25-storey, mixed-use residential tower approved to fill big hole in an industrial area of Mount Pleasant in Vancouver

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New major office and industrial complex in Mount Pleasant approved

Although the project retains an industrial space component, the introduction of residential uses goes against the established policies for the area, including Metro Vancouver Regional District’s Metro 2050 Plan and the City of Vancouver’s Broadway Plan.

The property lies within the northernmost perimeter of the Mount Pleasant Industrial Area (MPIA) — a designated industrial area protected by the regional district, framed by 2nd Avenue to the north, Main Street to the east, Broadway to the south, and Cambie Street to the west.

Mixed-use residential projects are already permitted for MPIA’s perimeters on Main Street, Broadway, and Cambie Street, but not along the area’s northern perimeter on the south side of 2nd Avenue.

Furthermore, just across the street along the north side of 2nd Avenue, there are mixed-use residential buildings — catalyzed by the City’s Southeast False Creek Plan, which includes the Olympic Village.

Project opposed by City staff due to the need to protect industrial land and prevent speculation

While the regional district’s Metro 2050 Plan allows for limited exceptions to support transit-oriented development, these apply only to employment lands located within 200 metres of a SkyTrain station. This site does not meet those criteria, as it is designated industrial rather than employment land and is also located beyond the 200-metre distance threshold from SkyTrain’s Olympic Village Station, which is a five-minute walk away.

During the public hearing, which spanned two evenings last week and this week, City staff made a strong recommendation that Vancouver City Council not approve the application at this juncture, citing the significant precedent it would set for protected industrial lands in the area. This position is notable and relatively rare, as under the current planning regime City staff have generally been accommodating and willing to work with developers to advance projects that support much-needed housing supply and economic activity due to the challenging market conditions.

Josh White, the City’s Director of Planning and General Manager of Planning, Urban Design, and Sustainability, told City Council that approving this individual project would conflict with City staff’s ongoing work to assess development opportunities for five “exceptional” industrial sites, including the Mount Pleasant Industrial Area (MPIA). City Council directed staff to undertake this broader review of the five exceptional sites in July 2025.

Allowing residential rezoning on a site-by-site basis for protected industrial lands before broader planning work is complete could significantly increase land speculation.

“I can’t underscore enough how ad hoc use of the on private sites in the absence of that criterion and declare strategy will cloud our exceptional sites planning process and act as an accelerator for speculation, increasing land value, imperilling industrial use viability,” said White during the public hearing.

“I completely understand why the applicant is seeking that exception due to the expediency of process it enables, but we also feel responsible staff to lay out the potential trade-offs for you as decision maker in the bigger picture.”

City staff were also opposed to using the regional district’s “flexibility exception clause” to enable such a private mixed-use residential project, as it was seen as more of a tool for only major and/or urgent projects. This clause by the regional district enables municipal governments to redesignate small portions of protected industrial land for uses that meet broader local and regional objectives. For example, the clause was previously enacted to allow the new St. Paul’s Hospital campus and temporary modular supportive housing in the False Creek Flats.

As well, City staff expressed concern that roughly a dozen proposals within the Mount Pleasant Industrial Area, currently in the early stages of the City’s review process, could be revisited and reworked by the proponents to include residential uses if a major precedent were set through approval of the Strand Developments project.

City staff strongly recommended deferring further consideration of the proposal at this time, allowing the City to develop a coherent and comprehensive approach to potential land-use changes across the five identified exceptional sites before bringing any changes forward for the regional district’s consideration.

Cancelled 2019 four-storey industrial and office concept:

Cancelled 2022 seven-storey industrial and office concept:

Cancelled 2024 19-storey industrial and rental housing tower concept:

Current 2025 25-storey industrial and rental housing tower concept:

A key challenge is that the Metro Vancouver region is facing a significant shortage of industrial land, with major implications for jobs and the broader economy. In Vancouver, industrial uses account for just six per cent of the city’s land area, and MPIA is one of the last remaining large industrial zones. Over the past several decades, the City has already converted substantial areas of former industrial land — such as Coal Harbour, False Creek North, False Creek South, parts of Kitsilano near Arbutus and Broadway, the area around SkyTrain’s Joyce-Collingwood Station, and the East Fraser Lands (River District) — to non-industrial uses, primarily major residential developments.

During the public hearing, City Council heard from approximately two dozen public speakers, who were roughly evenly split between supporting and opposing the proposal.

Those in favour of the project said it would unlock much-needed housing, bring new life and activity to the area, and make good use of a site located close to the SkyTrain. Supporters also argued that the area is no longer well-suited to traditional industrial uses and expressed concern about the site remaining an undeveloped excavation for years. The project was supported by the Mount Pleasant Business Improvement Association, which highlighted the area’s high vacancy rates in commercial and industrial spaces and suggested a new approach is needed to revitalize the area.

Opponents countered that the proposal introduces speculation and weakens long-standing protections for scarce industrial land that supports a significant number of jobs and cannot be replaced once lost. They argued that residential and industrial uses are generally incompatible in close proximity and that introducing housing often leads to the gradual displacement of industrial activity. Critics emphasized the need to preserve industrial land for long-term economic needs and raised concerns about land speculation, rising rents and property taxes for nearby industrial businesses, and broader impacts on established urban planning policies.

“A balanced approach”

On Tuesday evening, City Council unanimously approved, in principle, the rezoning application that would allow the site to transition from industrial-only use to a comprehensive mixed-use development. The rezoning is not final and depends on the developer meeting specific requirements. It invokes the flexibility exception clause to obtain approval from the regional district to change the site’s land-use designation from Industrial to General Urban.

City Council’s approved amendments noted that the City cannot finalize the rezoning until these regional amendments are approved, and specifically directed City staff to not recommend the use of the clause in the future and to not advance similar industrial land flexibility requests elsewhere for now, pending broader planning work in the MPIA, except in limited, previously approved cases.

“I do believe that this is an ideal location for a mixed rental and light industrial building. That said, I think that speakers on both sides of the debate made very strong points today, and I took them into consideration while deliberating over this,” said ABC city councillor Peter Meiszner during the public hearing.

“I believe that this is a balanced approach. Right now, this site is a pit. It’s a hole in the ground. And the office market, as many of us are aware, has cratered. Vacancies are higher than they’ve been in many, many years, probably decades. And if we’re waiting for a light industrial project with office space on top of it to be built here, we’re going to be waiting a long time.”

Meiszner also compared this proposal’s uses with QuadReal Property Group’s newly-completed 10-storey Archetype mixed-use building just off Main Street in the False Creek Flats, containing 200 rental homes, 67,000 sq. ft. of office space, and 32,000 sq. ft. of industrial space.

Other councillors echoed similar themes about the site’s long-standing underuse and the realities of the current market, while also weighing the competing policy considerations raised during the public hearing.

“This is a vacant site, and I went back and thought through as long as I can remember, it hasn’t been especially productive industrial land. It’s been like car garages, and it’s been a two-storey with office above, and it hasn’t been real heavy lifting industrial. It was retail for the most part,” said Green City Councillor Pete Fry.

“And so, the site hasn’t done a lot of heavy lifting for industrial for years, and the proposal for us that we see before us now does offer stacked industrial with the pivot to replace the commercial with residential that makes it pencil out. And so, I mean, it is actually creating industrial in a sense where there was none.”

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