Jericho Coalition demands halt to Vancouver’s Draft Official Development Plan for Jericho Lands – it lets developer drop social and below-market affordable housing unless subsidized at huge cost; massive 60 luxury high-rise towers up to 49-storeys would be highly profitable – and outrageously expensive to Vancouver, BC and federal taxpayers – also on the hook for unnecessary and super costly $8 to $10 billion SkyTrain extension to UBC

VANCOUVER – The Jericho Coalition says Vancouver’s Draft Official Development Plan for the Jericho Lands must be halted because it is a huge taxpayer giveaway to the developer, and alternatives should be considered.

The grassroots coalition says the Plan will cost Vancouver, BC and federal taxpayers billions of dollars to build luxury high-rise towers up to 49-storeys while subsidizing windfall profits – all without creating significant affordable housing.

The Draft ODP quietly released late last week outlines how all affordable and social housing is dependent on funding from the provincial and federal governments and unnamed “partners” – and that the city will drop affordable housing requirements in favour of market rental housing if those governments don’t heavily subsidize the project, the Jericho Coalition says.

“This proposed ODP is an outrageous and extremely expensive giveaway by taxpayers to a developer intending to make huge profits while building luxury high-rise towers that are strongly opposed by surrounding neighbourhoods and city residents,” said Jericho Coalition spokesperson Susan Fisher. “The magnitude of tax increases Vancouver, BC and Canadian taxpayers will have to hand over is astounding – for a project a strong majority of Vancouverites oppose, and that does not lead to any affordable units without additional public funding. The taxpayer will be on the hook even for the bare minimum of affordable housing that is mandated in the plans of any other development company.”

The Jericho Coalition also says the Draft ODP clearly shows that the entire Jericho Lands high-rise development project is totally dependent on the provincial and federal governments spending up to $10 billion on an unnecessary SkyTrain Extension to the University of BC – again at taxpayers’ expense for the profits of the developer, the MST Development Corporation.

Says Jericho Coalition spokesperson Murray Hendren: “There is no need for the UBCx SkyTrain extension – except to make this massive, unwanted development project very profitable,” “If approved, taxpayers would be taken to the cleaners in yet another subsidy that doesn’t
guarantee any significant affordable housing.”

“Vancouver could get 50 kilometers of Light Rail Transit for the cost of just 7 kilometers of SkyTrain – LRT could create a city-wide network serving far more people and communities than a single SkyTrain line,” Hendren said. “Other North American and European cities use LRT to
promote low to mid-rise affordable housing city-wide, not luxury concrete and glass high-rise towers. In addition, other parts of Metro Vancouver have far greater needs of improved transit options than the corridor to UBC.”

The Jericho Coalition says city-wide public opinion polling has shown that Vancouver residents don’t want a development with an even higher population density than the City of Hong Kong or the West End – but that’s what the Draft ODP is facilitating.

A Vancouver-wide public opinion poll in late 2023 showed that 72 per cent of respondents wanted City Council to reject the proposed Jericho Lands high-rise development with density three times greater than the City of Hong Kong and multiple towers up to 49 storeys, with 13,000 units for 28,000 residents. The poll, conducted by national firm Forum Research for the Coalition, also found that over 70 per cent of respondents said the Jericho Lands proposal was too tall for the Jericho Lands area, which borders on several of Vancouver’s best-loved beaches, including Jericho, Locarno and Spanish Banks.

The Jericho Coalition has proposed an alternative plan with low-rise and medium-rise buildings constructed with wood and mass timber instead of the MST proposal of 60 mostly concrete and steel towers. The alternative would see 7,200 units in courtyard buildings for about 16,000 people at a human scale with more green space, and 72 per cent of poll respondents supported it.

The high-rises would loom over Jericho Beach Park, a magnet for residents from all over Vancouver. These towers will shade parts of the park, negatively impacting the park and the recreational experience of park users. A city by-law that states that buildings cannot shade
public parks. Why is the City treating this developer more favourably than other developers and bending by-laws and due process to meet its needs?

The poll also found that 75.6 per cent of respondents said the Jericho Lands high-rise tower proposal, which is majority-owned by the MST Development Corporation, a partnership of the xʷməθkʷəy̓ əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-
Waututh) First Nations, should not be treated differently because it is indigenous-owned and should be considered in the same way as any other developer in Vancouver. The MST Development Corporation is one of BC’s most prominent developers, with currently $5 billion in projects and assets. About 25 per cent of the Jericho Lands is also owned by the Canada
Lands Company, a federal agency.

The Draft ODP for the Jericho Lands is at: https://syc.vancouver.ca/projects/jericho-lands/jericho-lands-draft-official-development-plan-feb2025-info-session.pdf