BC government buys 11 single-family lots next to SkyTrain Nanaimo Station for affordable housing redevelopment Eleven single-family houses next to SkyTrain Nanaimo Station on the eastern edge of Vancouver’s Kensington-Cedar Cottage neighbourhood are now owned by the Government of British Columbia.

This was a court-ordered sale of a land assembly owned by Coromandel Properties, representing the beleaguered real estate development company’s second sale of their development site assets since they exited creditor protection one year ago.

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The sale of 3805-3919 Nanaimo Street was completed in November 2023 in a deal worth $22.5 million. According to Altus Group, the buyer of this land assembly is the provincial government’s BC Transportation Authority.

This sale price is below real estate firm NAI Commercial’s advertised listing of $27 million.

The one-acre land assembly of 11 single-family lots is immediately northwest of Nanaimo Station — along the west side of Nanaimo Street between East 22nd Avenue and East 23rd Avenue.





It is expected the property will become a major affordable housing development under the provincial government’s legislated transit-oriented development (TOD) guidelines, which require the municipal government to permit heights of at least 20 storeys and floor area ratio (FAR) densities of a total building floor area that is at least five times the size of the lot for sites within 200 metres of a SkyTrain station.

This is also part of the provincial government’s strategy for BC Transportation Authority. In 2022, the legislation was amended to enable BC Transportation Authority to acquire land next to public transit hubs to build more affordable housing and community benefits. Prior to the legislation changes, BC Transportation Authority was only legally able to acquire and expropriate the required land to build transportation infrastructure.

This includes utilizing the excess lands held by BC Transportation Authority not used for building transportation infrastructure projects, which is the case for the major surface parking lots immediately south of SkyTrain Moody Centre Station in Port Moody. In November 2023, the provincial government announced it will build a significant rental housing complex on these parking lots, which were originally used as construction staging and storage areas for the Millennium Line’s Evergreen Extension.

As well, in the 2023 provincial budget, about $400 million was set aside through 2026 to acquire land along major public transit corridors to build new affordable and market housing developments, with the expectation that this funding will catalyze “thousands of new homes.”

However, City of Vancouver staff previously told Daily Hive Urbanized there are currently some major technical challenges with introducing high-density developments around Nanaimo Station, which at least partly explains why the area around the transit hub remains low density ever since the opening of the Expo Line nearly four decades ago. The technical challenges centre on the area’s utilities capacity, specifically sewage and water, which would require major reinvestments to renew and expand. City staff said they plan to create an area planning process for the combined Nanaimo Station and 29th Avenue Station areas at some point in the future.

Based on the latest available statistics, in 2022, Nanaimo Station was the 26th busiest station out of the total network of 53 SkyTrain stations, with 1.82 million annual boardings, and averages of 5,450 boardings per weekday, 4,600 boardings per Saturday, and 3,500 boardings per Sunday/holiday.

In May 2022, Daily Hive Urbanized reported on a highly preliminary developer-driven, high-density, tower-based redevelopment concept for the area surrounding Nanaimo Station, with over a dozen residential towers reaching up to 35 storeys.






In October 2023, Vancouver City Council approved Mayor Ken Sim’s member motion on seven “bold” strategies for housing, which included directing City staff to explore more high-density, transit-oriented developments next to Vancouver’s underdeveloped SkyTrain stations, with a particular focus on the rezoning of lands surrounding Nanaimo Station, 29th Avenue Station, Renfrew Station, and Rupert Station.

There is already an area densification planning process underway for the combined area of Renfrew Station and Renfrew Station, which is expected to be considered by City Council later in 2024 after public consultation.

You might also like:
- BC government to buy $400 million of land near public transit for housing
- New legislation to allow BC government to buy more land around SkyTrain for housing
- Dense, transit-oriented housing finally eyed for Nanaimo SkyTrain station
- Full list of 104 transit hubs under BC's transit-oriented development legislation
- BC government to build rental housing complex at Moody Centre SkyTrain
https://dailyhive.com/vancouve....r/3805-3919-nanaimo-