Urgent: City of Vancouver to eliminate view cones protecting Chinatown & DTES
Last chance to take action to stop City Council today
The reason why Vancouver has beautiful public mountain views is because they’re protected by something called “view cones” implemented since the 80s. For decades, Vancouver’s forward-thinking view cones policy prevented real estate developers from covering up the mountains so that everyone in the public can see and enjoy them.
Here’s an example of a public mountain view protected by a view cone (of which City of Vancouver wants to eliminate):
What’s interesting is that Chinatown and DTES have also been protected by view cones, because it limited buildings to a certain height in the area. Here’s the view cone from Olympic Village that has protected Chinatown and the DTES.
But, tomorrow, Wednesday July 10, the City of Vancouver is planning on eliminating the view cones that protect Chinatown and DTES for decades.
Removing the view cone protection will upzone the area and increase land prices, which will lead to further gentrification and economic displacement of long-time residents and businesses in Chinatown and DTES.
This is the before and after proposed seen from the Olympic Shipyard Pier:
In addition to the privatization of this view cone for development, Mayor and Council will be voting on even more privatization of other iconic public views, such as this one from Cambie St:
Once a public view is privatized with condos and office towers for the wealthy, you cannot reverse it. For the full scope of public view privatization, you can review the full report here.
Take action to stop Mayor and Council for upzoning Chinatown and the DTES that will exacerbate the gentrification of the neighbourhood. Tell them to keep Vancouver’s public mountain views public.
Here’s 3 things you can do:
Write City Council *today* to tell them stop their removal of our public mountain views, particularly the change of the Olympic Shipyard Pier view cone that will gentrify Chinatown and the DTES (July 10 - Standing Committee: Report 1):
Before 5pm today, sign up to speak by to Mayor and Council tomorrow Wednesday, July 10th (Report 1):
Sign up for the Save Our Skyline YVR campaign to keep up-to-date on the latest information and actions to protect Vancouver’s public mountain views.