Activists who oppose taller towers in Vancouver are worried the tower Jim Pattison Developments Ltd. and Reliance Properties Ltd. executives are proposing will cause too much shade in the downtown core.
City planners, however, say they have conducted extensive analysis of the potential for the tower at the corner of Hornby and Drake streets to cause too much shade. As a result of city staff research, the staff is recommending that council not support raising the height ceiling for the site from 350 feet to 550 feet.
“The developer has expressed an interest in a 550-foot-high tower,” said Brent Toderian, who is the City of Vancouver’s director of planning.
“Their application to us proposes 500 feet high because we told them that we would not support 550 feet high because of the shadowing in the intersection of Davie and Burrard streets.”
Toderian told Business in Vancouver that discussions between the developer and city staff are ongoing, but the developer understands any proposal higher than 500 feet high would not have city staff support.
“Ultimately, it is council’s decision, not staff’s,” Toderian told BIV. “That’s why we can’t say it’s a flat, ‘no.’ The city does not say ‘no’ during the process. What happens is the planning department recommends refusal.”
City council is expected to vote on whether to raise potential height limits on various city sites on January 20. (See “Taller buildings raising city citizens’ ire” – issue 1104; December 21-27.)