Planning, Land Use & Neighbourhoods

A commentary by an architect and urban design planner who has worked for more than 30 years in downtown Victoria Throughout Greater Victoria, more - and more diverse - housing is becoming a collective regional agenda, but care for urban quality and contextual scale should be integral to that quest. Continue gathering a healthy concentration of downtown growth, but there is no need for emphasis on excessive vertical tall towers. Keep to moderation, and foster vital streetscape

The biggest public backlashes against Victoria City Council (2023–2026 term) centred on a few recurring themes that generated the highest public anger, media coverage, and engagement across X (Twitter) and Facebook: Short-term rental (STR) restrictions (especially 2023–2024 provincial alignment and local implementation): Landlords, hosts, and tourism advocates saw it as economic harm and scapegoating. CHEK News coverage of delay motions drew thousands of views and dozens of r

In Greater Victoria’s rush to embrace “missing middle” housing, multiplexes have been marketed as the Goldilocks solution: not too big, not too small, and just affordable enough, if at all, for the elusive middle‑income household. But when you examine the actual strata fees, operating budgets, and developer practices behind these new buildings, a very different picture emerges. What looks like affordability on paper is often a carefully engineered illusion, one that shifts lo

Bill 44 must be repealed because it represents a sweeping, top‑down restructuring of land‑use authority pushed through without public consultation and municipal partnership. It is, put simply, a governance bypass: a bill that strips away public hearings, sidelines elected councils, and replaces community‑driven planning with a one‑size‑fits‑all mandate drafted behind closed doors. Back in 2023, when the most invasive Housing Bills were pushed through, several opposition MLAs

British Columbia’s sweeping housing reforms and land‑use overhaul were introduced and passed months before the Province publicly declared a “middle‑income housing crisis” in February 2024 with the launch of BC Builds. This is when the provincial government formally asserted that “middle‑income housing crisis” required direct state intervention. This means the most aggressive zoning, density, and municipal‑power‑limiting legislation in B.C.’s history was justified after the fa

Bill 44 delivers guaranteed density and instant land‑value inflation to developers and speculators, while handing residents the bill. It accelerates upzoning without requiring affordability, infrastructure investment, or accountability, fueling speculation instead of housing. Municipalities are left scrambling to fund the roads, sewers, parks, and emergency services this density demands, and Saanich’s tax spikes are the proof: public budgets absorb the costs while private act

Setbacks in Saanich’s single‑family areas are often dismissed as technical zoning details, yet they are one of the most powerful tools shaping the municipality’s character, ecological health, and quality of life. Far from outdated, setbacks remain essential to preserving the green, spacious, and safe neighbourhoods that define Saanich. In a moment of rapid policy change and densification pressure, it is worth remembering why setbacks exist, and why they matter. Setbacks prote

In many gateway cities – cities tightly locked into global flows of capital and people – immigration has become the largest component of population growth, and thus a major determinant of housing markets. In Vancouver, the arrival of wealthy migrants, many holding golden visas, plus significant offshore property investment, has contributed to rapid house price inflation. In a recent paper, Lauster and von Bergmann (2023) characterise local resistance to these trends as ‘housi

The city of Victoria is embarking on a bold journey by revising its Official Community Plan (OCP). This includes an extensive upzoning initiative that intends to transform single-family lots into areas designated for four-story apartment buildings. The city anticipates a population surge, but many residents and stakeholders are concerned about the necessity and impact of such drastic rezoning. In this blog post, we’ll examine the details of this upzoning plan, its potential i

Impact of Upzoning on Trees and Green Areas Upzoning refers to the process of changing zoning regulations to allow for increased density or height of buildings in a specific area. While it is often promoted as a solution for housing shortages and urban development, upzoning can have significant negative impacts on the environment, particularly concerning the loss of trees and green spaces, which in turn reduces biodiversity. Loss of Trees and Green Areas 1. **Increased Deve