Density in a City of Neighbourhoods – 11 (Myths, Part 1)

I’ve been excerpting pieces of Density in a City of Neighbourhoods for the last month or so but didn’t include the Appendix – a summary of common myths (and truths) about density that often complicates the discussion.  Here they are in the first of two parts:

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Height = density

A higher building is not necessarily denser in terms of floor space than a lower one. A one- storey building can equal the area of an eight-storey building if they both have the same Floor Space Ratio – though their site coverage will be different. This means just reducing the number of floors of a tower may make no difference to its density.

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High density = overcrowding

While this can be true, as Jane Jacobs explained, they are not one and the same. High-density means many units in one area; overcrowding is simply too many people in the same unit.

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Increase density = increased traffic

As Vancouver has discovered, density may actually be a necessity in order to reduce traffic volume. This is not a guarantee unless other transportation options are available and the density is sufficient to generate them. However increased density may justify more frequent transit, to provide customers for shops within walking distance, and to be safe and attractive for cycling.

An isolated project or a half-way attempt at increasing density may in fact generate more car traffic. However depending on local conditions, this incremental increase may not impact available road capacity. Residential development generally produces less traffic than even a lower-density commercial project.

Density is likely to occur somewhere. If pushed further out, where transit is not as frequent, new development may force people to drive further, sometimes through the neighbourhoods that rejected density in the first place due to traffic impacts.

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The majority of our housing stock is single-family homes

Not anymore. From 1991 to 2006, single-family homes went from one-half to about one-third of the housing stock regionally.

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New construction is predominantly single-family

Even in municipalities like Surrey, the majority of the new housing, while ground-oriented, is in the form of townhouses.

Completions of single family and row houses have been relatively steady with an average of about 1,000 units per year. Before the 1990s apartments averaged around 2,000 completions per year. Since the 1990s completions of apartments have increased to over 3,000 units per year.

Little of the new housing stock, except for single- family houses, is ground-oriented. The problem for the City of Vancouver when introducing new types of housing is land assembly, a change of lot lines, and other constraints in an already-developed neighbourhood.

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Four to six-storey mixed-use developments are, economically, the highest and best use of land

Given that wood is cheaper than concrete, it would seem to make sense that the best return for a developer would come from a complex that maximizes the available density using wood-frame construction, as well as incorporating commercial with residential when allowed.This is the kind of development the City encourages on arterial streets like Broadway.

In fact, the market may often value a one-storey commercial building as a better deal, since it avoids the complexity of mixed use for a potential purchaser. This is why, even though the zoning is available for residential development above storefronts, many developers forgo the opportunity.