Latest news with #AbundantHousing
Global News
16-05-2025
- Business
- Global News
Plan for 3 towers next to Commercial-Broadway station finally heads to public hearing
After nearly a decade of proposals, pushback and debate, a plan to build a set of towers next to one of Metro Vancouver's busiest transit hubs is getting a public hearing. About 100 people have signed up to speak for and against the proposed redevelopment of a Safeway lot next to the Commercial-Broadway SkyTrain station. The plan before council envisions three towers, with heights of 44, 38 and 37 storeys, comprising 1,044 rental homes. 2:14 Drastic changes made to Broadway-Commercial Safety redevelopment plan Ten per cent of those units would be secured at city-wide average market rates, while the remainder would lease for going market rates. Story continues below advertisement The proposal has generated strong feelings on both sides, with supporters arguing more housing is critically needed, particularly near transit, and opponents arguing the units won't be affordable. 'Vancouver has a crushing shortage of housing. For decades, we have not been building enough housing, and this neighbourhood, Grandview Woodlands, is a great example of this, we basically haven't built much new housing there since the 1970s, and as a result the population there is actually declining … despite the fact this SkyTrain station we are talking about is one fo the busiest transit hubs in the country,' Peter Waldkirch, director of Abundant Housing, told CKNW's The Jill Bennett Show. 'Burnaby just proposed an 80-storey tower … it's actually quite perverse, it's backwards that we are building bigger and taller buildings than this in the suburbs than we are in the heart of the city.' Get breaking National news For news impacting Canada and around the world, sign up for breaking news alerts delivered directly to you when they happen. Sign up for breaking National newsletter Sign Up By providing your email address, you have read and agree to Global News' Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy Opponents like Craig Ollenberger, chair of the Grandview Woodland Area Council, say the proposed secured market rental requirement is far too low. View image in full screen A rendering of the trio of proposed towers for Commercial and Broadway in Vancouver. City of Vancouver 2:05 Public hearings on controversial East Vancouver development postponed again Speaking on CKNW's The Jas Johal Show, he said the city should look to replicate what it did in the Broadway Plan, which is 20 per cent of units at 20 per cent below market rates. Story continues below advertisement 'It is bringing nothing but 1,000 luxury rental units to our community, suites that nobody will be able to afford. And for that the city is only asking for 10 per cent of the units to be at market rent,' he said. 'This community, the majority of people can't afford market rent.' The proposed redevelopment would also include a 37-space child care facility, a ground-level public plaza and an upper-level courtyard. The development has been contentious ever since it was first put forward in 2016, as part of the broader Grandview-Woodland Community Plan approved by the council led by then-mayor and now federal Housing Minister Gregor Robertson. Neighbourhood groups had rejected a previous version of the community plan, arguing it would radically change the neighbourhood's character, and the pushback led to a municipal citizens' assembly whose feedback was eventually integrated into the revised 2016 plan, which included a maximum tower height of 24 storeys. A proposal for the Safeway site envisioned two towers, one of them hitting that threshold. 2:04 Grandview Woodland development tour A subsequent version of the proposal, with the tallest tower reaching 30 storeys and composed mostly of condos, nearly made it to a public hearing in 2022, but was sidelined by the 2022 municipal election. Story continues below advertisement 'The economics have changed. Rents were lower a few years ago … interest rates were lower … community expectations were different. I think when this project started getting negotiated, you could argue against the need for more housing more successfully,' said Tom Davidoff, an associate professor of economics at UBC's Sauder School of Business. Davidoff said the pressure to get new units built and to comply with the provincial and federal governments' transit-oriented density requirements will likely weigh in the project's favour. The site would sit virtually on top of the intersection of two SkyTrain lines and the 99-B Line bus route. It's TransLink's third-busiest transit hub, and saw more than 6.2 million boardings in 2023. 'If you can't have density at the intersection of streets named Commercial and Broadway, where there is a major transit intersection, I don't know where you want people to go,' Davidoff said. With scores of people signed up to speak, Wednesday's hearing could go late into the evening, — with files from Alissa Thibault
Yahoo
05-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Los Angeles launches effort to encourage starter homes on city-owned vacant lots
The city of Los Angeles is launching a new initiative to encourage the construction of starter homes on small lots, an effort to provide relatively lower-cost for-sale housing and show how Los Angeles can densify without turning into Manhattan. The initiative, called Small Lots, Big Impacts, kicked off Wednesday with a design competition for architects and others to craft innovative plans for multiple small homes on one lot, with the hope those units will be less expensive than larger options being built by developers today. Winning designs are meant to eventually serve as preapproved city templates that all developers could use. Government officials also plan to start selling off a handful of small, city-owned lots to builders to demonstrate — in real life — what is possible with the designs. 'Angelenos should be able to buy their first home and raise their families in our city,' Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said in a statement. 'The launch of Small Lots, Big Impacts is a step toward that future.' Read more: Housing tracker: Southern California home prices dipped in January The initiative is a partnership between the city, the public-private program LA4LA and UCLA's cityLAB research center, which found that there are roughly 24,000 vacant lots in Los Angeles smaller than a quarter of an acre where housing is currently allowed. The city owns about 1,000 of these lots and plans to sell off about 10 of them as part of its demonstration project. Today, depending on the neighborhood, builders on lots of this size often construct large single-family houses or three to five large townhomes. Other times, nothing is built, because high construction costs mean developers won't make enough money unless they combine adjacent lots to build one large apartment building, said Azeen Khanmalek, who formerly worked in the mayor's office and is now executive director of the advocacy group Abundant Housing. The goal of Small Lots, Big Impacts is to provide another option: for-sale homes that are smaller and less expensive than a McMansion or a 2,000-square-foot townhome. "That isn't on the market" today, cityLAB director Dan Cuff said. To get there, designers are encouraged to use innovative construction materials and methods that would protect against fire and bring down the cost of overall construction. Officials said such designs could help Pacific Palisades build back after January's infernos. The City Council must ultimately approve the plan to sell off city lots. For now, officials hope to sell them to developers who could use the winning architectural designs to build for-sale homes. The city would use proceeds from the lot sales to fund down payment assistance for home buyers who would purchase the new units. According to the city housing department, eventual projects are likely to be between four and 20 units, with building heights ranging mostly from one to three stories. Architects are being asked to design for multiple homes on one lot, but competition organizers want them to do so while giving eventual homeowners access to the outdoors, natural light and a "comfortable relationship with neighbors." Cuff said she hopes the design competition and subsequent building on city lots will show developers they can make money doing the same thing on land that's now privately owned. She also hopes it will show the general public that Los Angeles doesn't have to rely on skyscrapers to grow. "These projects I think will really demonstrate that living together, with slightly more households on a site, is going to be a pretty nice arraignment," Cuff said. Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
05-03-2025
- Business
- Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles launches effort to encourage starter homes on city-owned vacant lots
The city of Los Angeles is launching a new initiative to encourage the construction of starter homes on small lots, an effort to provide relatively lower-cost for-sale housing and show how Los Angeles can densify without turning into Manhattan. The initiative, called Small Lots, Big Impacts, kicked off Wednesday with a design competition for architects and others to craft innovative plans for multiple small homes on one lot, with the hope those units will be less expensive than larger options being built by developers today. Winning designs are meant to eventually serve as preapproved city templates that all developers could use. Government officials also plan to start selling off a handful of small, city-owned lots to builders to demonstrate — in real life — what is possible with the designs. 'Angelenos should be able to buy their first home and raise their families in our city,' Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said in a statement. 'The launch of Small Lots, Big Impacts is a step toward that future.' The initiative is a partnership between the city, the public-private program LA4LA and UCLA's cityLAB research center, which found that there are roughly 24,000 vacant lots in Los Angeles smaller than a quarter of an acre where housing is currently allowed. The city owns about 1,000 of these lots and plans to sell off about 10 of them as part of its demonstration project. Today, depending on the neighborhood, builders on lots of this size often construct large single-family houses or three to five large townhomes. Other times, nothing is built, because high construction costs mean developers won't make enough money unless they combine adjacent lots to build one large apartment building, said Azeen Khanmalek, who formerly worked in the mayor's office and is now executive director of the advocacy group Abundant Housing. The goal of Small Lots, Big Impacts is to provide another option: for-sale homes that are smaller and less expensive than a McMansion or a 2,000-square-foot townhome. 'That isn't on the market' today, cityLAB director Dan Cuff said. To get there, designers are encouraged to use innovative construction materials and methods that would protect against fire and bring down the cost of overall construction. Officials said such designs could help Pacific Palisades build back after January's infernos. The City Council must ultimately approve the plan to sell off city lots. For now, officials hope to sell them to developers who could use the winning architectural designs to build for-sale homes. The city would use proceeds from the lot sales to fund down payment assistance for home buyers who would purchase the new units. According to the city housing department, eventual projects are likely to be between four and 20 units, with building heights ranging mostly from one to three stories. Architects are being asked to design for multiple homes on one lot, but competition organizers want them to do so while giving eventual homeowners access to the outdoors, natural light and a 'comfortable relationship with neighbors.' Cuff said she hopes the design competition and subsequent building on city lots will show developers they can make money doing the same thing on land that's now privately owned. She also hopes it will show the general public that Los Angeles doesn't have to rely on skyscrapers to grow. 'These projects I think will really demonstrate that living together, with slightly more households on a site, is going to be a pretty nice arraignment,' Cuff said.
