A staff report laying out the City of Vancouver's proposed Climate Emergency Action Plan will be debated at Council this week, starting Tuesday, November 3rd. It is a comprehensive plan that addresses emissions from buildings, transportation, and "embodied emissions" (what Vancouver essentially 'imports' from elsewhere in buildings and other consumption). While we are generally supportive of climate action and the measures in this report, we see two major areas that need improvement.
1. The Emissions Reduction Targets Should Be Scaled (Inversely) with Population Growth
Vancouver is a growing city and needs to reduce emissions regardless of population growth. However, the effectiveness of the proposed policies need to be assessed in a way that ensures we are not just pushing even more people and families into car-oriented suburbs and other, more car-oriented, cities. A family that is using public and active transit in Vancouver is one that is not driving in from Langley. We are calling on Council to require household/population growth targets to be appropriately integrated into the assessment of our 2030 emissions reduction target.
2. Planning for Housing and Complete Communities Needs to Happen Sooner than 2024
The Action Plan says very little about Big Move 1, targeting 90% complete communities where people can meet their daily needs within an easy/walk roll by 2030. This is because it is being addressed as part of the on-going Vancouver Plan process. But it does state clearly that complete communities with more housing options are essential to the success of the overall plan, including improving the feasibility of several of the other Big Moves. For this reason, the current timeline of merely having recommendations to Council by 2024 is setting up the entire Action Plan for failure. The development process in Vancouver is inevitably a multi-year affair, and multistorey buildings can take years to complete. We are calling on Council to amend the timeline by requiring actionable recommendations for referral to public hearing by 2022 at the latest.
Read our letter to Council Here
Want to have your say?
Learn how to voice your support for the Action Plan with this toolkit. Mention that we need to achieve our housing goals for the climate targets to be meaningful and to achieve them successfully. Housing action is climate action!
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