The concept of transit-oriented development has reached new heights in the past few months as local governments across British Columbia worked towards implementing the Province's new legislation, Bill 47, that essentially mandates it.

Vancouver-based PCI Developments was one of the earliest adopters of transit-oriented development, turning it into a niche that may not be a niche for much longer — considering the new legislation. Their Marine Gateway project has been cited as an example of a successful transit-oriented development. The project completed in 2016 and includes 461 rental homes, a 14-storey office building, and over 240,000 sq. ft of retail space, all centered around the Canada Line SkyTrain's Marine Drive Station.

Since then, PCI has embarked on numerous other similar mixed-use developments, including five in Vancouver under the Broadway Plan, two in Surrey, and one in Port Moody, all currently progressing at varying stages. The 40-storey South Granville Station tower is expected to welcome residents just over a year from now, the Broadway & Arbutus project with TransLink is the subject of a public hearing tonight, and several other rezoning applications have been submitted in the past few months, including one a few weeks ago for 1155 East 6th Avenue.

Now, the big project for PCI is a sequel: Marine Gateway 2, which is set for the car dealership immediately south of Marine Gateway. PCI has actually been working on the sequel for nearly 10 years, and previously submitted a rezoning application to the City in 2021. However, the plans have since been changed and PCI says it is set to submit a rezoning application to the City in September.

In an interview with STOREYS this week, PCI Developments President Tim Grant discussed the pre-application work they have been doing with the City of Vancouver, what Marine Gateway 2 will look like, and several other development industry topics.

When was the Marine Gateway 2 project first conceived?

Our first phase at Marine Gateway was done in 2015-2016 and we purchased the site immediately to the south during that process, so we've really been working on the Marine Gateway 2 site for about 10 years, and we've been talking with the City and with Metro Vancouver pretty consistently since then.

The premise is obvious: it's right at a transit station, it's a five-acre site, and we feel like we can address a lot of the City's, and the region's, priorities — notably industrial, along with residential.

The rezoning application hasn't been submitted yet, but I know there is often a lot of pre-application work. What has that looked like for this project?

At that time, the site was precluded for residential use by the regional growth strategy. Metro Vancouver had it designated as employment land only. There was, I think, some features that could've allowed it to move forward, but at that time the City wasn't willing to use the discretion it had in its control to do that. That has been cleared, from a regional perspective, with the Metro 2050 update that went through in February 2023.

Well before that, we were planning on submitting an application and we had varying levels of support from the City, so ultimately it wasn't able to move forward. Today, with a different tone, I think the City has showed recognition of what it could be and we're hopeful there will be more appetite for it to move forward.

We're going to submit a rezoning application by the end of September. We're just kind of working with staff now on some pre-application work. [Pre-application work] is something that's changing all the time. One of things that we're seeing now is having almost a bit of a workshop with a bunch of different departments in the room and talking about the considerations from their perspectives. We've done that recently with our Great Northern Way-Emily Carr application and also the VCC-Clark 1155 East 6th application, which will be going live hopefully in the next week or two.

We've had good pre-application workshops with staff, we've worked through the key issues from their perspective, and I think everybody felt comfortable that we're kind of well-aligned, so at that point you come in with the application. Staff have been willing to schedule the same [workshops] for Marine Gateway 2 and we're hopeful that working in a few meetings with them will address some of their comments in advance of a complete application.

Many of PCI's projects are relatively complex, with multiple towers and a few incorporated with transit. Do you think that results in more back-and-forth with staff or is it just the all the City processes and smaller projects also face this?

I think the complexity definitely makes for some more back and forth. I think the other case, particularly with some of our bigger projects around the stations, is there's also a higher opportunity. I think us as the applicant, and hopefully the City, recognizes that there's maybe some opportunities to address more things than you'd be able to do with other projects. I think that's part of the reason why it leads to a lot of engagement.

Do you think there's anything from the City side of things that can be improved, whether it's streamlining processes or using technology?

Yeah. For sure. I think the time from when a proposal is made or talked about to when it's actually finished and occupied is really long. Particularly for big projects. We're thinking about that on a few fronts right now. Even the ones that are moving forward, they take a long time to get there. I think the ability to compress that timeline and hopefully make that review and permitting process more efficient is really important. I do think technology could be a big part of that.

Regarding the City's processes we've been talking about, how do you think Vancouver compares to other municipalities? I know you guys have a big project in Port Moody, among other places.

Unfortunately, both have been challenging.

I'd say the City of Vancouver obviously has a lot more experience with the large complex projects that we've been involved in, and I think they're very good at understanding how to work through it — albeit, they could probably do it more quickly.

In terms of Port Moody, this has been new for them — the idea of transit-oriented development at scale is something they haven't had a lot of experience with, but there's good staff people very interested in working through it with us. And I will say that the change to Mayor and Council, this current group, has made a massive difference. With the previous group, it was very counter-productive and very, very challenging. It was frankly hurting the community, from our perspective. Whereas Mayor Lahti has done a great job at settling everything down, getting everybody going in the same direction, and we've noticed a huge difference.

We're hopeful [the Moody Centre project] will be going to public hearing in the next month or two.

In terms of the actual project, can you tell me a bit about Marine Gateway 2?

The Marine Gateway 2 application is for about 400,000 sq. ft of industrial, over three levels. Importantly, with that size, it'd be suitable for large-bay users, so it's not necessarily the small-bay units that you'll see in other places. And that [400,000 sq. ft.] is about nine times the area of the existing car dealership on the site.

And then we would have a two-acre local park that will kind of be one level above Cambie Street, with some adjacent community spaces, there will be a daycare and senior centre, and then we have 1,400 rental homes, 20% of which would be moderate income, and there will be a direct connection to the Marine Gateway highstreet with a bridge that would go over the bus loop.

And because we'd be realigning the bus loop, that kind of opens up the Cambie Street transit plaza. If you've ever been down to that area, there's a conflict between the buses leaving the bus loop coming onto Cambie Street and pedestrians, so we'd be reorienting the bus loop back to Yukon [Street] and that Cambie Street area can open as a bit of a transit plaza, rideshare drop-off, good community activation space. There's actually quite a lot of residents there today, but also [more] coming with Ashley Mar and a few other [projects] under construction in that area.

You said that the industrial will be multi-level. Have you guys done stacked industrial before and what do you make of the trend?

We haven't. We've tried, but frankly it's really, really difficult because of how much space you have to take up for things like ramps and circulation and loading to get industrial up onto the second level.

But one of the things about this [Marine Gateway 2] site that's really unique is because of its topography. It slopes north to south, and Cambie Street is also approximately one level higher than Yukon Street, so we can stack — which is the perfect way to say it — a Yukon level, a Cambie Street level, then a Yukon-plus-one level, and we can have the ramps running up the sides. It's uniquely well-suited for it. Not to mention that it's five acres, which is really the hang-up for industrial in Vancouver — assembling a site with enough scale that you could do it.

Even with that, all the industrial is not feasible without the residential. That rental residential component, which we know would be in demand, certainly facilitates our ability to put in all the infrastructure and expensive things that are required for the industrial.

The last time we spoke it was about the TOD legislation shortly after it was first announced. Now that the dust has kind of settled, what do you make of it? Are there any remaining questions or concerns?

I think regarding the legislation itself, it remains to be seen. [The City of Vancouver] did force more appropriate heights and densities in conjunction with transit, so I think that's certainly a good outcome. In our little world, we have a project near the Kootenay Bus Loop that previously was going to be a really challenging six-storey rental building to make work. Now we're gonna go back [with a revised proposal.]

But I think the biggest thing has been the tone, with the Province really making it clear how important transit-oriented development is. I think that's really given good encouragement and kind of a best practice for municipalities to rely on. We certainly see that in the municipalities we're working in — a lot more confidence and acceptance that this is something we need to do, and more energy around trying to make it happen.

There's a big focus on rental housing development across Canada, but obviously there are still a lot of challenges. How have you found the development landscape for rental housing?

I think rental housing is well-understood to be challenging. It's certainly less financially lucrative, just because it's based a lot more on a long-term income stream, as opposed to the build-and-sell model. I think, for a lot of reasons, the Vancouver marketplace has had a less mature rental housing sector, so that's something we've been really focused on trying to be a part of — along with our sister company, Warrington Residential.

The thing that we're really excited about is being one of the few, from what we understand, to deliver on some of the below-market aspects as well. We finished the two moderate income pilot program projects — our understanding is those are two of very few that have been completed to date. We also have below-market units coming at 20th & Arbutus, Broadway & Granville, and we hope to have them coming in the other developments that are up for approval.

We give a lot of credit to the City housing department. They do a really good job. I think one of the things that works well about that program is they rely on us to do the leasing, do the management, and then we report back to them on a regular basis, as opposed to us having it managed by somebody else or directly by the City. We think that's a really effective program.

From a policy perspective, do you think there are any policies that currently exist on the municipal, provincial, or federal level that are getting in the way of rental development?

The one that we're really worried about [are] some of the accessibility requirements. That really, really is onerous. We are all for increasing accessibility units — in the two buildings we just finished, we've lined up with some accessible housing organizations to make sure the accessible units we do have are getting to the right people — but to require that in all new housing, 100% of the units [set to come into effect in March 2025], would make development unfeasible.

On top of that, I think there's a real livability change for people that don't need the accessibility. That's one we're really hoping that can be reconsidered and it's encouraging that it seems like that's up for discussion right now.

I've heard that from other developers too. Can you elaborate on that a bit more? Where do the additional costs come from?

My really simple layman's terms is you have a much lower residential efficiency. You need more generous circulation areas in hallways and in the units themselves. You have to have more generous areas in kitchens, bathrooms, and entry hallways to make sure people can really move around in wheelchairs. And then in the parkades, you have to have wider parking stalls, wider spaces for people to be moving around cars.

So when we add all that up, among some other things, you end up losing about 15% of units, as opposed to what you could build under the current building code. And with that, you're not having a corresponding cost decrease. You're actually having an increased cost because of a lot of unique fixtures that are required. It's really prohibitive in terms of more new development.

Again, I think the key thing here is we absolutely need more accessible units. I think it would be more effective to do it with a more moderate requirement, ensuring that new developments can continue, rather than the really overly-onerous 100% requirement.

We've had a few developments with CMHC financing, under the RCFi program [which was renamed as the Apartment Construction Loan Program] and there's a requirement there for accessibility units. That's worked out great. I think it can be done well, just as long as it doesn't get in the way of desperately needed housing.

Responses have been edited for length and clarity.

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