According to the key founder and mayoral nominee of ProVancouver, developments in transit locations should be for affordable rental housing only.
David Chen noted that real-estate speculation is high in market-housing developments around transit.
“The problem is when you have speculation…people that buy, they actually don’t use transit,” Chen told the Georgia Straight in a phone interview.
Chen and ProVancouver are advancing a policy option that's been raised before.
In 2016, Metro Vancouver planners Raymond Kan and Margaret Eberle prepared a report in connection with the regional government’s transit-oriented rental housing study.
“Accommodating renter households, in particular those making less than $50,000 per year, in transit‐oriented locations is not only key to developing diverse, vibrant, and complete communities, but it is also to key to maximizing transit ridership and the value for money of transit and housing affordability investments,” the report stated.
Kan and Eberle noted that “transit usage rates for renters consistently exceed that for owners, even after controlling for density, household income, and location”.
