On Monday, Coquitlam City Council granted approval to a high-rise project in the Burquitlam neighbourhood by Cressey Development Group, advancing a project that has been in the works for at least three years and was impacted by a fire.
The site of the project is 727 North Road, a 0.94-acre site between Como Lake Avenue and Clarke Road on the eastern side of the the City of Burnaby boundary. The site is immediately north of the two-tower Smith & Farrow project by Boffo, and about a block away from the Millennium Line SkyTrain’s Burquitlam Station, making it a Tier 1 transit-oriented area (TOA) under provincial legislation.
BC Assessment values the property at $13,788,000 in an assessment dated to July 1, 2025, and the property is held by Cressey under Sherwood Park Apts. Ltd. According to a report to Council, Cressey first submitted a rezoning application for 727 North Road in May 2023, proposing a 34-storey condo tower and a six-storey rental tower.
Although there do not appear to be media reports about it, city staff said a December 2024 fire damaged the building and made it uninhabitable. In December 2025, a fire broke out in the building again, with Coquitlam RCMP announcing that they were investigating the cause of the fire in the abandoned building.
“Given the fire and evolving market conditions,” said staff, Cressey has revised the proposed condo tower down to 27 storeys. The condo tower would be located on the eastern half of the site, along Farrow Street, and include 46 studio units, 70 one-bedroom units, 99 two-bedroom units, and 18 three-bedroom units for a total of 233 units.
The six-storey rental building will then be located on the western half of the site, along North Road, and include 25 studio units, 36 one-bedroom units, 20 two-bedroom units, and 13 three-bedroom units for a total of 94 rental units. Of the 94 rental units, 80 will be provided at market rates and 14 will be provided at below-market rates.
Cressey is seeking to rezone the site from RM-2 (Three-Storey Medium Density Apartment Residential) to CD-59 (Comprehensive Development) and the project has a total proposed density of 5.5 FAR. The project will also include a total of 239 vehicle parking spaces, 319 bicycle parking spaces, 22,005 sq. ft of amenity space, and the widening of an existing publicly-accessible pedestrian path connecting North Road and Farrow Street.
According to staff, Cressey has committed to advancing the six-storey rental building before the condo tower. The development permit application for the rental building is currently being processed and is expected to be brought to Council for approval at the same time the rezoning application is ready for final adoption. A separate development application for the condo tower would then follow at a later date.
Renderings of the six-storey rental building set for 727 North Road. (Chris Dikeakos Architects, Cressey Development)
In May 2024, Cressey spoke before Council voicing concerns about the City’s Tenant Relocation Policy and having to make payments before receiving project approval, which drew a vexed response from Council.
The matter was not directly addressed in the recent report to council, but staff said “the applicant provided compensation to tenants who moved out prior to the fire in December 2024” and “has committed to immediately providing compensation to the remaining eligible tenants that have been displaced due to the fire in line with the expectations in the Tenant Relocation Policy.”
On Monday, Council briefly discussed the project, and voiced some concern about what they believed to be a high number of studio units, but ultimately granted first, second, and third reading to the rezoning application and said they were happy that the project is moving forward after the fire.
For the City, the project is expected to generate $7 million in development cost charges (DCCs), $6.4 million in density bonus payments, $713,506 in voluntary community amenity contributions (CACs), and $470,000 in developer-funded infrastructure.
