The City of Vancouver says its new policies will make it easier and more cost-effective to create laneway housing.
In a press release, the city says benefits resulting from bylaw changes approved Tuesday include:
- • Streamlining approvals for one-and-a-half storey laneway homes by introducing an outright review process similar to the current process for one-storey laneway homes
- • Supporting more functional and flexible laneway home design by increasing allowable heights and updating the method of measuring height
- • Improving livability by introducing minimum room size requirements
- • Providing more flexibility for the location and design of one-storey laneway houses
Enactment of the approved changes is expected in September 2018.
The hope is to add 4,000 new laneway houses over the next 10 years as part of the Housing Vancouver plan.
“By removing identified barriers to building a laneway home, we are making it easier and faster to build the type of housing we know people want and need,” senior planner Paula Huber said in the statement.
More than 3,300 laneway homes have been approved across the city since the program was initiated in 2009.
