39-storey rental housing towers proposed for Moody Centre SkyTrain

Artistic rendering of 60 Williams Street and 3006-3020 Spring Street, Port Moody. (Perkins&Will/PCI Developments)

A significant transit-oriented development with 100% rental housing uses for its primary function of residential density has been proposed for a site immediately adjacent to SkyTrain Moody Centre Station in Port Moody.

Local developer PCI Developments has just submitted a rezoning application to redevelop the land assembly of 60 Williams Street and 3006-3020 Spring Street, which fronts the station entrance at the northeast corner of the intersection of William Street and Spring Street.

You might also like:

The proposal is to build a pair of 39-storey, including a base podium, with mixed uses — replacing the existing uses of surface vehicle parking and old low-storey commercial and light industrial structures.

There would be a total of 857 secured purpose-built rental homes of varying sizes, including 43 below-market units on rates based on BC Housing’s Housing Income Limits.

60 Williams Street 3006-3020 Spring Street Vancouver SkyTrain Moody Centre Station PCI Developments

Site of 60 Williams Street and 3006-3020 Spring Street, Port Moody. (Google Maps)

Residents will have access to various indoor and outdoor amenity spaces, including on the rooftop of the base podium.

The base podium levels will also provide roughly 55,000 sq ft of commercial space, including 15,000 sq ft of retail/restaurant uses on the ground level — activating street frontages and the new transit plaza framed by the building, station entrance, and bus exchange — and a full-scale grocery store of about 40,000 sq ft in the second level.

The grocery store entrance will be in an atrium prominently located on the William Street frontage adjacent to the transit plaza, with escalators linking the ground and second levels.

In exchange for the rezoning, in addition to the transit plaza, the developer is promising several other major public benefits.

A pedestrian overpass bridge would be built from the building’s west side, closest to the transit hub, to provide an additional footpath above the Canadian Pacific Railway and SkyTrain tracks — a new more convenient way to reach Rocky Point Park, Shoreline Trail, and other waterfront areas.

The north end of the overpass will directly lead into PCI Developments’ future 12-storey secured purpose-built rental housing building at 2933-3005 Murray Street — north of the railway and SkyTrain station. This separate rezoning application for a mass timber building, also designed by Perkins&Will, is in the process of being considered by the City.

The proponents told Daily Hive Urbanized the south end of the overpass leads directly into the second level of the Williams/Spring building, with direct access to the grocery store. Pedestrians using the overpass will benefit from the shared accessibility of the escalators in the atrium.

Artistic rendering of 60 Williams Street and 3006-3020 Spring Street, Port Moody. (Perkins&Will/PCI Developments)

Artistic rendering of 2933-3005 Murray Street, Port Moody. (Perkins&Will/PCI Developments)

Mass timber form of 2933-3005 Murray Street, Port Moody. (Perkins&Will/PCI Developments)

Preliminary artistic rendering of 2933-3005 Murray Street (left; coloured) and 60 Williams Street and 3006-3020 Spring Street (right), Port Moody. (Perkins&Will/PCI Developments)

The Williams/Spring building is also significantly setback on its east side, where Slaughterhouse Creek — currently running underground in the area — will be daylighted to the surface and naturalized with a wetland area. About 4,000 sq ft of artist studios will face the creek side of the building.

Underground levels in the complex will accommodate a total of 605 vehicle parking stalls, including 423 stalls for residential uses.

Moody Centre Station is served by buses, and both the SkyTrain Millennium Line and West Coast Express commuter rail.

In 2022, the SkyTrain station saw a total of 616,000 annual boardings, making it the 48th busiest out of 53 SkyTrain stations and representing a 25% gap behind pre-pandemic 2019 volumes. It saw averages of 1,900 boardings per weekday, 1,500 per Saturday, and 1,100 per Sunday/holiday.

Artistic rendering of 60 Williams Street and 3006-3020 Spring Street, Port Moody. (Perkins&Will/PCI Developments)

According to the developer, they are looking to have their rezoning application considered concurrently with the wider area’s master planning process. PCI’s 2.9-acre property for this project is part of the Moody Centre Transit Oriented Development Master Planning Group, which is a consortium of nine different property owners who own various parcels that make up the 23 acres that surround Moody Centre Station.

The planning group is still seeking the City of Port Moody’s approval to amend the official community plan (OCP) in order to allow over a dozen high-rise towers on the 23 acres, containing over 4,000 homes and job space for thousands of people.

The process to amend the OCP was sluggish with the previous makeup of City Council, and when the municipality’s previous elected officials suggested the idea of lowering the allowable density next to the transit hub, the provincial government essentially fired a warning shot to the municipal government.

The provincial government is also one of the landowners within the master plan area. Earlier this year, it also named the City of Port Moody as one of the first jurisdictions under the new provincial Housing Supply Act, which mandates the municipal government to meet new housing supply quotas established by the Ministry of Housing.

Moody Centre TOD Area Master Planning Group Port Moody

Conceptual form depiction of Moody Centre Transit-Oriented Development in Port Moody. (Moody Centre TOD)

Conceptual artistic rendering of Moody Centre Transit-Oriented Development in Port Moody. (Moody Centre TOD)

Conceptual form depiction of Moody Centre Transit-Oriented Development in Port Moody. (Moody Centre TOD)

To achieve this particular Williams/Spring project, PCI is once again working with architectural firm Perkins&Will. The developer and architectural firm are known for their previous partnerships to produce some of Metro Vancouver’s most successful transit-oriented developments, including Crossroads (SkyTrain Broadway-City Hall Station) and Marine Gateway (SkyTrain Marine Drive Station).

PCI is also responsible for the King George Hub complex (SkyTrain King George Station), the 39-storey, mixed-use tower currently under construction that will be fully integrated with the entrance of SkyTrain’s future South Granville Station as part of the Millennium Line Broadway Extension, and the proposal to build a second major phase of Marine Gateway.

Most recently, PCI partnered with TransLink for the public transit authority’s first development project — a proposal for a 30-storey tower next to SkyTrain’s future Arbutus Station with 260 secured purpose-built rental homes, plus commercial and community spaces.

Perkins&Will is behind the design of the proposed mixed-use redevelopments of the Safeway grocery store next to SkyTrain Commercial-Broadway Station, and the TriCity Central project next to SkyTrain Coquitlam Central Station.

SkyTrain Moody Centre Station. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

Moody Centre Station on SkyTrain. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

You might also like: