The City of Vancouver is planning to expand and tweak its laneway housing program to encourage the building of laneway homes and make them more liveable.
Since the program launch in 2009, the city has issued 800 permits for laneway houses and more than 500 laneway houses have been built in single-family neighbourhoods zoned RS-1 and RS-5. These zones make up 94% of single-family lots in the city.
The city has announced that, later this spring, city staff will report to city council with proposed amendments to the program and guidelines to expand the program to other single-family zoned areas.
According to the city, proposed amendments will seek to:
- encourage the development of more one-storey laneway houses, which has less impact on neighbours and is more accessible to aging populations and families with small children;
- make laneway housing more liveable by allowing more floor area for living and storage space, without increasing the size of the house; and
- allow a faster permit process for one-storey laneway houses and ensure the provision of one-site parking.
According to the city, the laneway housing program will be expanded into the following new zones: RS-1A, RS-1B, RS-3/3A, RS-4, RS-6 and RS-7.
