Hadani Ditmars does a profile in the Globe and Mail of the biggest megaproject in Vancouver that you’ve never heard of: the River District, previously known as East Fraser Lands.
It’s being planned for 20,000 people, folks. That’s bigger than Concord Pacific on North False Creek. It’s taken years, including a week-long charrette by New Urbanist Andres Duany. Architect James Cheng, now in charge of planning, comments:
“New urbanism in many ways is a tame, very American version of what we’re doing here – limiting height to two or three storeys and a scaled-down version of mixed use,” he says.
Instead, Mr. Cheng says he’s pursuing a kind of “old urbanism.”
“Just look at ancient Rome, or even Pompeii,” he says in the afternoon sun as tugboats and log booms float past the embryonic new community. “They had residential quarters with retail spaces in front – selling wine, or cheese or textiles.”
East Fraserlands will have high-rise buildings – some as tall as 24 storeys – integrated with other housing types. Make no mistake: the pastoral riverfront scenes aside, this will be a high-density community.
While California expands plans to move away from low-lying coastal areas, we build new 20k-person communities on them. History may show a few more similarities to Pompeii than Cheng may have anticipated.
your comment got me curious so I looked it up. According to online flood maps, East Fraserlands is more than two metres above sea level — maybe not ideal but ought to be good for a century at least. At three metres a portion of the site becomes flooded. It’s on the water, yes, but that’s the Fraser River, not the ocean.
Isn’t it a bit strange that the plan is for 15,000 more people along Cambie Street and the RAV line, but for 20,000 at the very SE corner of the city, served by the #100 bus?
Great development, and a perfect place for it to be in order to put pressure on Translink to build an LRT line. Imagine a LRT line along the exisiting underused rail corridor connecting the Canada Line at Marine Drive Station to The Expo line at New West station. It would hit a large population as well as several large commercial employment centres which are currently underserved (Big Bend/Marine Landing/Glenlyon etc). Even just 4 trainsets should allow for 15 minute service along the line until demand increased.
As far as I’m aware, the project has a plan in place to add LRT service to the existing corridor once (if?) such an option is approved and funded by the many players involved. Earlier renderings of the development included the LRT line, which was deemed a necessity when adding so many people and services to such an otherwise disconnected site.
Yes, this would be an example of building in anticipation of transit.
A Diesel Multiple Unit LRT along that corridor would also serve the Glenlyon Business Park in Burnaby and connect New Westminster with the Canada Line’s Marine Drive Station (and possible continue up the Arbutus corridor).
Of course, build out would be many years away – as would completion of the River District itself (i.e. it’s more than 25 years after Expo 86 and the Expo lands are still not built out, and the River District is in a lower demand area).
“perfect place for it to be in order to put pressure on Translink to build an LRT line.”
I beg to disagree, build a development in the middle of nowhere for the purpose to put pressure to Translink to expand transit at probably great cost is certainly not perfect.
as mentionned by rbostyle , this site is currently “disconnected”…current connection to current transit route #100 involve a rerouting of it…so in order to serve this community, we have to make the ride slower for all other #100 customers: that is not right.
Build such a development at Marine drive station where transit is already existing (and where the hypothetical LRT will plug), is certainly much better, but curiously enough when there is proposal to put similar density at this perfect location where transit is already present: all the vancouver gotha is up in arm.
re: rbostyle
With respect, you don’t need to look afar, BC communities are also cautious on coastal areas, however they are profoundly different than EFL; they are remote or exurban, not close to the heart of a region of 2.4 million people. And, what is worth preserving are natural areas like coastal bluff ecosystems and especially the ultra-sensitive coastal sand dunes, with thin soils and sparse vegetation which are damaged easy and recover slowly. Areas with species at risk must also be preserved.
EFL is hardly any of that; a long-used heavy industrial site with significant contamination.
Settling 20,000 people in this location will have a noticeable effect on development demand that would otherwise be directed to the farm & forest fringes.
Here is another huge project, up to 15,000 residents out in Coquitlam on Burke Mountain. Including other developments, Burke could have up to 25,000 residents. Even more than River District.
http://www.bclocalnews.com/tri_city_maple_ridge/tricitynews/news/124450074.html?mobile=true
It is right next to the office parks in Burnaby in the Big Bend area so there is employment nearby. It is not exactly in the middle of no where. Still, it would be better to have more density closer to the downtown core. Kits and Point Grey are obvious places for more density,
Imagine a LRT line along the exisiting underused rail corridor connecting the Canada Line at Marine Drive Station to The Expo line at New West station.
That’s an approach I hadn’t thought of. It sounds like the people in the Tri-Cities have been imagining the Nevergreen line for some time now, without seeing it turn into a reality. I cannot help but wonder if this project might be another excuse for delaying that project, that is, the money is now needed to connect RAV and Expo line.
The DRU route referenced by another poster, if memory serves, was “analyzed” in one of the Translink papers on service to Coquitlam and more or less dismissed. To me that doesn’t mean much, it’s perhaps an idea worth reviving as these apartments are constructed and the Burnaby Big Bend development fleshes out, a project which the Burnaby Planning Dept and City Council refuse to fully acknowledge is presently an entirely automobile serviced development.