Flawed Vancouver Views Data No Basis for Hasty Council Vote

BLOG POST posted on January 28, 2011 by Joseph Jones

What You See on the Ground (26 Jan 2011) [Bohus photo]

City Planner Spin (28 Jan 2011) [Bohus from City of Vancouver]

Posted by Joseph Jones with permission of author Stephen Bohus.

[Complete twenty-page Bohus letter with all supporting documentation]

Subject: Open Letter to Mayor and Council on Vancouver Views
From: Stephen Bohus
Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2011 12:36:49 -0800
To: gregor.robertson@vancouver.ca
CC: suzanne.anton@vancouver.ca, george.chow@vancouver.ca, kerry.jang@vancouver.ca, andrea.reimer@vancouver.ca, Ellen.Woodsworth@vancouver.ca, tim.stevenson@vancouver.ca, geoff.meggs@vancouver.ca, david.cadman@vancouver.ca, heather.deal@vancouver.ca, raymond.louie@vancouver.ca

January 28, 2011
Mayor Gregor Robertson and City Councillors
City of Vancouver, 453 West 12th Avenue, Vancouver

Dear Mayor Robertson and Councillors:

Re: February 1, 2011 Regular Council: Implementation of Vancouver Views and Opportunities for Higher Buildings Downtown

I am writing to urge you to reject the staff report and policy referenced above, to instruct staff to rectify serious problems in the report and consultation process (which I outline in this letter), and to start a new phase of meaningful public consultation.

Last week Council heard from about 40 public delegations on the topic of higher buildings. I would like to encourage Council to be very open to the issues and concerns they raised, and also at the same time to objectively and carefully scrutinize the statements and work produced by the Planning Department.

Kindly consider that the work produced by staff may not be of a high enough standard to be adopted 'as is'. Not a single unbiased or accurate 3D computer rendering was used in the staff panels for the 3 public consultation sessions in October of 2010. Planning staff refused to release the computer model to the public and hence none of the images presented by staff are independently verifiable.

The staff report, presentations, and public consultations are so fundamentally flawed that I believe a Council approval of the staff report and proposed policy on February 1st, 2011, would fail to serve the public interest. I believe the entire view study process should be started from the beginning, with meaningful cooperation with citizens groups and members of the public, and with the involvement of independent consultants agreeable to the public.

For Council's reference, I hereby provide a summary intermixed with images to explain several of my key concerns with the current state of Vancouver Views. I would also like to personally thank the 3 councillors who attended the CityHallWatch Citizens forum on January 11th to take part in the discussions; I've provided links to video presentations for other members of council.

Thank you for giving residents an opportunity to voice our concerns.

Sincerely,
Stephen Bohus, BLA

* * *

Links to Jan 11th Citizens forum on Views, presentations on YouTube:
http://wp.me/P18o1P-4n

Summary:
Though the staff report does not explicitly state it, the capacity/view/heights study actually tries to achieve two goals.

The first goal is to remove the Queen Elizabeth Park view control over much of the downtown. In this case the sites affected would revert to control by existing height bylaws (maximum "discretionary" height) or the control of other view corridors (where applicable).

The second goal would be to substantially increase heights on many of the identified sites over and above the maximum allowable under existing height controls without the QE view control. This would almost give developers a blank cheque to do whatever they wish on the identified sites, without the kind of painstaking review that was involved with the Shangri-La (when this development encroached upon public views).

There are a total of 8 identified sites for towers, including one in the West End (not 7 as indicated by staff). Summary of identified towers:

1) 425' tower (Southeast of Granville Loops)
2) 425' tower (Southwest of Granville Loops)
3) 48 storey tower (Burrard Gateway / or 53 storeys @ 550 feet)
4) 36 storey tower (Burrard Gateway lower tower on Hornby)
5) 375' tower (Davie Tower North at Burrard, community gardens, approx 41 storeys, clearly identified Jan 17, 2011)
6) 550' Alberni Street (west of Burrard)
7) 550' tower (Melville)
8) 700' tower (on W.Georgia, west of Burrard; there is a 19 storey tower on the site, so either a redevelopment of this site is being considered, or there's a possibility that this 700' tower is a precedent 'height' to include for a tower nearby such as the empty lot at 1151 W.Georgia between Thurlow and Bute)