Trout Lake in East Vancouver. Vancouver has a view cone policy that has, for decades, protected many mountain views from various points throughout the city. But in 2024, the city council directed staff to review those protections and make changes to allow for taller housing development.DARRYL DYCK/The Globe and Mail
Young renter Alison Wick has known the uniquely unobstructed panoramic mountain view from Vancouver’s Trout Lake Park since she was a child.
She spoke at a Vancouver city council meeting last week to argue in favour of keeping it unobstructed by distant towers, and several hundred east side residents felt the same.
The city’s chief planner, Josh White, had said that it was neither “defensible” nor “justifiable” to preserve the views as they are from Trout Lake, also known as John Hendry Park, which is within walking distance of the Commercial-Broadway SkyTrain station. Mr. White acknowledged the overwhelming pushback they received from a public survey.
“What we did find is there is a strong preference for no incursion into the view,” he told council last week. “We didn’t believe that was a defensible or justifiable limitation on development opportunity relative to [the transit-oriented area]. That’s why you see the professional recommendation in front of you.”
City councillor Lisa Dominato said she’d received several hundred of those e-mails. City council voted unanimously that staff needed to come up with something more aligned with the uniqueness of such an asset.
Trout Lake offers clear views of the mountains without a trace of urban skyline. That’s a difficult view to find in a city filled with construction cranes. Mr. White told the council, “there is no denying” their proposed changes “would change the characteristic of the nature-focused view today.”
In an interview, he said: “Certainly, the strong preference of many incumbent residents is to keep it as it is,” said Mr. White. “And so, we took the view that we don’t think it’s defensible to have no development … and if that’s true, then it becomes a matter of degree of where is it most appropriate.”
On the west side there are significant parks, including Pacific Spirit Regional Park, Queen Elizabeth Park, Stanley Park, as well as beaches, trails and the 28-kilometre sea wall. The east side’s crowning glory is Trout Lake.
Resident and computer graphics expert Stephen Bohus manipulated this image of Trout Lake, which he says shows the view once developments add high-rise buildings. The proposed buildings at 2611 Victoria Drive and 1926-1978 East Broadway are pictured in the rendering. The Safeway site is on the extreme left.Stephen Bohus/Stephen Bohus
City staff had made the recommendations in response to the province’s transit-oriented area density legislation, which in turn has led to several development applications around the Commercial-Broadway station. The legislation requires a minimum 20-storey height within 200 metres of a SkyTrain station, but the city is open to heights that go well beyond that.
Ms. Wick, who rents near Trout Lake, took issue with Mr. White’s disagreement with the survey results.
“To me, that was very dismissive,” she said in an interview. “I think it is defensible – it’s a public good, and we want more housing, but we also want places for people in those houses to be. It seemed like their consultation was maybe not genuine and [they weren’t] genuinely looking to hear and work with the community,” she said.
Ms. Wick suggested that instead of partially blocking the mountain view with more high-rises, let’s preserve the view so existing and future residents can enjoy it in perpetuity. Once it’s gone, it’s gone forever. She said it’s especially important to preserve that sensation of open sky, park and mountains for people who don’t have cars to get out of the city.
“I’m not against new housing. I’m just against things that don’t make sense, things that aren’t done with actual genuine community connection and community in mind,” she said.
“It’s not necessary that we build 20-storey towers on that five-block strip of land in front of the mountains. Because there are lots of other places that we’re building a lot of housing.”
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Vancouver has a view cone policy that has, for decades, protected many mountain views from various points throughout the city. In 2024, the city council controversially directed staff to review those view protections and make changes to allow for taller housing development. Staff gave the Trout Lake view special consideration because they say it’s one of North America’s busiest transit hubs, and the provincial transit-oriented-area legislation calls for residential towers amid a housing shortage. However, the legislation also allows for exceptions that conflict with existing municipal policies, such as character and view preservation.
The city has received two development applications for towers that would obstruct views from Trout Lake, including a proposed 26-storey rental tower at 2611 Victoria Dr. and a proposed 33-storey rental tower at 1926 E. Broadway. The current policy allows for around 12 storeys on those sites, which Mr. White says would be tough for a developer to make financially viable, or “pencil out.”
The Safeway site has already been approved for three towers at 37, 38 and 44 storeys, which will sit outside of the protected Trout Lake view cone, but still visible, according to Mr. White.
The city staff’s updates to the Trout Lake view cone caught many residents by surprise. Ms. Wick and others complained that they weren’t given enough notice to consider such a major change. Resident Paisley Woodward, who spoke at the meeting, said the views presented to council had shrunk even more than the ones they’d been shown in the public engagement process.
“There is lots of development that’s gone in above the heights required by transit-oriented development,” she said in an interview.
Her point is that extra density the city has allowed elsewhere makes up for any density lost due to the view corridor being protected, said Ms. Woodward.
Melody Ma, a community activist who’s been fighting to protect view cones, also said there’s plenty of land in the city on which to build housing, including the massive Broadway Plan.
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“Why have this incursion into this last panoramic view that is so important to folks, especially those who live on the east side of Vancouver, where you don’t have ready access to the seawall?”
So, she was happily surprised by the council’s response to send the staff report back for review.
“I’m so used to this council just passing everything through, particularly things that are development-related,” said Ms. Ma. “And it was a unanimous vote, too, so I was happily surprised that the view cone – at least right now – has been saved. For the time being.
“City council has a signal that if they do want to get re-elected, that view cones are something that they need to consider,” she added.
Mr. White and his team now have the job of coming up with other options, finding that delicate balance between a prized public asset and the need to add significant density around a major transit hub. Whatever recommendations they come up with, the status quo likely won’t be one of them. Mr. White wants to open the discussion up to the broader community, and not just the “incumbents.” He believes some people will feel quite differently, such as those who might want to live in the proposed rental towers.
“We completely understand that that doesn’t necessarily align with many people’s preferences,” he said. “But that’s the nature of these types of trade-off conversations between two different benefits, the housing and development opportunity and what comes along with that … as well as public views.”