light use. And modern buildings have soundproofing technology. I live in one, and it's very good, that can insulate and reduce frictions between those uses. So I urge you to consider the unique context of this neighborhood, the street, and the fact that the Mount Pleasant neighborhood is already changing. It's becoming a dynamic place and a dynamic building, which has mixed use. This is a great time for it to be added to the neighborhood and to our city. Thank you.
Thank you very much. Speaker number four, sorry, 24, Trevor Scott. Speaker 24 is not on the line. Speaker number 25, Eric Froese.
Hello. Can you hear me?
Okay. Thank you. Hello. My name is Eric, and I'm speaking as a Vancouver resident in favor of the rezoning application at 320-360-Wast 2nd Avenue. As a student who is struggling to find affordable housing, I see tremendous value in the addition of 200 more market rental units, especially in a highly walkable and transit-exhavenible and transit-exhavenile neighborhood like Mount Pleasant. Creating more housing opportunities while protecting industrial land in this area, makes it easier for people to live closer to the amenities, employment opportunities, and services that they use on a daily basis. This prevents people like myself from having to leave the city simply to find somewhere to live. I hope you move this forward, and thank you so much for your time and the opportunity to speak.
Great. Thank you very much. Okay. If there are any additional speakers in the chamber,
please come forward to the podium. Clerk, are there any additional speakers on the line?
There are no speakers on the line. Okay. Okay. This is the third and final call for speakers. If there are any speakers for this item, he wished to speak to counsel, please call toll-free at 1-3-3-353-8610, followed by participant code 106-1-44-5 pound before the close to the speakers' list. The phone number will be posted on next and displayed during the recess. We're now going to take a two-minute recess for any additional speakers to call in or come forward to the podium. We're back and we have quorum. So we have another speaker on the line. Caller with the last number. or last four digits, 9059. If we can please get your name, first and last name for the record, and whether or not you support or oppose the application.
You can hear you great. This is Randy Halton, just from the City Hallwatch Media Foundation. I would just like to share that, I've done analysis of the correspondence to this public hearing. And I'd just like to briefly report, just report the vast majority of correspondents here. It's from best interest in the public hearing, and that our elected officials need to know this as they weigh this decision, this important decision. I am in opposition to the application and in support of the staff recommendation to send it back for further analysis. The support list includes internal staff, some of whom are employed by the applicant, other external consultants, including principal level engineers and consultants, whose firms designed these buildings, market facilitators, including commercial brokers and investment analysts who broker the land and lease the space, and also advocacy mobilizers, including abundant housing Vancouver and Russell Wong, who provide the ideological grassroots framing for the technical industry goal. These individuals effectively perform a professional echo chamber where the developer, the consultants, and the brokers all write in as local citizens. without declaring their affiliation and urge counsel, their urging council to override the city staff recommendations for rejection. So please keep that in mind as you weigh all of the input you have received.
Great. Thank you very much. Clerk, do we have any other speakers in the chamber or online?
Okay, we have another one online.
Caller with the phone number with the last four digits, 3181, if you can please state your first and last name and whether or not you are supportive or an opposition of the application.
Hello, good evening. My name is Joan Jakard. I'm a resident of Vancouver, and I oppose this policy tonight. I cannot support this mixed-use proposal for multiple reasons. Primarily, it does not provide any relief to the real housing crisis in the city, which is affordability. All housing development proposals, whether rental, which is most in demand or other forms must first include, and more than the minimal arbitrarily deemed 20% below market, rents and prices that reflect the income levels of Vancouver. To begin to address the affordability of housing, the city must incentivize other typologies of housing that better support the diversity of population needs to sustain a social fabric that includes families and people of all social standings. This proposal subscribes to the excessive density of one size fits all tower form and provides zero affordable units. It is irresponsible of council to even consider any such development proposal. As was brought up at the initial council meeting, which I watched, shadowing the buildings to the north of this broad building is a significant intrusion. Also, the question of compatibility of residential intruding into this inner city desirable industrial zoned area is a significant concern in terms of. of potential noise and other disturbances with the diversity of businesses that have found homes in this unique and scarce building typology that industrial lands provide. I attended a Jane's walk last April, Jane Jacobs, conducted in part by Ned Jacobs, son of the renowned urbanist, in the threatened industrial area to the east of Maine near Terminal Avenue. The tour offered a lesson into the value of retaining these old, large building spaces where enterprise are repurposing these existing spaces with businesses that require that scale of buildings. We must protect them. I learned there are diversity of businesses that can coexist in the industrial zones. Residential is not one of them. These industrial lands must be protected from the pressure of encroachment of particularly the tower form of residential, which is totally out of scale with the character of these valuable and scarce economic industrial zones. For once, I would concur. with staff recommendations to defer an approval until further study and coordination with regional planning regarding industrial zones. Do not be threatened by the proponent over delay with their desire to fill a 40-foot hole in the ground. Time to think long-term about supporting a diversity of uses and economic opportunities, the industrial lands can contribute to the heart of Vancouver. What we don't need is yet another tower of unaffordable housing. Council must refocus on engagement with the citizens of the city who care about preserving the unique character of its neighborhoods and zones that reflect the historical development of Vancouver's neighborhoods and allow creativity and vision to adapt what is there to current needs, not demolish, displace, and obstruct treasured views to our iconic geographic setting, that previous planners and councils have the intelligent and foresight to present. for all. I urge you to oppose this development proposal. Thank you.
Thank you very much. So, Clerk, do we have any additional speakers in the chamber or online?
We do not. Okay. Seeing no further speakers, the speakers, the speakers list is now closed.
Clerk, has there been a large volume of public comments received on this item, sorry, this item since 5 p.m. There has not been. Okay. Seeing there are few or no public comments received after 5 p.m., I'm now going to close their seat of public comments. Does the applicant have any closing comments? Well, thank you, counsel. First, let me begin by saying respectful debate on land use policy is critical. Policy
and zoning can either transform neighborhoods or create stagnation. Secondly, it's okay to disagree on things. However, the expectation is that what staff presents to counsel in the public is fair, factual, and without bias. And I don't think that was the case here. I'd like to respond to several questions raised by counsel. First, how did we get here and what took so long? I think that's a great question. You know, we started a dialogue with staff in December 2023 on this proposal when it became clear that there wasn't a viable pathway forward to build office. We submitted a rezone application. We paid the fees, but we couldn't get any traction on the application or with staff and it felt like it was being slow played. As Josh acknowledged the other night, prior to the exceptional site's motion, The policy environment was, quote, wholly unsupportive for this application. So here we finally are two years later. The staff recommendations really result in only a six-month delay. Let's be clear. This will not be a six-month delay. Staff provided conflicting timelines for when this project could come back to council. PEMPAR summarized the best-case scenario timelines very clearly. Option one, reconsideration following the exceptional sites work, followed by Metrovan-approval That would be mid-20207. So that's 18 months or so from now. Option two would be to approve it tonight and then and then send it off to a Metro Vancouver type 3 amendment process. That would be late 2026, early 2027, so about a year from now. Council's final public hearing of your term is July of this year. So counsel, it doesn't matter if it's a six-month or a six-day difference between staffs-to-options. In either case,
it's absolutely clear the fate of this application will be left to a future council. I did appreciate hearing the reading the letter and hearing the comments from some of the retired planners. But with respect, I think they're talking about a metro plan that was approved in 2010, so 16 years ago, and work that began on that almost 20 years ago. A lot's changed since then. A number of those retired planners also worked on the Expo lands, Yaletown, Coal Harbour, and those were all industrial lands, as Michael noted. Those have all been positive additions to the city. As Councillor Klassen noted, we are in the midst of a structural change in our economy and we need planning policies that can adapt and keep up. So in my view, we need to look forward to the next 20 years, not back to the last 20 years. And what about shadowing? Councillor Kirby-Yung asked some very clear questions on shadowing and about the sidewalk in front of Nook. The staff response was incorrect. There will be zero shadowing from this project on the Nook sidewalk. The prototype buildings, and I'll just hold it up so people can see it, the prototype buildings and shadow modeling from staff's presentation in these chambers five years ago for stacked industrial buildings actually showed shadowing across on the north side of the sidewalk. By contrast, this building has a substantially lower podium than those prototypical buildings and a more slender tower. So it actually has a better solar performance than the I-1C buildings. If this project is approved, will others line up with this proposal, with their proposals? So we agree with Josh on putting a ring fence around this project. And I'd say the circumstances here are vastly different from other sites. How many other sites are located at a three-minute walk from SkyTrain? They're in an amenity-rich neighbourhood. They've been in an 18-month rezoning process. Our design is well advanced through lots of discussions with staff and we have that 40-foot hole in the ground. There's no one else like, no other sites like it. Even, this is, I think, the critical point, even if another developer made an application today, there's no way that application could get ahead of the exceptional sites work that's underway. So the precedent argument is moot. This is an exceptional situation and precisely the circumstance to use a flexibility clause. We were surprised the staff report didn't even advise council of the municipal flexibility clause, particularly as Metro Vancouver 2050 expressly references this option for undertaking, quote, small-scale industrial land use designation changes. Metro Vancouver's Senior Planner wrote, quote, we think that this flexibility clause is an option for this particular regional land use designation change. You've heard from people tonight, the public, the BIA, local businesses support this proposal. Josh, I do want to thank you for your leadership here at City Hall and for presenting council
with a ring fence option while a broader area study is underway. As a final reminder, this project is delivering 100% of the industrial space requirement, 100%, but instead of building office, we are creating 200 units of secured market rental housing. Council, we urge you to support this application tonight and to use a flexibility clause to enable this in-stream application to deliver on key city priorities now, not years in the future. Please don't leave this decision to a future
council. Thank you. Thank you very much. Do our team members have any closing comments?
Thank you very much, council. Thank you for a thoughtful consideration of tonight's application. I'd like to acknowledge the remarks by the applicant and those from the public are much appreciated in contributing to a very interesting dialogue and debate. Over the course of Thursday's meeting and tonight's discussion, we did want to highlight a few and clarify a few points that were raised, just to make sure that it's abundantly clear as well. As the applicant pointed out, we did receive a formal application fee paid complete application in August 2024, despite staff's advice around the challenges with considering residential at this location. The report was referred to council in December 2025, marking about 16 months of formal process, which is generally within line of a timeline that we would expect for a project of this complexity with the policy challenges that it has. A few clarifications that we'd like to make on boundary conditions and just the nature of how policy has enabled residential in certain parts of the city. During the question period on Thursday, there were questions raised around the types of permitted uses around the boundary conditions of Mount Pleasant Industrial Area. It was noted that many of those boundary roads allow for residential and questions around why it wasn't permitted within along West 2nd. We'd like to reiterate and clarify that those land use permissions along Broadway, Main Street, and Cambie were all permitted through to include residential at those locations. Many in cases allow for below-market residential as well, with a minimum FSR requirement for job space following extensive planning processes and council-adopted policies to enable that. To the north, north of West Second, that's the southeast False Creek area that you'd heard from other speakers as well that was developed in the 90s. Those policies initially had industrial let-go lands all the way up to False Creek. The industrial mixed-use area actually used to go to First Avenue and was scaled back and a new boundary was created at West Second. And I think one of the general things that we'd like to identify as a benefit from the policy work is it does create very bright lines about where we do want to see residential and where we don't want to see residential. And those are the primary points around the primary staff recommendation. In terms of the lens of economic development and land speculation, staff certainly heard a number of questions and comments and weighing in on the trade-offs and the risks associated with introducing residential in industrial lands, predominantly either through a policy process or an individual site rezoning application. While the proposal does have merits, and you've heard from the applicant is what those merits might be as well, as well as what we tried to include in a fair balanced assessment of the project in the report, it's staff advice that that policy work be undertaken prior to converting any individual site to general urban use. This would be consistent with those past planning practices around ensuring the implications of land speculation and maintaining affordability, an industrial land base is maintained, ensuring economic development considerations to maintain strong and vibrant industrial employment space and job creation, managing operational compatibilities that may exist between the types of industrial uses that you might see in these mixed-use buildings and those that you might find more standalone or traditional commercial mixed-use buildings. And instilling confidence in both operators and investors alike to ensure that they have the understanding and awareness of what the long-term plan for these lands are. We also heard questions from council around the potential impacts to other uses like arts and culture. Mount Pleasant Industrial has a very strong cultural and job base in both creative and arts and culture businesses. According to the 2026 census, there's about 200 jobs in arts, entertainment, and recreation sector. Area planning can reduce the risk by clearly articulating which sites can be entitled for co-location with housing and which sites contribute to maximize job space. It also minimizes the risks of displacement while exploring opportunities for potential expansion of arts and culture businesses in industrial areas through tools like density bonusing and CACs where they're appropriate. For those reasons, again, that refers us back to the primary staff recommendation to refer this application back to staff to ensure the planning work can be completed. Lastly, process, and to make it abundantly clear, process was a very clear consideration and debate as part of the discourse here at council. And I wanted to reiterate and provide further clarity as the applicant has as well before. Staff recommendation for tonight is to refer this application back to staff to conduct the policy work. Right now, our staff are proposing to bring back that policy work in Q1, 2027, which we could follow with a report back on this application subject to that policy in that same quarter. Subject to consideration and approval of that policy and that rezoning application, at that point, it would undertake then a comprehensive review and process with Metro, which would then be considered sometime, as you would have heard as well, sometime in mid-27 and then subject to that process being concluded by Metro, the bylaw could be enacted along with the ODP amendments that are necessary to it. So to the applicant's point about 18 months of a total process, give or take from today, if you'd refer it back to staff. In the alternative, should council wish to support the proposal now, staff's alternative recommendation in the report was for a type 3 amendment process. This process requires a submission from staff to Metro to consider the changes, and staff would make that submission quickly thereafter the meeting if this was the decision. Followed by that review and consultation process by Metro and the necessary public input and decision-making points with Metro should Metro approve that. We would also concurrently bring forward the RGS amendment changes necessary for this council to still consider, and we would use best efforts to bring that on a basis of our best-case scenario for this council to consider and ultimately for enactment in consideration, hopefully by the end of the year as well. Again, these are all best-case scenario timelines that we would work with the applicant and Metro staff on, and some of these things are beyond our control. The last process option, as you would have heard from the applicant is using the flexibility clause under the Metro RGS process, which would allow for the conversion of industrial lands to general urban without having to go to Metro. The time savings are really that Metro process. There is a minimum 45-day period of consultation, plus the board meetings and the public hearing process associated with that. So the time savings we're talking about is just that Metro process, which is measured in months. Though, again, we can't commit to those timelines. Many of these things are up to the applicant on timing as well, as you mentioned through the enactment process. If council wanted to pursue this alternative process of the flexibility clause, we can certainly furnish council with a potential resolution for that and can speak to the specifics of those options and those risks there too. Lastly, I'd just like to remind you that you do have a yellow memo that needs to get moved with the recommendations. And we're happy to answer any other questions.
questions that you might have. Thank you. Great. Thank you very much. Does council have any final questions for our team members noting no additional questions to the applicant are permitted? Councillor Dominato. Thanks, Mayor. And thank you for the updates and the clarifications. I appreciate that.
I did, after listening to a number of the speakers, I had a question. I don't know if we addressed it last week, which was, what is the current vacancy rate for industrial sites in the Mount Pleasant area?
Hi, Council. Matthew Burke, Senior Planner, responsible for industrial lands policy. We don't actually have the specific rate for Mount Pleasant in particular, but we do have the citywide rate. It's 3.7%. And in the region overall, it's 3%. I would say that in Mount Pleasant, or sorry, overall, we know that smaller industrial units are harder to lease. I believe you heard some of the speakers mentioned that. And so one of the things we pointed out last week was in these co-location buildings, the potential for smaller industrial units or the requirement for smaller industrial units due to building code concerns is a factor. So it could be harder to lease these units.
Well, I have you there. I have a follow up to that. It's just I've visited a number of these buildings over time. And some of them are biotech, some are tech, some are gaming, some are literally like greenhouses. Like, you know, and so there's a whole variety of uses, some of the arts and culture. But in my estimation, and I guess I'm looking at, for maybe a confirmation is that the vast majority of uses there are not heavy, heavy industrial. They're light industrial or arts and culture. Would that be a fair representation of what we're seeing in that area? So one of the things I tried to point out last week was this idea of
heavy industrial, moderate hazard and light hazard. And the moderate hazard does include biotech, some types of biotech laboratories, depending on what they're doing. So, and in a co-location building, those moderate hazard uses have to be on the ground floor and have to be maximum 5,000 square feet. So there are implications. It doesn't mean that co-location is impossible or maybe appropriate in some areas, but there's a trade-off in terms of flexibility.
Right. Okay. And tangential to that, I want two more questions. We do have, not co-located in buildings, we do have residents. We do have residential, very close to existing heavy industrial in the city, as well as rail, where there's very limited, there's quite close proximity to rail lines and heavy industrial.
Yeah, there are parts of the city where it does exist like that, yep.
Okay. Last question is, the planner walked through the type 3 amendment process versus the flexibility clause. Type 3 would require coming back to council with a flexibility clause use. Does it, if, would it come back here again as an application?
Yes, we would have to amend the Vancouver ODP. When the applicant is ready to enact, we would bring forward an amendment to the Vancouver ODP.
Okay. Um, thank you. I'll leave it there.
Thanks. Um, just, um, I was wondering if you could talk to the comment made that there's probably around 12, uh, of these sort of industrial sites that are, maybe projects that are, like, looking towards tonight, you know, um, do you have any sort of, um, picture of how many sort of, you know, the projects that are looking at this that could, you know, follow suit?
Um, I believe, I guess it's fair to say we know of 12 projects that are in the development pipeline. So these are projects that are controlled by developers at one stage or another in the approvals process. And, uh, you know, should housing be approved here, they may decide to pivot and reapply and come in for housing. Um, so that's where the number 12 comes from. We have no visibility on whether they would or not. It's just, that's the existing pipeline in Mount Pleasant.
Right. So they would either, they would have to sort of pull their, that, that planning and go back to the drawing board and, you know, yep, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's just, it's just a measure of, you know, how, how much, uh, activity there is in Mount Pleasant right now in terms of projects that are kind of going through a process who might decide to pivot. They may not, but they may. And then, um, in your opinion, so with the, the sort of suggested ring fencing that we've been hearing a lot about, would that sort of, um, be a good buffer to, to, to sort of prevent that, um, that option of converting the office to the residential? Um, so, um, um, so, um, um,
it would be helpful for council to to give us direction to to limit uh future applications with before the planning work is done but of course we can't we can't prevent that even with direction from council um to to create the ring fence uh you know applicants could still come forward right right but it is it would be helpful yeah okay it would be helpful okay and then there was also comments around
you know say um you know suri and burnaby and and and and and and and and and and it is it would be helpful yeah. and developers in those in those communities are sort of looking at this today too to, you know, as far as sort of sitting off a precedent that would ripple out not only in Vancouver,
but to surrounding communities. Do you comment on that or? I guess it's pretty hard because you can't, you can't comment on what other municipalities are doing,
Sorry about that. Sorry, tricky question. I'll try and answer. I think I haven't heard, I don't know. I don't know. if the team has heard that personally, so I think we'd be speculating on what the intentions or
understanding is from other municipalities. Just something that's stuck with me, you know, so interesting.
Okay, I'll, I'll leave it there. Thanks. Thank you very much, Councillor Klausen. Thanks very much, Mayor. So just focusing on a few areas that came up
through the questions and comments from our speakers. So just with regards to speculation and market behavior is clear the the intent of the exceptional lands, if clearly defined, that's one way that we can ensure that we're going to reduce the potential for any plan speculation. Is that correct?
I think that's absolutely correct, Councillor Claussen. I think the strongest work that we can do, the strongest indications we can give around the appropriateness or inappropriateness of certain locations within the five exceptional sites is to complete that work. I think Templar used the word bright lines. There's a very bright lines we can draw with sound reasoning, sound rationale, using planning, criterion factors to help determine those things. So things like proximity to transit, adjacencies, expected composition of industrial land. These five exceptional sites are not like and similar. Other considerations. like proximity to rail, noise, vibration. These are all the types of things that we must consider. And upon completion of that work, I think those bright lines can be drawn. And that's, I would suggest, the most important and strongest ring fencing we can do as part of that work. Again, just reiterating, it's not to say there aren't appropriate locations. I think we agree with the premise that there may be. And that work will help us determine that.
Well, I'll sort of say, my comment, but just the observation is that it doesn't feel as though that work, which is underway, will necessarily preclude the either or decision that faces counsel today. But I'll move on to my next question here. Just one of the areas that I have been really struggling with is the word industrial in terms that we don't have a really way, and this is a crude way analogy, but the Inuit have like several words for the word snow. And I feel like we don't have the right word sometimes. to describe industrial because in our case, you know, we're not necessarily talking about logistics, warehousing, port-related uses. You know, we've got tech companies like Hoot Suite, Dapper Labs, image engine, really, Relic Entertainment, leading edge companies that are occupying the Mount Pleasant Space and not necessarily giant looms that are creating cloth or assembling model T forts. We're trying to modernize this. And BC Tech Association told me that the tech sector is producing about 30,000. jobs per year in British Columbia. So that's where my energy is going in terms of making sure the future of this area. But again, I'm not seeing it preclude what we do on the boundaries in this case. But anyway, I think you get my point about the definition of industrial is a difficult one.
Yeah, and that's something we can look at through the area of planning work.
Okay. And just for the last, just, again, I'm somehow stating the obvious here, but the neighborhood itself includes supportive housing across the way at Marguerite Ford Department. It has a noteworthy amount of below market and market rental in the Olympic Village neighborhood. So we do know that there is a fairly broad mix of housing right there.
I believe that's true. Yes, in the Olympic Village, yeah.
Okay. And just from a planning perspective, how do we weigh the opportunity cost of not delivering housing within a few short steps of a major rapid transit station?
Yeah, I guess we would absolutely be looking at that through that area planning work.
Okay. Thanks very much. Those are my questions, Mayor.
Yeah, thanks, Mayor. I have a few questions. I'll just kind of go globally first. Just comments made from some of the speakers around the importance of protection. And then there's other comments that there's empty space there. Should we be acknowledging that some of that empty spaces, that new space is always more expensive than the old and people either just can't afford it or that perhaps our conference. current policies are building space that is not functional and workable. I had referenced in the first part of this hearing, number counselors went on a tour, the requirement of the second staircase inside, the amount of space it took up, it wasn't functional. And so you can walk around and you can see BOTI, which looks like, you know, just a retail showroom. And then you can see empty space with crumbling rocks. I walk past it all the time. And then a weird stairway to nowhere in the middle. So is it a question that new is an affordability issue is going to be there, regardless or maybe our policies are just not building the kind of space people need?
Yeah, we have been amending the Broadway plan over the years and adding uses and adding flexibility based on advice from industry. And, you know, we will continue to do that through that work that's underway now. But it is true, yeah, that there is some vacancy in Mount Pleasant and that needs to be looked at through this upcoming work.
Right. Okay. It was just because it's vacant. It doesn't mean there isn't demand. It means it may not be the right product.
Right. We need to be flexible.
We need to be more flexible.
Yeah. Okay.
I had sent in questions to staff because this is, I think, a really important discussion and debate. And I wanted to be prepared if counsel did decide to support the project of what ring fencing options look like for language. Something came back from staff, and it was, I'm going to characterize it as underwhelming. And it was really. around not further initiating and recommending for the use of the municipal flexibility clause. I was anticipating something that was more definitive that would sort of speak to the fact that this particular application is on the edges and the periphery. It's on a main street that protects sort of the core of the area while the planning work is completed and it comes back. And it's about to come back as staff indicated early next year. So do you want to speak to further options around that?
Yeah, happy to. And I'd like to keep. high aspirations, moderate expectations on some of these things. I would like to just clarify as well, just for the public benefit. If counsel were to support this application as presented with the conditions of Appendix B to allow the residential using the flexibility clause, we've furnished some alternative language. The ring fencing option is really around just making a statement, a recommendation and a resolution as to whether or not it is or is not appropriate to be used in the future or when that might be. We are somewhat limited by the Vancouver Charter where applicants may apply for rezoning applications. We must intake them. We must process them. We must bring them forward to your decision. And a decision of this council can't limit the future council's decision as well, as each application has to be kind of considering on its own merits. So there are limited opportunities for how it can be tightly ring-fenced, but it can certainly send instructions both to staff and to applicants about what you're some expectations are. So some of the wording we had suggested was that staff, the council direct staff do not recommend for the use of the municipal flexibility clause as provided by the Metro RGS for privately initiated rezoning applications until the employment land work has completed, for example. So there's some language we can offer to, again, help set those expectations, but it's very hard to manage those in practicality. Okay. Well, that's my question, because that's not
in sort of the response that came back that, Council has in front of them now that's not incorporated in there. So it's my question. Is it possibly get alternatives or options? A further option?
And sorry, just to just to clarify, the wording we have provided attempts to do that.
And if you'd like to... It does not do what you just said.
It does not do what I just said. I apologize, I just tried to...
My question is, can staff take that away and have a further look at that, please?
You can certainly take that back.
Okay. And then finally, it's really around this process of, again, language around the flexibility. clause because it does strike me that if counsel has, is deciding if they're going to not approve this pending the work or they're going to approve it, that the Metro piece, given that there is a flexibility clause, is an extra layer that's not necessary, but there's no language provided. Is that also coming as an option?
Thank you for the question. Again, though I can certainly summarize conversations that have been internally happening, both with colleagues in law, we don't think we actually have to specifically name the flexibility clause in the resolution to apply it. paragraph A stipulates that if counsel were to approve this, it would be approved subject to the conditions of appendix B.
I think I'm out of time, but I'll just say that there's no clear path forward for that option to be moved that I can see. Thanks.
Thanks very much. And I'll continue on with the questions around the flexibility clause. And I noted in the staff presentation that sort of precedent around when this flexibility clause has been utilized is when there is strong public interest in utilizing industrial lands like the TMH or the New St. Paul's Hospital. These are widely supported uses. And I note in the presentation it also said that there is updates needed to clearly define the criteria for when and how the flexibility clause is used for privately initiated proposals, recognizing TMH and St. Paul's obviously we're different than that. So what's your take on that in terms of precedent setting and also do we have the runway to use the flexibility clause given that context as provided by staff? Yeah, so our, we've only ever used it for, you know, public interest,
public lands generally reasons. And this would be a departure from that. So we, and we don't have criteria. So I'll just, I can leave it there. We don't have criteria or when to use it for private projects.
Okay. So is there any expected fallout from using a clause that is outside of what?
Yeah, I believe we tried to get at that in the presentation and answers to previous questions. We are concerned about using this for the first time for a privately initiated project because we're concerned that, you know, other applicants may come forward and our ability to, you know, our bank of space left for flexibility will be drawn down.
But I mean more so the relationship with Metro, you know, overriding a process that's been long held by using a flexibility clause in an application that's not where it's typically used is, you know, would not be. And there's other, we've got five exceptional sites. We've got a lot of work to do around our industrial zones. It just seems like we're would be getting. off on the wrong foot with Metro with a tremendous amount of work that we're trying to do with them.
Yeah, I think Metro would expect, I mean, the applicant did attach to their letter, the email that it could be considered for this application, but, you know, I think Metro might expect a type three amendment process would be kind of more thorough, right, and kind of, yeah, more thorough.
I'll keep going. I appreciate that. I appreciate that. that answer. In terms of purpose-built rental in Olympic Village, do we have any idea of what proportion of housing in Olympic Village is purpose-built rental?
Thanks for the question. Chris Maugh with the Special Projects Office. I don't have that stat off the top of up. Yeah. If I can, I don't know how hard it is to find. It's just, you know, when we talk about
the Broadway plan, we talk about two-thirds of it as purpose-built rental. It's a sort of a feature, if you will, in its initial concept. concepts in terms of when we made that decision. It just struck me that I don't know how much purpose-built rental we have adjacent to this particular site, and I think it's relevant.
Yeah, apologies. I don't have that stat for the Olympic Village. The Olympic Village falls outside of the Broadway planning area.
Oh, I know. I'm using that as an example because it's right across the street from this site, and if this site was to provide purpose-built rental where we don't have any, I just am curious about that.
Yeah.
So if that comes available, that would be great. I just have another question around the noise. And the concerns around noise, you know, I noted that, you know, some of the establishments. I mean, Nook Restaurant is one that's come up. Others have brought that up. There's residential above Nook restaurants. So I'm not sure if that is an issue there. Vintage Provisions is more of a bar restaurant that's right in the heart of the industrial area we're talking about, and there's four single family homes, a heritage homes right across the street, which is much more street level and would be, I'm sure, single pane windows based on the age of the buildings. There are probably much greater impacts with those residents. Do we have any sense of where these complaints have come from in the past and the difference of, I think it's nine stories or six stories of industrial and then sort of a tower of residential and then the difference in terms of how far away those residents are from the source of the noise?
I don't know exactly the, you know, the origin of those complaints. What I will say about the vintage provisions, that's the project where they've retained that heritage house. That is in the Mount Pletland.
I'm sorry we're at time. Okay.
Thanks. Thanks to staff for answering all the questions. My question was around the floor plate size. One of the speakers mentioned that the floor plate size is quite substantial. And I'm just wondering staff's perspective as to whether or not that's true. And I'm referring to the tower floor plate, not the podium, which I think the speaker may have been referring to by looking at the model.
Thank you for the question. David Chaud-Dem-L-Panner. Yeah. So the policy expectation for residential floor plate is 6,500 square feet to maximum 7,200 square feet. The proposal right in front of you is actually. at 13,000 square feet, because generally because of the tower will be considered anything above four stories and the podium height is at six stories. Now with the conditions where the where we are lowering the podium to six to three stories, that would get to the tower foot, the proposed tower full of place size of 8,000 square feet.
Okay. That is still higher than why. what we would typically expect. Okay. Thanks for explaining that around the relationship to the decrease in the podium size. Haven't we recently introduced more flexibility around tower floor plate sizes?
Yeah. So, I remember having a discussion about it with Broadway plan and, you know, improving development viability, and I believe it was 8500, up to 8500? Yeah, so I could help clarify. The standard Broadway plan floor plates 6,500 square feet. We introduced director planning guidance on circumstances in which we would consider for kind of a standard kind of 20, 25-story tower of around 7,200 square feet, acknowledging that taller buildings with more elevator banks lose efficiency. So taller buildings, as a matter of principle, we would allow kind of more in that 8,000-foot range.
Okay. Just by way of history, I think it's important to.
acknowledge the back and forth in exchange we've had with the applicant on this, the original proposal that transitioned the project from an office to a residential, more or less extruded a very similar kind of very bulky residential floor plate of a similar size to what the office was.
Yeah.
Through some discussion, we suggested it would be very important that it resemble something closer to, more of a standard, recognizing that the 8,000 still is exercising some more flexibility beyond what a standard floor plate might be in the Broadway plan. But we looked at the tower separation, a specific context to arrive at that as a acceptable outcome. Okay.
So when it was an office proposal, that floorplate was larger than 8,000 square feet?
Yes, for sure.
It was a shorter, much wider building. And is that because of the flat iron aspect of the lot?
Isn't it kind of a flat iron? Yeah, I think it's a relatively constrained sites. I think they were trying to optimize the floor plate there when it transitioned to a residential component. We tried to help work with the applicant to shape something that was more a standard.
Okay. Okay. Thanks, Josh. And just quickly, the council of law was asked about rental buildings. There's this couple in the Olympic Village I can think of offhand. So that's helpful.
Thanks. I just wanted some more details of the arts, culture, and entertainment, small businesses that operate in the Mount Pleasant Industrial Area and particularly close to this site.
Yeah, so we did look into that. We found, you know, looking at census data and then also at business license data, we're estimating there's between 200 and 250 jobs specifically in arts and culture related businesses in the Mount Pleasant industrial area. That's about 30 arts and culture businesses total with 250 employees. Examples are the Beaumont Studios, LeBont School of Acting, Vancouver Performing Stars. I have a list here, yeah.
And what kind of work would you be doing or are you already doing to help foster and preserve those businesses in the planning work?
Yeah, so the current zoning does have a provision where you get a little bit extra density if you provide the city with artist studio space. It's not, no, we're not seeing too much take up on that right now. Something we could look at as part of the area planning work is ways to, you know, encourage arts and culture space be provided as a condition of more development rights. And I think Templar was mentioning the possible use of CACs or just. development charges for arts purposes in this area.
Could you elaborate on that?
Yeah, yeah. So it's related to what I just said. It's basically looking at, you know, development tools or urban planning tools we have to allow the building to be slightly larger if the developer does something we like, such as a contribution towards arts and culture or a provision of arts and culture on the site.
And those kind of options would be developed as part of the work that you're doing?
They would be looked at, absolutely.
Okay. And can you briefly run through the relative staff time requirement for the different options that are before us?
Thank you very much. I'm attempted to provide some clarity before as their closing remarks. So I'm just going to stick with the type three in the flexibility clause options. So in a type three amendment process, subject to counsel's decision today, staff would refer that up to Metro Vancouver staff for circulation, consultation, a committee meeting, a board meeting, a public hearing for Metro to decide upon the proposed change. We would also concurrently advance an ODP amendment to redesignate our RCS regional context statement to reflect that as well, subject to Metro's approval, subject to that public hearing to amend the RCS designation. Then the bylock can then come forward, the zoning bylock could then come forward for council's consideration and enactment. We think that's. that can all happen in a type three process in a best case scenario within this calendar year. It may not stretch and it may overlap the election period. Again, these are all things that we, some of these things are beyond our control of when we could actually advance them. On the flexibility clause option, we would skip the metro process, which again is measured probably in a period of months. Again, I can't specify exactly how long the difference would be, but it could be three months. It could be six months difference. But again, we would still try to advance that. change, which includes an RCS designation change for our own RCS purposes, this calendar year for council. And again, we think we could do the RCS change before this council breaks for the summer, too.
Thanks. And in terms of the industrial land flexibility cause, can you just explain to me? So of our 2%, we've got 11 hectares left. And can you tell me how much would this take up and how much would be left over? And how long has it taken us to use up what we've already used up to give me an idea of how much we need for the future?
Thank you. So the flexibility clause allows for up to 2% of the industrial base to be converted in the absence of going through a type 3-3 amendment process. For Vancouver, that works out to be 13.5 hectares. We've got about 11.1.1.5 hectares. 0.5 hectares remaining, so we've used two. This site is only 0.17 hectares, so about 1.5% of the remaining bank. For the city, we haven't used it often, as Josh and Tien mentioned in the presentations earlier. Typically, it's been used or it's only been used for things of either city-owned lands or provincial interests or city interests, including temporary module housing lands or the delivery
in support of St. Paul's. Sorry about that. We're at time. Thank you. Thank you. Counselor Fry.
Okay. Lots of questions. So zooming out. just less than 6% of our land in the city is industrial. The exceptional sites, how much of the 6% industrial is the exceptional sites potentially looking at this future work program?
I had that number and I'm trying to recall exactly how much of the industrial land bases. Generally. So the team is saying 14% of our total industrial land base is covered by the exceptional sites motion, 14% of our industrial land.
Okay. So, okay. That's helpful. Now, the concerns, as I understand them from you, largely is around precedent in the context of this exceptional sites. Now, is it more specific to the, what are we, when I see zoning along 2nd Avenue? Is that the gist of the concern more broadly? Or is it like all the industrial sites?
It, we are concerned. We are receiving calls. For meetings, people asking, hey, can we come in and talk to you? So it's not just Mount Pleasant. We are concerned. Here comes, Josh. Sure. Maybe I'll just reiterate what I talked about in the, sort of my opening remarks. I think with respect to the exception in clause in particular, it was not included in the report, as you've seen. It was an issue that's sort of arisen and been requested more recent. recently. And I think the principal point we wanted to convey was us's staff could not see, like based on site characteristic alone, a sort of a credible way to say, well, we should use it here in this instance, but then talk to other applicants that are interested or for sure would be interested in taking advantage of that clause that qualify based on the criteria and be able to say, well, you should be able to use it, but we, you shouldn't. And so that I think that was part, that formed part of the request insofar as counsel's able to provide a resolution that gives us some language that helps us, maybe abate some of that concern. That's a productive ring fence that we can receive and utilize. And the ring fence is a legally permissible, vetted kind of concept that we've, I know there's amendment. Yes. I think what Templar was. partially saying was we can't, we can't fetter future decision has your limitations, right? Like you can tell us to say, don't recommend it to us, but you can't say to a future counsel, thou shall not approve an exemption clause. That's part of the sort of the nature of the limitations of that ring fencing, so to speak. Nevertheless, it is helpful. And so this is an I, or I1C, and I think the commercial linkages, we did amend the I1C to have commercial languages that could go to arts and culture. If I'm wondering correctly, that was last term.
That's the one. This is the same. We're talking the same. Okay. Raised an interesting point with Michael Geller about the whole concept of industrial live work. And I realize we couldn't necessarily shoehorn this into this project, but to Mr. Geller's point earlier about it being taxed under empty homes, is that a real issue for our industrial live work?
Yeah, I'm not 100% sure about that. We do know that live work, you know, are often just condominium live units. They have to be built to a higher building code standards so that people can do business in them. There's a building code, like, clause about that, but they are often used just as housing, and I guess if they're empty, they would, they would attract the tax. Not empty. If they're used for purposes, they're taxed. I have heard, I recall last term concerns around the taxation and the split assessment, and then artists erroneously saying, claiming too much. Anyway, conversation for another day, because,
but it is one that I'd like to follow up on, actually, because I think it's fascinating. And I realized this is 25 years ago, but 28 UConn Street. That is the Yukon House. It's the lookout operated shelter. It's in the, it was rezoned in 2000 from I-1 to CD1. What was the process there? Was that considered, was that an exceptional use to warrant that rezoning? Sorry, for throwing that way out of
left field. Thanks, Councillor Fry. That predated my time, but I do believe that was an exceptional case, because I believe it's social housing or supportive housing. Both. Yeah, it's shelter and residential.
Okay, I'm out of time anyway, so, but thank you. Thank you very much. Okay. Clerk, did we receive
any additional public comments since the closed public comments? We did not. I'll remind
council that the staff recommendation for item number four is to refer back to staff and we need to move a motion together with the yellow memo dated January the 12th, 2026 entitled CD-1 rezoning 320-360 West 2nd Avenue amendments to modify rezoning conditions. Council will now make its decision on this application. Do we have a mover for the recommendations and the yellow memo?
Well, hold on. Sorry, we have some options here. So we could have a seconder or a councillor could put forward one of the alternative recommendations. Or a councillor can move the new, the new mo, sorry, excuse me, tongue-tied here, new motion language from staff to the amendment distribution list.
So with that, is there anyone, yeah, why don't we take a five-minute recess? Thank you. Oh, sorry. Councillor Orr?
Okay. Councillor Kirby-Yung. Yeah, I was waiting, so I was listening to some of the questions from other councillors
and that earlier that had expressed interest in different options and we're exploring it. But at the interest of getting this process moving and discussion, I can. move and strike and replace alternate recommendation as opposed to us taking a break. Because we do have to do all this in the public eye, right?
No, it's, I'm sending it right now.
Councillor Kirby-Yung, I'm going to advance you. You have the floor again?
Yeah, I emailed it in. I don't know if the email is slow right now. Oh, there it goes. Okay. So I will, I imagine that we still might want to take a break for council to sort of review and absorb this, but I'll introduce it to provide some context. So this motion can replace the staff recommendation and the staff recommendation for clarity is to refuse the application. This one is an alternate recommendation to approve it in principle to, I'm not going to read all of the language because it's long, but I'm going to hit the highlights just for context for everybody. To invoke the municipal flexibility clause in section 2.7 of the Metro regional growth strategy and to include some ring-fencing language that's council direct staff to not further recommend use of the municipal flexibility clause as provided for in section 6.27 until after staff report back to council on the planning work for the Mount Pleasant industrial areas and exceptional site as per the council motion of July 23, 2025. I just want to provide some quick context on the amendment and then we can take Thank you. And then we can take a break if council needs it to digest it. And I spend a lot of time in this area. There's some comments from some folks that it's dead. It's not. It's a very thriving and existing ecosystem. There's a lot in the area. There's breweries. There's wineries like Fabricco. I was actually there last night. I hate to admit this, but I actually did it and went to a sourdough making class, which apparently is a whole thing. And I don't know how you can spend a lot of time doing it. but there's pop-up comedy nightclubs. There's the birdhouse. There's Astro Club Arts facility. It's not just tech. There's bioscience with Aubera. There are commissaries. There are dance studios. Pottery studios. There are Northern Greens doing indoor vertical farming. There's a lot of science and a lot of interest going there. I'm not convinced that all of our industrial woes in this area are due to vacancy. I think that we have a miss hit with respect to our industrial policies. And I do think they need to be reviewed because I don't think the space that we're delivering makes sense. I'm very concerned about protecting an existing ecosystem. This is a unique area compared to some of the industrial sites, and I'm not going to provide comment on them, but they're all quite distinct and different in the city. Where there's Marine Gateway, the former Molson lands, et cetera. They all have really different contexts. But this is an existing ecosystem that needs to evolve and modernize, but it needs to also maintain the heart of what makes it interesting and exciting. And there's lots of life and production and creativity and art that is happening in the area. And I think that it's important to protect that. Do we have a hole currently on West 2nd, which is immediately opposite of highly populated residential area and Olympic Village? Yes, we do. The bottom line, whether this went ahead under the existing allowable use, is that the industrial FSR is exactly the same. It's 2.0. It's two floors. And if you look at the number of floors, you end up with about 12 or 13. more on a much skinnier tower than you would have on the wider floor plate, but you would have about six floors of office necessarily above there. So I can see an interesting review of this particular neighborhood, not dissimilar to the West End that recognizes it was a leafy green neighborhood and the interior character is quite different than the exterior perimeters. And so it will be interesting, I think, to see staff's analysis of this work and how we maintain and support it. And I struggled with this one, a lot. I sat on the Industrial Lands Task Force at Metro Vancouver, I'm very familiar with how constrained industrial land is, but the nature of industrial itself is changing, and particularly in Vancouver in the city as a whole. And so we have developed a lot of spaces. When you walk into them, it's not necessarily industrial use. The real gritty use is happening in the older buildings that are coming to end of life. That's going to be the hardest challenge to maintain is to keep those folks in the area because they are oftentimes sort of hanging on by a thread, and they're not going to be able to afford to level up some of the newer space. That is really the inherent challenge, I think, that we face. So I sort of recognize that, and then I recognize this particular situation, which is sort of just as you come around that curve and you sort of head in there, but it is on the periphery of the neighborhood, and it is, I think, a particular unique situation challenge, but I don't want it to impede on sort of the thoughtful work and the analysis about how the overall Mount Pleasant industrial area will be protected and will be supported in modernizing and moving forward, but not at the price of losing a lot of those uses that I mentioned that are already there. So that's what's on the floor for consideration at this point. Thanks.
Great. Thank you very much. So did we? Yeah. So I do recommend we take a five-minute recess. Great. Thank you very much. On to Councillor Maloney, if you can enable your camera, please. Okay. Councillor Maloney.
Yeah, I sent through a draft amendment to the amendment, but I would like to withdraw it if that's possible.
Okay, so I'm going to put you in the amendment queue.
Oh, you don't want to do.
Speak to what's up on the screen. Okay, yeah. I'll just, yeah. This is fascinating. You know, I think future councils will sort of just study this. You know, and I really, you know, I'm not a both sides person usually, but I absolutely can see both sides really clearly here. It's really interesting. I mean, you know, I don't think I fully have a solid grasp of this. But I do know the area. I've done it. My first art show was actually a photo essay about this, about these lands. You know, so I know how important it is. We heard from Christina DeMarco about industrial land. And we also heard that it's one of the most successful industrial areas. You know, we heard about that potential to increase speculation and clouds. the ongoing policy work. We heard that, we heard even that housing isn't worth the tradeoff, potential conflicts with art studios and spaces. Actually, this space was where one of the 10 locations that my band actually rehearsed at throughout the city. So it would be cool if jazz spaces went back in, but I know that's out of my purview. You know, we saw my colleague, Lisa Domino's basically skis. catch out the different timelines. It was pretty interesting. And, you know, we heard about other jurisdictions sort of, you know, looking at this and sending a message to neighboring mountain municipalities and that we heard from Louis Schwartz that there's 12 industrial projects sort of looking at tonight. But also that this isn't a no forever and that it was to defer back. But then at the same time, you know, we heard that this is, you know, if this was a block over, this would be approved. You know, we heard about that. this sort of, you know, why is second just sort of exempted and, you know, there would be housing, you know. We heard, you know, there are about lots of different spaces for lease. We heard the need for more rentals. And we heard that the applicant was confident that he would get this project off the ground and that there would be no loss of industrial. And that industrial is, in fact, changing. The nature is changing. And we heard about this. whole so many times. It's sitting there. So, you know, it's, we heard that it won't set a precedent because it's so unique as well. So I'm quite interested in this amendment in terms of ring fencing and flexibility option, all things that I've just learned in the past few days. So it's, you know, it's a really interesting thing. I really appreciate the amendment or the motion to sort of take in into consideration. that that speculation. I think it's really well-worded. So, yeah, I'm going to have to absorb a little longer. But, yeah, I just really appreciate the whole process.
Yeah, thanks very much, Mayor. And thanks to the mover, Councilor Kerbillon. I won't, I'll save most of my remarks for the final motion, but I, and I'm a must that we'll be able to come back after this, or is this our final? I think we'll come back. We would come back on. Oh, it's the one at time. Okay. So I'll just, I'll just sort of speak broadly. I do support the thrust of the changes in this motion. I want to thank staff. I want to thank all the speakers who came and spoke to this one. There was really great conversation and debate. And I think the level of engagement really reflects just how much people care about Mount Pleasant. and it's about jobs and the future of our city. And we've talked about all the different dynamic types of businesses and communities that are represented in this area. And I really do want to respect the concerns raised. I heard from our friend Louis Schwartz and Mr. Geller, among others, and, you know, there are a lot of good points here. And I think that many of their concerns I share as well. But I do think in this particular situation is Council's job to, to, to, you know, not necessarily restate policy, but I think it's an opportunity to exercise judgment here and to apply policy thoughtfully to the facts that are for us. And to respond to the real conditions the city is facing again today. And I have, in my remarks and questions, in the last few days, I've talked about our economic challenges and the need to make sure that we are very focused on growing our economy. And this is a place that will absolutely be the best. beating heart of our economic roads. And also just it's noteworthy. There are people already live in this neighborhood. There's housing scattered and people. There's residential that is from a long legacy of this neighborhood, but it exists there today. And of course, across the street. We see supportive, below market and market rental housing along West 7th Avenue and woven woven right throughout the entire area. And people already live alongside workplace. studios, offices in these areas, workers commute here by transit bike and foot. And we're going to have, it'll be surrounded by three different rapid transit stations. And but the Olympic Village station, which I actually took a ride as a guest of S&C. Lavin Land just before the Canada line opened. And I remember my guide telling me the Olympic Village station was known among them. as Larry Station, meaning then Mayor Larry Campbell, because he had fought so hard for it. But it has underperformed because there isn't the amount of housing and density around there. This being just a few steps away provides that opportunity. And also, the proposal is not in introducing housing within the district, but it's on a boundary site on the northern edge of the area, ringed on three sides by housing and commercial uses. separated by an arterial street from a fully mixed neighborhood. And so that really matters in my sort of thinking and decision on this one. And we've heard a lot today about land speculation. I think we've had a very good discussion. The term ring fencing has been used multiple times, but it's clear for us that we have to try and make sure that we can employ measures through our policies to make sure that it's clear that this site has a distinctiveness that allows us to make a decision like this one. So we have, we have, this is, truthfully, I think this is why council directed staff to explore the exceptional lands framework. And so it doesn't weaken our industrial policy, but to apply intelligently where conditions warrant. And so saying yes to a truly exceptional site is not the same as saying yes as saying yes everywhere. And with regards to how. Housing. Just clearly we are in a housing shortage crisis and we need to cry and make sure that a great neighborhood like this one will have people here both for access to jobs in transit, but to create an evolving neighborhood here. And I don't have fears that the types of businesses here will be at odds with people living living. on the northern boundary of this area. So certainly Mount Pleasant is not frozen in time. It's always adapted. And so I think for this neighborhood to really adapt to become a innovation-driven community with tech, life sciences, digital production, and creative industries, I think our zoning policies have to adapt to that as well. So with that, I'm planning to support this. Thank you very much.
Thanks very much. Yeah, I do also very much. much appreciate the investment in time, both from speaker, from staff, of course, but really the speaker is bringing forward so much of the historical context of how we got here in this particular area that I think has been identified already as a very unique area worth preserving in many ways. And yet we still see, you know, the evolution of industrial and it's been talked about already. has really changed in so many ways in this particular area. And so there's a, there's a natural adaptability, I think, in Mount Pleasant, where we see agri-tech. We see, you know, there's the Miru, who, you know, the glass is right across the street in an Olympic Village. There's a whole new, integrated, I think, forward-looking, modernized version of tech happening in this particular area. And so with that comes. considerations. So this has not been an easy one for sure. I have spent also, like others, time thinking and looking at how we look at industrial across the city and across the region. I now sit on the regional planning committee with Metro, and this is a conversation we talk about, often not Vancouver-specific, but generally in terms of preservation of these areas. And as the city grows and changes, there are sites in this sort of future-looking work. outside of Mount Pleasant that also needs to be considered. And that works underway. Specifically to this site here, I really just wanted to address what I've been hearing in thinking about. And again, Christina DiMarco, Chris, you know, the work done many years ago to create policy, this is something to be incredibly proud of and also to not sort of throw the baby out with the bathwater, and I don't see that happening here. Louise Schwartz and the work that's done with the recycling alternative in all of the adjacent sort of recycling green hubs, you know, grid is a whole policy paper that's been developed that needs protecting. It's not in this area. It's across terminal, of course, on the other side. So I think I'm saying that that that all needs to be protected in some shape or form, and we're going to look at the policies that are going to ensure that we do that. the future. This site in particular, I, you know, heard from a lot of the speakers around the need for housing. Our vacancy rate is coming up with this council and others have approved a lot of rezoning. But those approvals are not necessarily getting built. They're getting flipped. They're getting sold. This one will get built. You know, I'm not going to state again that there's a hole in the ground, but we've heard that there is a massive 40-foot hole in the ground for two years. this one's actually going to move forward and actually going to deliver rental units faster than I think a lot of projects that we see come forward in this council in the last year. So we have to remember no one can live in approvals. We have to actually create the conditions where homes can be built. There's no net loss of industrial. It's one crosswalk from Olympic Village where there is housing, but I'll say there are only from my quick research, three purpose-built rental housing. everything else is strata condo and then there's co-ops so we actually are missing this type of housing in this area it's one crosswalk from Olympic Village in three minutes walk from the Sky Train Station I think in terms of noise I don't I haven't heard reason to be as concerned just sort of the built form and where the residential units are going to be and the distance from the sort of Street level restaurants and bars and things like that I heard a speaker comment that it could be storage units and that would be okay. I don't agree. Storage units are not a satisfactory alternative for the site, but it is a pressure that we see elsewhere where industrial uses and that application is very difficult for all the different industrial uses, creating jobs, and so the default is to turn them into storage units, and that doesn't create any more jobs or any more as strong economic development that I think we're looking to achieve. So I don't want that to happen here. So, you know, I guess my last 20 seconds, I'll just say I wish that we had taken staff's advice to not put in language to state that they will be invoking the flexibility clause. It was clear from staff's recommendations that's not necessary. Why we've pushed ahead with it, I don't know. So I was prepared to just support the staff language. I think there's going to be some pushback as a result. I know we've got the letter from Metro, but I just think the grand scheme of things. We didn't need to do that, but I'm going to support this today. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Counselor, Kerby Young, for this thoughtful motion. This is a unique site, and I also, like many of my colleagues who have spoken so far, believe it is worth trying this concept of mixing light, creative industrial space with rental housing on a site like this, given its unique location on the edge of the Mount Pleasant Industrial Area, where the other side of this street is full of condominiums. I mean, if you're on the north side of West Second, it's condomania. But if you're on the south side of West Second, it's struggling. And as mentioned by many of the speakers who spoke in support of this application, there's many vacant spaces. And some of the zoning changes that are already in place haven't really resulted in the development that we'd like to see in that area. And of course, we can't forget, this is 400 meters from the Cannon Line Station and Olympic Village. So I do believe that this is an ideal location for a mixed rental and light industrial building. That said, I think that speakers on both sides of the debate made very strong points today. and I took them into consideration while deliberating over this. I mentioned that I believe that this is a balanced approach. Right now, this site is a pit. It's a hole in the ground. And the office market, as many of us are aware, has cratered vacancies are higher than they've been in many, many years, probably decades. And if we're waiting for a light industrial project with office space on top of it to be built here, we're going to be waiting a long time. We have a proposal here that will bring new space, new light industrial space, and 200 rental homes with no displacement on this site. I know through many of the other public hearings that we have around development of new rental homes, there's, you know, concern around displacement. And I share those concerns. This is an opportunity to build new rental homes and new industrial space. I also feel that it is an appropriate place to have a transition of the typology of the neighbourhood. So going from the predominantly residential use with ground floor retail on the north side of the street to the south side of the street where this site is located to have a mix of light industrial and rental homes. And then transition on the next block to Mount Pleasant and the industrial typology that already exists there. We also do have some successful examples of similar mixed-use developments in Vancouver. Archetype is one that people may have noticed on East 2nd, or near East, I think it's on East First and Main Street, recently completed. It blends light industrial, retail and office space and rental homes. And I think it looks fantastic. And I think it's a great addition to the neighbourhood. And I think that's what we can do here with rental and light industrial. I also wanted to address some of the concerns around noise. And I don't have a ton of concern around that. Given the changing nature of light industrial, the firms and businesses we see in Mount Pleasant in the newer buildings, which are video game studios, high tech, you know, they're not really, we're not making, you know, heavy industry or manufacturing goods. And I also think the fact that this is a rental building, and just to be clear, I would not be supporting this if this was not rental. The fact that one entity owns the industrial spaces and the rental apartments means that they can really manage the whole building holistically, and they can ensure that the tenants that are selected for the light industrial space work well with the fact that there's residential in the building. So all that said, I believe there's a strong argument to approve this project, given the context and location, and with the protections outlined in the motion, I am mindful of opening up industrial areas to land speculation, and I don't want to see that. So I believe that this will, the measures in the motion will limit that. And I'll be voting in favour. And in the meantime, I look forward to the development of this project and the new rental homes it will bring and not looking at a hole in the ground for the next 10 years. Thanks.
Thanks, Mayor. And I'll try to not to repeat my colleagues, because I think that my colleagues have made some really good points and articulated a lot of thoughtful reflections on this application. I do want to acknowledge at the outset my appreciation for the different perspectives that were shared and quite diverse. We had a number of people speak who have a long history in the planning space and experience here at the city, but beyond we had a number of, we had some younger speakers as well, involved, and we had a whole range continuum of individuals who reflected the importance of maintaining, protecting our industrial land, but also on the other end of the spectrum, the need for housing. And I, you know, I was compelled at one point when I was looking at the maps and the presentation by the applicant where, you know, with this industrial area that it was bounded, the three boundaries, were residential and then there was this one boundary that was not, even though despite the fact it was directly across from an entirely residential area. And when I asked staff about the other uses, even though they're zoned industrial along that block, it was only to discover that, in fact, they're not all being used for industrial at this point. And then I was listening to a speaker who, and hopefully I understood what he was trying to say, but he talked about in terms of urban planning that you would potentially have more of your light creative industrial more on the, say, inside of your city and on the periphery, your heavier industrial. And when you think about Vancouver in terms of its geography, we don't have really much in the way of heavy, heavy industrial inside the city proper because we've put so much housing over time all over the city. So really, and it makes more sense to have your heavy industrial close to your port access. close to your freeways. And so I just identifying that because it hasn't been really talked about, but we, and the notion of industrial, someone challenged, I don't know who was on council, challenged this term of using the term industrial, because really what we're seeing in our urban centre is not that heavy industrial of, you know, logs being hauled out. And actually it's increasingly hard to do that because movement of goods in our city is very challenged because we've built up the urban environment so much. that between pedestrians, cyclists, cars, residential is already existing. It's actually very hard to do anything, heavy industrial. And then you look at what the existing uses are, and I think Councillor Kirby-Yung highlighted the continuum and diversity of uses and already there in terms of agrotech, biotech, arts and culture, visual, high tech. And I've toured a number of those buildings, so I've seen it for myself. But I do challenge, and I appreciate that the research was cited about other cities and jurisdictions that have gone down this path of combining housing and industrial and one stated that it has failed at, I think every jurisdiction was cited. And I challenge that premise that there must be, and I, you know, examples of where this is successful. And surely, in a world where we've got AI now, we've got so many different innovations that we cannot have the light industrial creative coexist in a housing development. I just find that shocking. So I challenge that premise of it. And then I also, we've talked a lot about policy and frameworks. Frameworks, you're talking to the person who developed policy for many years. You do need to have a framework for when you're, whether it's urban planning or whether you're doing social policy. But I also think you need to be prepared to pivot. And the environment we're in today is that increasingly governments need to pivot to the circumstances. And in this particular instance, I do think it is unique. I appreciate the amendment in terms of wanting to have the ring fencing and to not necessarily use this flexibility clause on a regular basis. But at the end of the day, we can end up pushing things into planning processes forever. And you're talking to somebody who's done planning for most of my lifetime. And then we can get into it. inertia. And so I think we need to look at this unique circumstances is a very unique one where the builder already has a hold of. They've said they'll meet the 100% industrial and also has a proven record as a developer. I know that we have approved rezoning here where we've known very little about the builders and developers that we've approved and rezoned those sites. Here we actually have a developer with a very strong record in the city. And so trying to balance all the comments I've heard and I appreciate this isn't sounding particularly eloquent this evening. But I think that you're over time. Oh, I'm over time. Look at that one. But I will say I support
the motion that was moved. And I think it's sorry, Councillor, thank you. I have to treat everyone the same here. Sorry. Councillor Maloney.
Thanks. I think it is really important not to downplay the importance of industrial zoning. A lot of my decade of work at the Environment Protection Authority in Melbourne as an in-house lawyer dealt with the impact of industrial uses on residents and conflicts. And I remember one administrative appeal hearing I worked on dealt with an industrial facility that had workers' cottages built directly around it so workers could, I guess, walk to work more quickly. And, you know, while the original workers may have begrudgingly put up with the noise and vibrations and odour and danger of the industrial use, decades or centuries later residents paying top dollar for a home in a place with rising property prices are far less inclined to do so. And I also witnessed in Australia a myriad of small, sticky carpeted live music venues that were incubators for an incredible wealth of Australian bands like AC/DC and Inxs and Crowded House and Midnight Oil close their doors under the pressure of increasing property values and residents' complaints about noise and disruption. So, you know, as staff mentioned, the origins of zoning restrictions arose to manage the interface with incompatible uses, especially industrial and residential. However, industry and economic conditions are changing and I think Mount Pleasant is very different than traditional industry areas where it's cut and dried. So it's a more complicated situation and I support staff very much working on modernising and adapting zoning to meet current circumstances and the particular different characteristics of the five areas identified in. in the original motion. I mean, I like this design and I accept the industrial landscape is changing, and I would very much like to see 200 new rental homes built close to transit and jobs and amenities and close to the the downtown core. And the motion directing staff to do this work did direct them to continue to process existing applications. So this situation was to be expected. I would echo Councillor Bligh's reservations about directing the use of the industrial lands flexibility clause and I do hope that staff incorporate as they put in their presentation clearly defined criteria for decision making regarding when and how to apply the flexibility clause in any future cases where it's requested, especially to privately initiated proposals inside their planning work. I will be supporting this, I guess it's a motion or a referral to staff. I'm not sure how to categorise it. It's very late and I'm tired. But I think that this is a project that I'm comfortable seeing going ahead on the periphery of the Mount Pleasant Industrial area and that that's a project. and that it is limited and I thought that there were some very good comments by my council colleagues. But with that reservation that industrial zoning is important and, you know, my support of this discrete aspect of it doesn't necessarily allay my concern. with some other aspects of the five areas that have been identified in that motion. So I'll definitely be exploring that. Thank you.
Yeah. Thanks. Also, long day. Yeah, I appreciate the general concerns expressed around the encroachment into industrial land. And I really appreciate the language around creating that bright line and how we are delineating Mount Pleasant and the I-1C land because I think that it is important to broadly ring fence our industrial lands in a cogent and tangible way. And it does make it difficult to say, well, you know, we're going to make an exception for this one site on the south side of Second, but not the rest of them. And where does that slippery slope begin and end? I mean, I lament that I wasn't present for the mayor's exceptional lands motion. because I think as we've learned, it has the potential to denude our industrial land from less than 6% to less than 5%, which I think should be more broadly a cause of concern for all of us. But this is a vacant site. And, you know, I went back and thought, you know, through as long as I can remember, it hasn't been especially productive industrial land. It's been like car garages and it's been like a two-story with office above. and it hasn't been doing real heavy lifting for industrial. It was retail for the most part. And so the site hasn't done a lot of heavy lifting for industrial for years. And the proposal that we see before us now does offer stacked industrial with the pivot to replace the commercial with residential that makes it pencil out. And so, I mean, it is actually creating industrial, in a sense, where there was none. So it is more conceptually kind of contributing to industrial land. Now, I do worry that some of the justification for this project and from my colleagues suggests that the proximity to transit is the driver, because I think by that same token, and to some of the earlier points, that that rationale effectively might serve up industrial areas that are doing heavy lifting for industrial, like on the flats and Marine Drive gateway. So I'm very conflicted. I do recognize this is a decent project from a, a good developer and it does deliver industrial land per policy. Speaking frankly, I probably would have preferred to follow the staff recommendation to refer this back because I think there are very complicated planning considerations that I know staff are grappling with and I totally respect their concerns and presentation. But at this council, we've been hearing fairly consistently that the development environment is too challenging and projects aren't penciling out and that we need to make more and more concessions to allow development to happen. And so where I'm, my preference would have been to refer this back, I think that Councillor Kirby-Yung's amendment does reasonably address some of the concerns around precedent. And I think it does take a more discretionary lens to this specific project. And it gives me some satisfaction that at least we're ring-fencing it conceptually and that when the final report comes back for the exceptional lands we can have that conversation then. So I will vote in support of this amendment from Councillor Kirby-Yung.
Great. Thank you very much, Councillor Fry. Okay, just to be clear, it's on the screen is what we're voting on. It is the only item that we're voting on. There is no other motion. And so with that, a reminder that any council member participating virtually whose video is disabled will be marked absent for the vote, pursuant to section 14.13 of the procedure bylaw. And by the way, sorry, Clerk, you wanted me to remind the council that this motion, whatever we're calling it, it's being moved with the yellow memo as well. Okay. Clear to everyone? Awesome. I'm now going to call the vote. If we can please go to the voting panel. And to councillors, if you can register your vote.
Great.
And that passes unanimously and that completes item number four. So can we have, by the way, thank you. I do want to say thank you to all the speakers, all of our team members, everyone who came out today for all their incredible work. Can we have a motion to adjourn? Councillor Kirby-Yung, seconded by Councillor Klassen. All in favour say aye. All opposed say nay. Great. Carried. This meeting is adjourned. Thank you, everyone.