New rental building in Point Grey designed for future vertical tower expansion

New rental housing building in West Point Grey designed for future vertical expansion for tower

Artistic rendering of the six-storey building concept for 3803-3823 West 10th Avenue, Vancouver. (GBL Architects/Sightline Properties)

Three single-family houses at the northwest corner of the intersection of West 10th Avenue and Highbury Street on the eastern end of Vancouver’s West Point Grey neighbourhood are to be redeveloped.

It’ll turn into a new six-storey, mixed-use building with secured purpose-built rental housing with 81 units, plus 6,500 sq ft of commercial space.

At the same time, this redevelopment will also provide ample vehicle parking—nearly five underground levels with 79 stalls.

This vehicle parking supply far exceeds the number expected for a project of this size and its uses, especially for secured purpose-built rental housing, which generally has significantly fewer vehicle parking stalls than market strata condominiums.

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However, in its newly submitted development permit application, Sightline Properties notes it is future-proofing the low-rise structure to enable a future vertical expansion with a tower.

The developer did not specify how many more floors could be added in the future, but it notes that the extra underground parking levels are built in mind for the future parking requirements for the building’s evolution into a tower. The mid-rise structure will also be engineered to enable such an expansion.

In its application, the developer says its design anticipates new City of Vancouver policies in the near future that will enable a tower-based development

“The current [mid-rise] design aims to provide needed rental housing in the short term, with the ultimate goal of providing additional density on the site… an eventual addition of a tower on top of the six-storey building,” reads the application.

The project’s rezoning application was previously approved by Vancouver City Council in June 2023. This rezoning was pursued under the Secured Rental Policy (SRP), which enables mid-rise buildings along arterial/major roads with 100% rental housing uses for the residential component on top of ground-level commercial space.

3803-3823 West 10th Avenue rental housing

Artistic rendering of the six-storey building concept for 3803-3823 West 10th Avenue, Vancouver. (GBL Architects/Sightline Properties)

This is a prime transit-oriented development site located about one city block southwest of SkyTrain’s future Alma Station at the intersection of West Broadway and Alma Street. It is part of the future Millennium Line extension from Arbutus Street to the University of British Columbia (UBC) campus.

It is also just one block south from the southern edge of the 90-acre Jericho Lands redevelopment, which recently saw its master plan approved — 13,000 homes for up to 24,000 people and 750,000 sq ft of office, retail, restaurant, and other job space within dozens of buildings, including high-rise towers up to 49 storeys.

The high-density, tower-based developments of the Jericho Lands and the area’s two SkyTrain stations, including the on-site Jericho Lands station, are expected to set a precedent for the type of development that can be expected in the area in the future, replacing the single-family neighbourhood. The UBC SkyTrain extension is expected to catalyze a planning process to create a new densification area plan for much of the western Kitsilano and West Point Grey areas, similar to the enacted Broadway Plan for the area east of Yew Street.

Moreover, Sightline Properties’ development site of 3803-3823 West 10th Avenue would fall within the provincial government’s transit-oriented development legislation, which stipulates an 800-metre-wide transit-oriented development radius around SkyTrain stations.

Site of 3803-3823 West 10th Avenue, Vancouver. (Google Maps)

Existing condition:

Site of 3803-3823 West 10th Avenue, Vancouver. (Google Maps)

Future condition:

Artistic rendering of the six-storey building concept for 3803-3823 West 10th Avenue, Vancouver. (GBL Architects/Sightline Properties)

Depending on the exact placement of Alma Station within the vicinity of the intersection of Alma Street and West Broadway, the development site could be within the legislation’s inner 200-metre radius, which enables residential developments of at least 20 storeys with a floor area ratio (FAR) density of a floor area that is five times larger than the size of the lot. For areas within 200 metres to 400 metres of a SkyTrain station, the legislation permits residential uses of at least up to 12 storeys and a 4.0 FAR density.

The legislation provides minimum height and density that municipal governments must allow, and they could also grant added height and density beyond the legislated minimums. Moreover, the legislation eliminates minimum vehicle parking standards for residential uses within the 800-metre radius, enabling developers to provide parking based on expected demand, lower construction costs, and shorten construction timelines.

Artistic rendering of the six-storey building concept for 3803-3823 West 10th Avenue, Vancouver. (GBL Architects/Sightline Properties)

Designed by GBL Architects, the current development permit application of a 72-ft-tall, six-storey building contains 64,487 sq ft of total building floor area, establishing a 3.5 FAR density.

Out of the 81 rental homes, 68 will be market rental units and 14 will be below-market rental units, representing 23% of the total residential space, exceeding SRP’s requirement of 20%.

The unit size mix is 26 studio units, 27 one-bedroom units, and 29 two-bedroom units. Residents will have access to indoor amenity space on the ground level and outdoor amenity space on a temporary basis on the building’s rooftop until there is a vertical expansion of the building.

Artistic rendering of 3701-3743 West Broadway, Vancouver. (Leckie Studio Architecture + Design/Westbank)

Much closer to the future location of Alma Station, Westbank is currently in the process of building a 14-storey rental housing tower at 3701-3743 West Broadway, the northwest corner of the intersection of Alma Street and West Broadway. This building, which will have 161 rental homes and retail/restaurant uses, is expected to reach completion in 2025.

Some precedent was recently set by PCI Developments from the future-proofing of its initially proposed six-storey commercial building at 1477 West Broadway, which includes an integrated subway station entrance for SkyTrain’s future South Granville Station as part of the current Millennium Broadway extension project reaching Arbutus. In that initial proposal, PCI proposed six underground parking levels, which later enabled it to change its design plans mid-construction to build a 39-storey tower with primarily rental housing as a vertical expansion of its six-storey concept. PCI’s tower at the northeast corner of the intersection of Granville Street and West Broadway will reach completion in 2025.

Also, the Five Bentall Centre office tower in downtown Vancouver was originally a 22-storey building when it was completed in 2002. In 2007, a vertical expansion significantly increased the tower’s height to 35 floors, with existing office tenants remaining during the construction process.

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