Via City of Vancouver:

The City of Vancouver is seeking input from apartment-dwelling families with children to help plan for spaces that better meet their needs.

As part of an update to the High-Density Housing for Families and Children Guidelines, city planners are looking for feedback from families who live or have lived in apartments to better understand their current situations, needs, values, preferences and issues. The goal of the design review is to produce updated guidelines that help create homes and buildings that are functional, sociable and inclusive.

Since the guidelines were first drafted more than 25 years ago the housing market and how people live in Vancouver has significantly changed. Today’s families face complex trades offs between affordability, space and lifestyle.

Families are key to a growing economy and vibrant society. Having suitable housing choices is important for keeping families in Vancouver and attracting more families to live in the city.

Households that include children under 18 years of age are encouraged to provide their input through an online survey at vancouver.ca/familyroom.

The survey will remain open until May 22, 2018, and updated design guidelines are expected to be completed in Fall 2018.

City staff will also be popping-up in various locations in the West End and Downtown to seek input on Saturday, April 28th and Saturday, May 5th between 11:30 am and 3:00 pm. Pop-up locations will be posted on City of Vancouver social media streams.

A priority in the Housing Vancouver strategy is to ensure the right types of housing are created for families. Recent actions have included the creation of the Housing Mix Policy for Rezoning Projects (2016), which raised requirements and targets for rezoning projects to include 35 per cent family units (two bedrooms or more), up from the previous requirement of 25 per cent to help Vancouver’s housing stock make room for families.