Category Archives: Affordability

The Economist~Chinatown Resisting Developers in “Property Battle”

13 Friday Apr 2018

Posted by in Affordability, Annals of Walking, Architecture, Generational issues, Gentrification, Housing, Inequality, Social issues, Sustainability, Urbanism, Vancouverism

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Even the magazine The Economist is weighing in on the importance of Vancouver’s Chinatown as a historic and very special cultural place deeply rooted in the birth and development of this country.  One of the positive things that has happened with the impetus to build condominiums in Chinatown is the rise of  a new generation of articulate, smart and savvy young professionals that grew up in or coming to Chinatown,  understanding the essence of this place in a very rooted way.

Urbanist Melody Ma is one of those young professionals interviewed by the Economist, and talked about the Chinatown neighbourhood not really changing until after the 2010 Winter Olympics. At that time “the downtown area was forested with new condominiums” and prices have risen by close to 60 per cent in the last three years. While Chinatown was avoided by developers in the past, development applications such as the nine storey luxury apartments proposed for 105 Keefer threaten to undermine Chinatown’s cultural identity. Read on >>

Meeting On the Road To Change

11 Wednesday Apr 2018

Posted by in Affordability, Municipal Campaigns, Politics, Urban Planning, Urbanism

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Wondering who’s thinking about housing and might bring change to City Council? Here’s a few cross-party names.

The Struggle For Change

11 Wednesday Apr 2018

Posted by in Affordability, Housing, Municipal Campaigns, Politics, Urban Planning

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Vancouver’s October civic election contains a fascinating struggle by young new faces to effect real change on council and the city.

I’m seeing young people who are working to switch Vancouver City Hall from comfortable old party-centric positions and into an alliance of progressives, centrists and conservatives across party lines.  It’s beginning to look like there’s a movement to try to bring their housing-related ideas to council, where at least a bit of political power resides.

I’m not alone, it seems, in sensing the change:

Read on >>

Living with Kids in Higher Density~Five Kids, One Condo

09 Monday Apr 2018

Posted by in Affordability, Annals of Walking, Generational issues, Housing, Municipal Campaigns, Politics, Real Estate, Social issues, Sustainability, Transportation, Urbanism

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Three bedroom challenge (P/V)

Kirsten Dirksen is a television producer who has become an on-line video blogger.  Her company Faircompanies.com has a media site that looks at the aspect of less complicated, simpler living styles. As a vlogger she came to Vancouver to interview Adrian Crook who lives in the Yaletown area of downtown with five children in a two bedroom condo. Adrian likes living downtown for the health and psychological aspects of walking everywhere and notes that while “Vancouverism” includes a taller housing form in the downtown peninsula, that has not been embraced in the largely single family areas away from the downtown.

Price Tags Vancouver has chronicled  Adrian Crook’s quest to have his children using transit to school and Price Tags has also examined a program in Calgary with Bus Buddies where children are allowed to take transit to school. Adrian does have a blog about living in the downtown with his five children, and he is also running for City Council.

The  twenty minute video on YouTube features Adrian’s kids and shows the simple adaptations that have been made in the condo to maximize usable space. There’s a home office that turns into a murphy bed at night, a bunk bed that can morph into a table and desk, and a triple stacked bunk bed.  Parents everywhere will see in the video that  children’s socks still disappear -even in smaller footprint spaces.

 

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That Housing Thing

08 Sunday Apr 2018

Posted by in Affordability, Housing, Urban Planning, Urbanism

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Alex Bozikovic writes in the Globe and Mail on housing:  the hot topic now firmly entrenched at the top of the issues list in Vancouver’s civic election. [Ed:  the article may be paywalled].   It’s a terrific primer on the issue itself and on the political movement it has spawned among younger people in the city’s upcoming October civic election.

Daniel Olesiuk inside his Mount Pleasant apartment.

Thanks to MetroNews

Mr. Bozikovic starts by discussing the ideas of Daniel Oleksiuk and Abundant Housing Vancouver.

The brutal realities of Vancouver real estate are leading many young locals to think about these issues in a systemic way. And their central argument is powerful, once you understand it: That zoning, a form of municipal policy, protects expensive houses and forbids apartments that middle-class people can afford.

“We are a non-partisan group,” he said of AHV. “Arguing for more housing is something that seems to cross party lines.”

The ideas behind the issue are zoning, density and exclusion.  Coalescing around this issue is an emerging fresh young cohort of proto-pols looking for council nominations, since this is where some of the levers of power reside.  This includes the NPA, who have in the past seemed to represent only the very people opposed to up-zoning.  Talk about party lines crossed, generations divided and, one presumes, lively back-room discussions.

Bozikovic quotes Bruce Haden, of Urbanarium who hosted a recent Missing Middle Competition:

“Touching single-family house zones was until recently the third rail of municipal politics,” he told me in an e-mail. “I believe that those who are fearful of those neighbourhoods changing are now outnumbered by residents who are fearful of those neighbourhoods not changing, as they realized they may have to drive three hours to see their grandkids.

“Maybe people have figured out that being rich, old and alone on an empty street is not the most fun way to live.”

 

Ideas, Not Taxes – Solutions for Affordable Housing in BC

29 Thursday Mar 2018

Posted by in Affordability, Housing, Urban Planning

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Regular PT commenter Thomas asked to have this analysis he wrote of the ‘speculation tax’ posted on Price Tags, to provide a more complete overview of his thinking, with some specific examples.

So here it is.

TWO IDEAS FOR MORE AFFORDABLE BC HOUSING – RATHER THAN A NEW TAX

by Thomas Beyer

There is much debate these days about the new so called “speculation tax” in BC which levies 1% onto Canadians and 2% on foreigners who own houses or condos in BC that are not rented 6+ months. It also levies a 20% foreign buyer tax and expands the taxable region from MetroVancouver to 4 others regions (Victoria area, Nanaimo, Kelowna including West Kelowna and Fraser Valley).

The purpose is to allegedly improve affordability in BC – by reducing demand. To me, it is really an #EnvyTax to buy votes that will do little, if any, to increase affordability. Who really benefits if a home in West Vancouver drops from $4 million to $3.5 million due to these new taxes, or if a golf course condo on Bear Mountain that is vacant for eight months of the year is now sold in the market and drops from $800,000 to $725,000?

The predicable result: These new taxes merely cause many Albertans (and some foreigners) to sell, causing a short-term sell off in markets like Kelowna or Victoria, with a result of much less supply in the coming years and a negative impact on local retailers, restaurants and the construction industry. Add enforcement costs and the much envisioned additional several hundred million in taxes will likely not appear, as investors are not dumb. How ? Rentals are easy to fake to family members or friends, and it is easy to create local income taxes paid for a Canadian spouse of a non-resident foreign investor that owns multi-million dollar properties in the Lower Mainland.

Also keep in mind many immigrants [me included] come here because they can buy property, including land and many love large lots or large houses, not just tiny condos. It is part of the appeal to immigrate to Canada. Have a drive through Richmond, Surrey, Vancouver Island, Sunshine Coast or Fraser Valley for ample proof of that theory.Not everyone wants a small shoebox in the sky. Many want land. That puts an upwards price on land. Many immigrants come with money, and many more have connections from back home to friends, family and business associates with money.

Continue reading →

This Week in Victoria – 3

28 Wednesday Mar 2018

Posted by in Active Transportation, Affordability, Annals of Cycling, Architecture, Bicycling, Housing, Urban Design, Urban Planning

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This week, selected items and observations from a short trip to Victoria.

Back in 2016, Dan Ross reported on Victoria’s first protected bike lane on Pandora Street here.  Since then, as reported here, the City has moved towards a complete active transportation network in the core – notably on Fort Street, just now nearing completion.

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While I didn’t have a chance to get on a bike and explore it all, here are some shots which demonstrate the commitment the City is making:

IMG_6764Pandora at Government

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Pandora looking west to new Johnson Street Bridge

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Fort Street lane waiting to open

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Frontage lane at 525 Superior Street – a new provincial government office building

Inside the building, there are large bike rooms with lockers – but the designers provided parking capacity based on counts of use in other buildings with departments that were consolidated in this new one.  Guess what?  With better facilities, the numbers of cyclists so increased that the architects are trying to figure out to repurpose space for the demand.

Another lesson: this nicely designed bike ramp in the centre of the stairs leading to the bike rooms isn’t used all that much.  There’s a car ramp immediately to the left, and cyclists use it instead of having to dismount and carry their bike up the stair ramp.

 

Hong Kong Reviews Radical Housing Options

28 Wednesday Mar 2018

Posted by in Affordability, Housing, Infrastructure, Real Estate, Social issues, Urban Design, Urban Planning, Urbanism

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Another city that is really facing the housing squeeze is Hong Kong as reported in this New York Times article that describes five ways to deal with housing shortages. Price Tags Vancouver has already discussed the usage of drain pipe as temporary downtown apartment units in Hong Kong. Besides drain pipe as housing, other ideas such as “the return of the tenements” “building to the sky”, the use of cruise ships and the use of industrial port spaces are also being discussed.

How expensive is Hong Kong?  “A single parking spot sold for $664,000 last year. Apartments only slightly bigger, and in much less desirable parts of town, go for more than $380,000. Living spaces have shrunk so much that a new term has emerged: “nano flat,” for apartments measuring around 200 square feet or less. Many Hong Kongers have been priced out of the housing market, including young people forced to live with their parents. Their discontent is said to have contributed to recent street protests like the 2014 Umbrella Movement.”

While the government has charged a task force with considering potential housing options, the return of “tong lau” the tenements that used to exist before the advent of highrises are making a comeback. Renamed and repurposed as “Bibliotheque” tiny bedroom units of 50 square feet per unit share common bathrooms and kitchens, like a college dormitory. With rents at $450 to $750 a month these mini units attract mainly young residents.

Another idea is buttressing existing residential buildings and going higher, changing buildings from 25 stories to much higher buildings. Seoul Korea has faced similar pressure but bureaucrats note that above 35 stories the quality of life and connections for residents seem to decrease. Repurposing cruise ships for apartments and adding artificial islands off Hong Kong is also under consideration as well as repurposing the Port of Hong Kong’s 900 acres to accommodate hundreds of thousands of people. Hong Kong has already constructed  port residential developments in the Taikoo Shing housing project built on the former Swire Company dockyards. This development on 8. 5 acres has 61 residential towers and houses nearly 37,000 residents according to 2011 figures. But there is a cautionary tale~the median monthly rent in the rental units in Taikoo Shing is $18,000 to $35,000 Hong Kong Dollars  for units that range from 585 square feet to 1,237 square feet.

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This Week in Victoria – 2

27 Tuesday Mar 2018

Posted by in Affordability, Architecture, Housing, Urban Design, Urban Planning

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This week, selected items and observations from a short trip to Victoria.

The Victoria I grew up in was a product of the 1940s and ’50s.  Literally: this was the house my father had built in 1946 on return from the war.  Cost: $7,000, with a Veteran’s loan.  (In 2017 dollars: $102,000)

It is astonishing to me how much of that era is still intact.  Almost nothing has changed on the surrounding blocks, not even the corner store down the street.

 

Bringing my Vancouver eyes, I can see that era is coming to an end.  Land values are rising as the decades-old housing stock decays.  In some neighbourhoods, like Cadboro and Cordova Bays, it means the original house, regardless of condition or suitability, must be demolished and replaced with a development that maximizes the allowable density and provides all the amenities expected for million-dollar-plus accommodation.

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Three:

The same conundrum: the loss of more affordable housing (small houses on large lots, especially), a change in scale and character of the community, discomfort with speculation and empty homes – but a resistance to anything that might lower property values or tax the spectacular gains that one generation lucked out on even as they complain that their children can’t afford to live in the neighbourhoods they grew up in.

This is not the Victoria that established residents want, but it looks increasingly like the one they will be getting.