Smart Growth in BC
New West Coast publications, website, highlight growing movement
Smart growth is taking off in British Columbia. Many local municipalities and developers are emerging as North American leaders in smart growth practices at the regional and local scale. Residents are demanding more choices in where they live and the quality of neighbourhoods and job opportunities. Bounded by ocean, mountains, rivers and working lands, communities are also being forced to use land more efficiently to stop urban sprawl, revitalize commercial centres, and maintain a working land base.
With a projected 1.6 million more people calling BC home in 2025, municipalities are turning to smart growth approaches to maintain the livability of communities while ensuring that municipal costs do not snowball. Most importantly, this means using the landbase more efficiently and protecting working lands.
As Don Chen, the Executive Director of Smart Growth America states, “We do not achieve the kind of residential and commercial mix of land uses, and the densities, that you have in your town and city centres. Citizens in British Columbia value their open space as much as they value vibrant commercial centres and healthy downtowns. We need to apply this lesson across the US.”
What is Smart Growth?
Smart growth refers to land use and development practices that enhance the quality of life in communities, preserve the natural environment, and save money over time. The aim is to limit costly urban sprawl, use tax dollars more efficiently and create more livable communities. Smart growth practices range from promoting compact complete communities to supporting a viable working land base. Developments that conserve resources (land, infrastructure, and materials) cost less and increase property values.
For example, studies across North America show that proximity to greenspace increases real estate values from 15 to 30 percent. Likewise, more compact development patterns that use natural stormwater management methods can decrease the cost of new housing by $20 per square foot.
Smart Growth has both “where” and “how” components. Good growth occurs where development has minimal adverse impact on the environment, and in places where development takes advantage of existing public investments. Smart Growth also addresses how development works with other projects to create choices that are missing – the choice to live in a townhouse, condominium, house, garden suite or apartment, the choice to walk or use public transit, and the choice to meet neighbors in attractive common spaces.
Smart Growth Principles
Smart growth is composed of a package of complementary strategies that include:
- Promoting urban revitalization and a healthy working landbase by containing urban areas and channeling development into existing
neighbourhoods.
- Incorporating green infrastructure into communities.
- Creating compact complete communities by mixing land uses and using land more efficiently.
- Increasing transportation choices through land use decisions.
- Creating inclusive neighbourhoods by ensuring that a diversity of housing types are accessible to a wide range of people of different age groups, family types and incomes.
- Maximizing the enduring benefits of developments by using resources wisely on sites and in buildings that are tailored to specific neighbourhood conditions.
- Supporting municipal goals through cost recovery by ensuring that development cost charges and other taxes and fees reflect the true cost of different types of growth.
- Promoting smart growth throughout the development process by reforming administrative processes and addressing liability issues.
Best Practices
Most communities in BC are putting these principles into action. To create a more compact complete community, Saanich has had an urban containment boundary since the 1960’s that helps to direct development into already-serviced areas. Fast-growing municipalities such as Kelowna and Nanaimo are concentrating development around neighbourhood centres. And some municipalities, such as Whistler, are using quality of life indicators to evaluate the effects of development over time.
Municipalities are also returning to using the “green infrastructure,” which refers to the ecological processes, both natural and engineered, that provide economic and environmental benefits in urban areas. Traditionally, we have paved over streams in favour of hard drainage solutions, but, at a fraction of the cost to both themselves and developers, municipalities are exploring natural ways to deal with stormwater management. The new East Clayton Neighbourhood in Surrey and UniverCity on Burnaby Mountain will provide excellent models of on-site stormwater management that mimic hydrologic processes.
Smart growth is also about process – how those with good ideas put them in place on the ground with the support of existing community members. Saanich requires developers to meet with the
affected community association to resolve any issues before the project goes very far in the municipal approval process. This helps to solve problems early, create a better project, and avoid lengthy public hearings. The developer’s team for the Selkirk Waterfront project in Victoria kept their doors open for nine months consulting with the community, and took a team approach to working with City staff. They obtained a rezoning and approval of development guidelines for a 23-acre site in just nine months.
Smart Bylaws Guide
In recognition of BC’s leadership role in many areas of smart growth, West Coast Environmental Law has developed a Smart Bylaws Guide to assist local governments to implement smart growth strategies through policy and bylaw changes. The Guide is addressed to the towns and small cities in BC that often do not have the resources to research and apply new practices in a comprehensive way. It describes smart growth practices, and backs up the theory with case studies, technical standards and bylaws that can be tailored to specific municipal circumstances. The Guide brings together the best practices of municipalities across BC, and highlights other innovators in the US and Europe.
The Smart Bylaws Guide is composed of seven interconnected tools:
1. The Case for Smart Growth outlines what smart growth is and why it is of benefit to local governments. It goes beyond principles and provides economic and other data to prove that smart growth strategies work – how smart growth costs less for municipalities and developers, increases property values, creates safer streets, increases housing and transportation choices, and protects drinking water supplies.
2. The Smart Bylaws Summary describes the basic elements of smart growth using case studies ranging from the regional and municipal scale to site and building scale. It provides an overview of the entire Guide, and links from within the chapters take readers to more detailed online tools.
3. Web pages discuss each smart growth tool in more depth and provide examples of case studies.
4. Case studies document development projects that exhibit a number of smart growth features, including bylaws and contact information.
5. Bylaws and policies accompany each smart growth strategy. They are either working examples from local governments or have been drafted to assist local governments to effectively use specific Local Government Act powers.
6. Checklists enable staff, council members and citizens to evaluate projects and municipal programs.
7. Resources provide links to further online information.
The entire Guide can be accessed at www.wcel.org/issues/urban/sbg.
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