Planning for an Aging Population
When: Thursday, October 18
Time: 12:30 to 1:30pm
Where: Room 1700, SFU Vancouver Harbour Centre
This is a free event.
If you’re in your 20s to 40s and think this subject doesn’t apply to you, please read on. Today, one in seven Canadians is 65 or older. By 2030, one in four– 25 percent of the population– will be seniors.
The aging will affect everything from housing to health care, taxation to transportation, testing our country’s vaunted equality. How should we plan for this change?
Our two presenters have given much thought to this question and its implications for the Lower Mainland.
Gordon Harris is an urban planner and President and CEO of the SFU Community Trust, where he provides leadership in the development of UniverCity, the award-winning sustainable community on Burnaby Mountain next to Simon Fraser University.
Leslie Van Duzer is director of the School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture at UBC. She brings a unique perspective from her experiences with elderly people in Minneapolis.
They’ll briefly frame the subject. Then it’s your turn to ask questions, present suggestions and give opinions. Please bring your lunch if you like, and join the conversation.
This event is co-sponsored by the Seniors Program of SFU Continuing Studies.
Following the conversation, the SFU Seniors Program and Vancouver Student Life are hosting a tea/coffee for those who would like to continue the dialogue. It will be held in the Teck Gallery just around the corner from room 1700 where the dialogue is taking place.
I would love to hear the presentation and be a part of the conversation, but cannot make the event. Having recently tried finding an apartment for my fiercely independent 92 year old grandmother, I would like to share my experience.
She is independent enough to live on her own, with limitations and some assistance. She has difficulty walking more than a few blocks and has limited lifting strength (so no carrying groceries or laundry), but still sharp as a tack. The objective was to find a place immediate to a grocery store, preferably also to a clinic and transit to meet her daily needs.
I found her a place at Cambie and 13th, but now learn that even that moderate uphill walk from City Square and the long walk from the Skytrain to be most taxing on her. Other locations would present their own challenges. The obvious alternative is an expensive assisted living facility would devastate her emotionally and financially, so what’s the solution?
In the Lower Mainland, there is obvious and eminently workable solution. The classic Safeways, IGAs and London Drugs (et al) sites around the city all seem to be in some phase of redevelopment as anchor pedestals with condos on top. As much as I think most of the proposals for these towers are already too tall for their locations, broker a deal with the developers to dedicate the lower 2 floors to affordable rental units for seniors as a community contribution or if necessary, in return for a floor of additional height. City councils have consistently given away density for lesser returns to the community.
For independent seniors like my grandmother, a location like that would probably keep her happily independent for many years to come. She gets her needs met at the foot of the building and the company of other active seniors, plus still being in her community. It’s a true all-round win-win solution that does not require a new framework or overhead and could be implemented immediately.