Here’s a “myth” –
The Metro Core is becoming a ‘resort’ economy.
Here are the “facts” –
The largest and fastest growing sector in the Metro Core is business services: computer services, law, accounting, management consulting, advertising, engineering, etc. (The number of these jobs has more than doubled in 20 years.)
This comes from “Myth and Fact – Metropolitan Core Jobs and Economy Land Use Plan” – a summary of the most common perceptions about the state of downtown Vancouver (including the Broadway corridor). You can find more about the study here.
Here’s the area the study covers:
I’m not sure this will settle the debate (which is largely conjecture and perception of the future), but it’s a helpful start.
I would think that it’s indisputable that growth has increased in the downtown core over the past 20 years (since 1987) – Cathedral Place, Terasen Centre, Waterfront Centre, BC Hydro on Dunsmuir, etc. hadn’t even been built yet (let alone Bnetall V, 401 Burrard, and several hotels, etc.).
But is just “doubling” enough to rest your laurels on for a downtown core over TWENTY years? Surely that figure is tempered by job losses (or failures to locate downtown) as a result of suburban business parks.
I’m not one to be keen on “relative” figures for growth – i.e. doubling, tripling, percentage growth.
So are the job growth figures for Burnaby, Surrey and Richmond more than 2 times what they were 20 years ago when the business parks were underutilized land? Is that a useful figure?
I think a more useful figure would be the relative distribution of total jobs in the region and the percentage held by each municipality (or area within each municipality).
But then again, it shouldn’t be a competition among municipalities since we should encourage jobs in the regional town centres (the biggest failing of the LRSP).
1st Quarter 2007 report from CB Richard Ellis:
http://www.cbre.ca/NR/rdonlyres/2C5C41CE-CE62-4988-AADB-91863F703170/0/vancouver1q07ofc.pdf
And 1st Quarter 2007 Industrial report:
http://www.cbre.ca/NR/rdonlyres/DE0CEAB0-25EA-42E6-B3F4-DFA5E19354DD/0/vancouver1q07ind.pdf
Regarding the CB Richard Ellis report, I wonder if the business parks are considered “industrial” for the purposes of the reports (having combined warehouse space with office, etc.).
Given that the rapid transit lines run through the town centres, it does make sense that the office report indicates a leaning towards office space locating near the rapid transit lines – just slower than desired. I’ve heard of a couple of office projects near Brentwood Station – a 6-ish storey building as part of a condo project near Madison Centre and the bigger news of 17 and 9 storey office towers at the SW corner of Lougheed and Willingdon in construction pre-bid – posted on the SkyscraperPage forum:
“More info on the SW corner of Willingdon and Lougheed. 5 buildings.
1*17 storey office tower
1*9 storey office tower.
3*28-34 storey condo towers.
Townhouses on SW portion of site, start date Apr/08.”
Note that the supply of triple A space in Burnaby appears to be half that of Vancouver’s while much of Vancouver’s space is single A, B or C. (i.e. Burnaby has a higher proportion of desirable triple A space). However, note that the Grandview area (Bentall Tech Park?) is considered part of the Burnaby sub-area for the purposes of the report. The only Vancouver sub-area is the Broadway corridor, so some of that Burnaby space is probably in Vancouver near Renfrew Skytrain Station.