Check out this interview with Michael Kluckner by Charles Campbell in The Tyee.
Here’s a clip:
On density as an excuse for redevelopment:
“If the current [Vancouver] council collectively had a brain, they would realize that eco-density is an area like South Granville. These walk-up apartments — that to me is eco-density. There are 10 suites on a 66-foot lot. They’re affordable suites. If you tore that place down, and replaced it with a building that was in theory more environmentally friendly, it would take you about 40 years to pay back the energy that you used in building the new place. Plus you would lose affordability, which is another aspect of what I think of as eco-density. These are the people that walk, that tend to use transit, that are supporting the local businesses.
“We may come back in five years and find that the neighbourhood has changed because the buildings have been torn down and replaced by wildly ostentatious crap that people are building — the ‘limited collection of fine residences’ — and I think you’ll find that the net density will not really have gone up and affordability will be out the window. The place will work in a less environmentally friendly way, and you’ll lose heritage.”
The same thing is happening in Kerrisdale. They are tearing down three-storey rental buildings and replacing them with “luxury residences.” I expect density is actually decreasing.