Oct. 4, 2021
City of Vancouver Council
Dear Mayor Kennedy Stewart and Councillors,
Re: Climate Emergency Parking Program
Agenda: https://council.vancouver.ca/20211005/spec20211005ag.htm
Report: https://council.vancouver.ca/20211005/documents/spec5.pdf
While the Coalition of Vancouver Neighbourhoods (CVN) recognizes that the climate emergency needs to be urgently addressed, CVN is concerned that this Parking Program will not address the climate emergency as proposed. The Parking Program to implement citywide pay parking permits, is a greenwashed City of Vancouver fee-based cash-grab that makes life yet more unaffordable and unlivable for residents. Therefore CVN is strongly opposed to the report recommendations as proposed.
Further, the related Climate Emergency Action Plan proposal to eliminate parking minimums for new development is a giveaway to the development industry while offloading those costs onto the residents and businesses in the surrounding areas. The Parking Program for citywide pay parking permits is a City fee-based cash-grab taking advantage of these offloaded costs and impacts from developers onto the residents surrounding new development. The proposed citywide rental rezoning proposals will exacerbate these impacts.
This will have negative impacts on:
– Seniors, people with disabilities, and families with small children would be less likely to find parking in front of their residence when the area is flooded with vehicles from new development without onsite parking minimums.
– Pay parking unfairly impacts renters who are less likely to have a garage to park in.
– Lower income people will be more impacted since it adds a larger percent to their cost of living.
– While the annual parking permit fees may be relatively low to start, this will escalate quickly. We understand that the West End Parking Permits started at $40 annually and are now $400.
– The transition to electric vehicles will be less viable because there is little to no onsite parking in new development for vehicles to charge.
We also are concerned that the report has misrepresented the feedback from the public. Clearly 80% of the almost 19,000 responses to the city’s survey are opposed to this pay permit parking citywide. It is disingenuous for the city to create selective additional surveys designed for a different predetermined outcome to support the initiative when there is in fact demonstrated to be overwhelming public opposition.
We request that the report recommendations not be approved, and instead, also reconsider the proposed actions to eliminate onsite parking minimums in new development.
Thank you,
Steering Committee,
Coalition of Vancouver Neighbourhoods
Arbutus Ridge Community Association
Arbutus Ridge/ Kerrisdale/ Shaughnessy Visions
Cedar Cottage Area Neighbours
Downtown Eastside Neighbourhood Council
Dunbar Residents Association
Fairview/South Granville Action Committee
False Creek Residents Association
Grandview Woodland Area Council
Granville-Burrard Residents & Business Assoc.
Greater Yaletown Community Association
Joyce Area Residents
Kitsilano-Arbutus Residents Association
Kits Point Residents Association
Marpole Residents Coalition
NW Point Grey Home Owners Association
Oakridge Langara Area Residents
Riley Park/South Cambie Visions
Shaughnessy Heights Property Owners Assoc.
Strathcona Residents Association
Upper Kitsilano Residents Association
West End Neighbours Society
West Kitsilano Residents Association
West Point Grey Residents Association
