16 — Friday, March 10, 1995 ~ North Shore News iorth Vancouver Ci eves Lower Lonsdal A> PUBLIC © consultation process to help North Vancouver City Council decide the direction of future development of the Lower Lonsdale lands that kicked off earlier this year continued recently with council address- ing building heights. NORTH VANCOUVER CITY COUNCIL By Robert Galster Council is in the process of fin- ishing a conceptual plan to guide the city in the development of the Lower Lonsdale lands. The area is bounded by Esplanade, Third Street, Chesterfield and St. Georges avenues. ; Although. council initially planned to address all issues relat- ing to the development of Lower Lonsdale, it has since divided the process into two parts. The first is to proceed with the development of the non- -contentious Sites. - Such areas are those that require no changes to the local zoning bylaws and don’t exceed any other guidelines of the city’s Official Community Plan. The ‘second relates to sites requiring more input from both the public and city staff and includes the often-contentious issue of site bonusing. During a recent session council voted to divide the i issues of height _ and density. Councillors decided to limit pos- ° sible bonusing options to issues of density only. -: “The real question we’ve got to deal with in Lower Lonsdale has got to do with density, not height,” said Coun. Darrell Mussatto. Mussatto later. amended the motion to exclude a single site . north of Lonsdale Quay because of : the height of surrounding buildings. .‘?...Density bonusing is a trade-off c process where the city allows a developer to exceed maximum den- sity guidelines i in exchange for pub- “. lic amenity space the developer sets _, aside and hands over to the city fol- : lowing the development’ s comple- tion. : i Coun. Stella Jo Dean voted oe against the mation and said she felt that height is an important aspect of : bonusing. A developer isn’t going to give. ‘you amenities unless we give them 7 heights,” she said. - But Coun. Barbara Sharp didn’ t ; agree, stating that if density bonus- AOAK & PINE Quality FURNITURE you B Before (FACTORY DIRECT) ‘Upstairs Second Level in front of the elevator ing ulone is not enough, the city would have to do without some amenities, “We'll simply have to de with- out (amenities) what we can't afford,” said Sharp. However, before council can proceed it needs to establish which, if any, amenities should be provid- ed. During an earlier public meet- ing, various delegations called fora variety of amenities including: an arts and cultural centre, a youth centre, a child-care facility, a muse- um and a theatre. However, because density bonusing calls for the relaxation of tules to which the councillors usu- ally steadfastly adhere to, not everyone at the meeting was in agreement and some questioned the need to make exceptions. “In terms of density I ask do we have to be as dense?” asked Dugal Smith. “Are we trying to duplicate the West End of Vancouver? I real- ly don’t see the need for excep- tions.” But Jim Ramsay, chairman of the Lonsdale Citizens’ Association, defended the bonusing concept and asked council to address all of the public concems where possible. “I urge council to assess every- one’s point of view, but at the same time not throw away the real bene- cabin |. 500 sq. ft. fits that come from using the bonus- ing tool available to it.” said Ramsay, Meanwhile Don Rutherford, executive director of the North Shore Neighbourhood House, reminded council that the area already has many positive aspects that should be protected. “This (Lower Lonsdale) is a community marked by diversity,” said Rutherford. “Diversity of age, ethnicity, income and ability and because the existing housing is designed to accommodate this diversity, so too is the surrounding community.” He continued to warn that coun- cil’s current direction will lead to “the imposition... of huge amounts of single-purpose housing, in this case housing for double income, no-kids people” which will in um “forever alter its present diversity and thus its surroundings.” Coun. 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