City Debate #7: THE VACANCY TAX WILL WORK (VIDEO)
Vancouver just enacted a 1 per cent tax on empty homes. Will that make housing more affordable or fail to do so while creating new problems?
City Debate #6: VANCOUVER REPELS CREATIVE PEOPLE (VIDEO)
Vancouver has been a creative hotbed for environmentalism, urban design, art and social policies – but is that coming to a halt due to high prices and other factors?
Meet Vancouver's New Chief Planner (VIDEO)
Welcome to Vancouver’s new Chief Planner!
Gil Kelley is the City of Vancouver’s new General Manager of Planning, Urban Design, and Sustainability. Please join the Urbanarium in welcoming him to his new role.
Gil will speak on: West Coast Cities: On the Leading Edge of Change
Gil’s talk will be followed by a Q and A and a reception in the Playhouse lobby:
5.30 Doors Open/Check-in
5.30 - 6.30 Networking and No Host Bar
6.30 - 8.00 Talk and Q+A
8.00 - 9.00 Reception
An Intracity Canal for Vancouver
With limited budgets and the large scale of sea-level rise challenges facing cities, it’s time to think about design solutions that address many problems at once. Streets provide an amazing opportunity for this because they are owned by cities (which makes it easier to implement changes), and they are significant public spaces for community use (in Vancouver, about 30% of land are streets).
Decoding Density in VR: Building Density In a Climate Emergency
Decoding Density in VR: Building Density in a Climate Emergency was 4 weeks of Ethos Lab mixed reality camps exploring concepts of building housing and food density through combining urban planning and architectural practice and live drawings with the powers of the Unity game engine.
City Debate #19: HIGH RISES ARE MORE SOCIABLE THAN LOW RISES
Which form of housing development supports a stronger community fabric and greater sociability? Do low-rise housing forms make it easier for neighbours to get to know each other and build stronger social connections? Or does being more spread out make it harder to stay connected? Do the higher population densities of condo and rental towers make it easier for residents to form tight social networks? Or does the high-rise form lead to residents being surrounded by people, but all avoiding eye contact in the elevator?
City Debate #18: MASS TIMBER IS NOT WORTH THE RISKS
Mass timber is widely touted for it’s potential for speedy, low carbon construction. However, market acceptance in BC remains elusive. Do the risks (cost, supply chain, trades, maintenance etc) outweigh the benefits? Our panel debates the position: “Mass timber is not worth the risk(s)”.
A Sign is a Design Fail
How could the communication features in our cities help everyone feel safe, informed and led?
While standard signage can play an important role in connecting people to different places, warning potential dangers, providing instructions and reinforcing a community vibe, having too much signage or the wrong kind of signage can create the opposite effect.
Breaking the Sound Barrier
Designing event space for a quiet city.
Outdoor events face barriers - How can we design flexible spaces that accommodate loudness and other disruption for a variety of cultural activations?
ADFF Panel on Living Together: The Story of De Warren & Where We Grow Older
Living Together follows a group of young people during the creation of a housing cooperative that aims to be sustainable, social, and affordable. The project is ambitious. Not only is it the first of its kind in the Netherlands, but the group of young residential pioneers has the added challenge of having no house-building experience.