City eyes federal and provincial loans to demolish downtown Vancouver viaducts | Daily Hive

City of Vancouver eyes federal and provincial loans to demolish Dunsmuir and Georgia viaducts for Northeast False Creek developments

Georgia Viaduct and Rogers Arena in downtown Vancouver. (Kenneth Chan)

The City of Vancouver is exploring the possibility of tapping into federal low-cost loan programs as part of a renewed push to demolish the Dunsmuir and Georgia viaducts and advance long-stalled major redevelopments under the Northeast False Creek (NEFC) Plan.

During a community symposium session on Friday organized by Hogan’s Alley Society, Josh White — the general manager of planning, urban design and sustainability for the City of Vancouver — said the municipal government has begun discussing with the Government of Canada on federal funding solutions, including potential participation by the Canada Infrastructure Bank (CIB).

“We’ve also begun to, for example, engage the federal government in this conversation,” White told the audience. “We ought to think of this project as not just a Vancouver project, but a project of national significance. This is one of the most important projects that we can help achieve in terms of city-building.”

For instance, recently and of local significance, the CIB provided BC Ferries with a $1-billion low-interest loan to support the purchase of new major vessels built by a Mainland China shipyard and related ferry terminal infrastructure upgrades.

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The removal of the downtown Vancouver viaducts has long been identified as the key prerequisite to unlocking the development potential of Northeast False Creek — an area envisioned to deliver new significant housing, commercial space, an entertainment district anchored by BC Place Stadium and Rogers Arena, public parks and plazas, and cultural, community, and recreational facilities. This also includes the envisioned contemporary return of Hogan’s Alley, with new affordable housing and community and cultural facilities on the city block between Main Street and Gore Avenue, where the easternmost end of the viaducts is located.

However, the pandemic, prolonged weakness in strata residential pre-sales (especially in downtown Vancouver), high borrowing costs from financial institutions, and escalating construction costs have stalled progress since the NEFC Plan was approved by Vancouver City Council in 2018. The plan included the key initial step of demolishing the viaducts and constructing a new replacement downsized surface roadway network.

When the area plan was approved in 2018, the implementation timeline for the NEFC Plan targeted 2019 as the start of the viaducts’ demolition. This was later postponed to 2020, before effectively fading altogether.

Instead of demolition, the opposite is now occurring. The City is making interim investments to repair expansion joints on the seismically vulnerable structures built in the early 1970s to help ensure they remain safe. The City has also previously noted that more significant reinvestments will be required if the viaducts are still in place in the early 2030s, at which point the viaducts will be six decades old.

Dunsmuir and Georgia viaducts. (Kenneth Chan)

SkyTrain Expo Line’s elevated guideway underneath the Dunsmuir and Georgia viaducts. (Kenneth Chan)

Unrealistic to rely solely on development revenue to fund the work

As previously reported by Daily Hive Urbanized over the years, the 2018 area plan’s financial strategy for covering the very significant costs of demolishing the viaducts and constructing a new replacement roadway network — including building a new four-lane West Georgia Street ramp between Beatty Street and Pacific Boulevard, situated between the stadium and arena — as well as building a new viaduct-like elevated walking and cycling pathway from Beatty Street to near Quebec Street (inspired by New York City’s High Line Park), other new infrastructure and utilities, community and recreational facilities, 32 acres of new and improved public park and open spaces, a continuous seawall, and affordable housing, was all based on achieving a substantial amount of strata market ownership condominium housing at the Plaza of Nations site and on Concord Pacific’s large remaining waterfront parcel in the area.

Under this original strategy, such strata market residential uses were expected to generate substantial development revenue to cover the vast majority of these wide-ranging costs, which were estimated at a total of over $1.7 billion in 2018 — including $360 million as the stated cost at the time of the area plan’s approval for the demolition of the viaducts and construction of the new road network.

But White said the cost of the required infrastructure has now doubled, making it unrealistic to rely solely on development revenue to fund the work. “If we’re just expecting the development revenue to make up that massive cost escalation that we’ve experienced, we’re gonna be perpetually spinning our wheels,” said the City’s chief planner.

According to White, recent major City policy changes — especially the amendments to the protected mountain view cones to relax building height restrictions — have reopened conversations about increased density and development capacity, which could generate additional revenue to help finance infrastructure.

He said these view cone changes have catalyzed renewed engagement with Concord Pacific, one of the largest private landowners in Northeast False Creek.

“They don’t have land to proceed on unless we remove the viaducts,” said White, adding that City staff have been meeting with Concord every two weeks for the past year and a half to resolve funding and phasing challenges. Discussions are also ongoing with the Government of British Columbia around a “participation mortgage,” which White described as a “key piece of revenue” needed to fund land remediation, infrastructure, and public amenities. This is in addition to potentially tapping into federal programs.

“We have to work collectively together, and creatively, and think of solutions that weren’t even on the table in 2018 in our previous iterations of the plan. Concord needs to be a participant to that. Plaza of Nations needs to be a participant to that,” said White.

Under such a scenario, a participation mortgage could theoretically be a financing arrangement in which the provincial government provides upfront funding for the viaducts demolition and new road network, in exchange for repayment plus a share of future development revenues generated once the land is built out. As a form of low-cost financing, this approach would allow the major upfront capital costs needed to kickstart the NEFC Plan to be deferred until high-density development projects are ready further down the road.

In an emailed response to Daily Hive Urbanized upon inquiry following Friday’s symposium, Concord Pacific indicates it still supports moving their development project forward, but emphasized that certainty around the removal of the viaducts remains the critical obstacle.

“Until there is a solution for removal of the viaducts it is not possible for anyone to predict a timeline for development,” said Matt Meehan, Concord Pacific’s senior vice-president of planning.

Meehan said development of Concord Pacific’s NEFC land is “very important” to the company, noting it would be the final neighbourhood built out at Concord Pacific Place spanning the northern stretch of False Creek on the downtown Vancouver peninsula. He added that Concord Pacific and the City are “generally aligned in their aspirations for the development of NEFC,” but stressed that “finding and implementing a solution for the removal of the viaducts is essential to unlocking NEFC’s potential.”

Meehan also told Daily Hive Urbanized the company is encouraged by the City’s outreach to the federal and provincial governments for financial support related to the viaducts, and confirmed it intends to continue working collaboratively with other landowners and the community. The company was unable to attend Friday’s event, but plans to meet with Hogan’s Alley Society in the near future.

White said the scale and complexity of the project means success will depend on collective action across governments, landowners, and communities.

“Province, city, federal government, everyone combined,” said White. “This is going to be a collective effort.”

northeast false creek plan road network viaducts

Existing road network with the Dunsmuir and Georgia viaducts (top) and the Northeast False Creek Plan’s future road network with the viaducts demolished and replaced by a street-level road network and the new West Georgia Street ramp onto Pacific Boulevard (bottom). (City of Vancouver)

georgia-street-ramp-vancouver-viaducts-2

Preliminary conceptual artistic rendering of the two-way, four-lane West Georgia Street extension ramp from Beatty Street to Pacific Boulevard — between BC Place Stadium and Rogers Arena — under the Northeast False Creek Plan. (City of Vancouver)

The lay of the land

In early 2025, Daily Hive Urbanized reported Concord Pacific’s newly revised development concept for Concord Landing — its 10-acre NEFC parcel, with a substantial increase in density made possible by taller tower heights enabled by the view cone changes. At the time, the developer submitted a pre-application rezoning enquiry to receive input from City planners to refine the concept ahead of a potential future new rezoning application submission.

There would be about four million sq. ft. of total building floor area — roughly double what was proposed in the developer’s original rezoning application about a decade ago — for over 5,000 homes (up from 3,500) and roughly 220,000 sq. ft. of commercial space, including 120,000 sq. ft. of active ground-level retail/restaurant uses. Made possible by the view cone changes, two towers would reach about 65 storeys — exceeding Vancouver’s current tallest building of the Park Hyatt tower (formerly known as Shangri-La) — and nearly a dozen other towers would be between 20 storeys and 50 storeys. All of this would replace surface vehicle parking — a site used for major and seasonal events, including Cirque du Soleil’s touring performances — and the developer’s presentation centre and interim public park.

concord landing northeast false creek 2024

2025 revised concept for Concord Landing at Northeast False Creek. (Civitas Urban Design & Architecture/Concord Pacific)

Although the Plaza of Nations redevelopment’s rezoning application was approved in 2018, and its initial phase subsequently also went through the development permit application process, this separate private development has since stalled. In 2023, longtime property owner Canadian Metropolitan Properties (CMP) sold the 10-acre site of Expo ’86 World’s Fair’s former B.C. Pavilion to Northchild Group, which intends to go back to the drawing board on the redevelopment concept with substantially added density and height following the view cone changes. Northchild’s new concept is expected to include a mix of strata market ownership condominium housing, secured purpose-built rental housing, retail and restaurant space, a hotel, and other commercial uses and new public spaces. But so far, there has been no public movement on this revised Plaza of Nations redevelopment concept.

CMP’s previously approved concept, which included substantial strata market condominium uses, was expected to generate significant development revenues for the City toward initiating the first components of the NEFC Plan, especially the provision of in-kind public benefits.

This original concept uniquely included a civic centre with an NHL-sized ice rink intended to provide the Vancouver Canucks with a dedicated official practice facility — strategically located next to their home ice of Rogers Arena — while remaining open to public use and community groups when not in use by the team. However, the partnership between CMP and Canucks owner Aquilini Investment later fell apart, with CMP previously telling Daily Hive Urbanized in 2021 that the Canucks had abandoned the partnership. A further notable in-kind benefit was the provision of 380 social housing units integrated into the project’s broad mix of uses.

Another major stakeholder in the area is PavCo, the provincial government’s Crown corporation responsible for operating BC Place Stadium. Site 10C — a triangular-shaped parking lot at the southeast corner of the stadium — is critical to the NEFC Plan’s envisioned West Georgia Street ramp and Pacific Boulevard reconfiguration, which would require a large portion of the provincially owned stadium lot.

In 2018, PavCo received approval for its rezoning application to redevelop the site into a high-rise, mixed-use residential tower, with City Council at the time stipulating that the residential uses must be rental housing in order to achieve the maximum permitted height of 400 ft. PavCo objected to those restrictive conditions.

To date, PavCo has not proceeded with the tower project. But like the Concord Landing and Plaza of Nations parcels, Site 10C now enables greater density and height following recent view cone changes.

2020 model of the Plaza of Nations redevelopment. (B+B Scale Models)

2020 artistic rendering of the Plaza of Nations redevelopment. (James Cheng Architects/Canadian Metropolitan Properties)

Revised 2018 design of the Site 10C tower redevelopment at BC Place Stadium. (Stantec Architecture/Pavco)

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