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And yet if you ask the average person in the street, they will blame 'interest rates' or 'Chinese buyers', and not once look at the ridiculous blockage on suppl

And yet if you ask the average person in the street, they will blame 'interest rates' or 'Chinese buyers', and not once look at the ridiculous blockage on supply. I think that this is the other dimension to the Vancouver housing problem that no one is talking about yet. Vancouver is separated from the rest of the province by the Fraser river to the south-east, and regional development policy for about 30 years has been fashioned to make it difficult for anyone to live south of the Fraser. If we put more bridges across the Fraser and built more highways, I think most of this problem would go away on its own.

vkou 11y ago
Where will those highways feed into? Business district roadways north of the Fraser are close to saturation.
- CountSessine 11y ago
  At this point they need to be widened and expanded. What I'm advocating isn't simply a one-off highway and bridge expansion; rather I want the regional development plan scrapped and I want a new one that no longer treats Richmond/Delta/Surrey as a separate development region. Rather than fighting and antagonizing families who want to live south of the Fraser, we should try to integrate Delta and Surrey more completely with Vancouver and Burquitlam. Highways to bring people to their jobs in Vancouver, yes; but also a focus on encouraging businesses, perhaps through preferential taxes, to locate in Delta and Surrey. We should be planning, zoning, and developing to minimize the presence of the Fraser. That would include more bridges, but it would also include more mass transit. And if we need to pay for this somehow, I can't think of a better way than a non-linear property tax on everyone west of Cambie. ;-)
hollerith 11y ago
Isn't most of the land sourth of the Fraser prone to flooding?
- allannienhuis 11y ago
  no, it's all diked appropriately for the most part. Of course some would like the diking to be improved as there has been some minor flooding every 20 years or so. But that flooding is typically limited to the lowest areas which are almost always agricultural land. It would be a huge stretch to say the area is prone to flooding.
  - hollerith 11y ago
    I stand corrected.

vkou 11y ago

Where will those highways feed into? Business district roadways north of the Fraser are close to saturation.

CountSessine 11y ago
At this point they need to be widened and expanded. What I'm advocating isn't simply a one-off highway and bridge expansion; rather I want the regional development plan scrapped and I want a new one that no longer treats Richmond/Delta/Surrey as a separate development region. Rather than fighting and antagonizing families who want to live south of the Fraser, we should try to integrate Delta and Surrey more completely with Vancouver and Burquitlam. Highways to bring people to their jobs in Vancouver, yes; but also a focus on encouraging businesses, perhaps through preferential taxes, to locate in Delta and Surrey. We should be planning, zoning, and developing to minimize the presence of the Fraser. That would include more bridges, but it would also include more mass transit. And if we need to pay for this somehow, I can't think of a better way than a non-linear property tax on everyone west of Cambie. ;-)

hollerith 11y ago

Isn't most of the land sourth of the Fraser prone to flooding?

allannienhuis 11y ago
no, it's all diked appropriately for the most part. Of course some would like the diking to be improved as there has been some minor flooding every 20 years or so. But that flooding is typically limited to the lowest areas which are almost always agricultural land. It would be a huge stretch to say the area is prone to flooding.
- hollerith 11y ago
  I stand corrected.