The innovation economy has changed the way we live and work—our land-use strategies need to catch up.
We are truly on the cusp of some transformative times for urban planning around the world, particularly in Vancouver. With the decrease in what we know as traditional industrial jobs and the rise of new industries and the creative class, Vancouver has an unprecedented opportunity to be a pioneer in how we recreate and redesign our cities to accommodate the evolving needs of the new workforce.
New technologies are transforming the way we do everything, especially the way we live. And yet, people still cling to the old definitions of industry—dirty, noisy steel plants, automobile factories, welding shops. Those jobs are still important, for sure. But they are moving out to the suburbs where land is cheaper, closer to where their workforce lives.
The future of sustainable urban cities lies in the new and evolving creative businesses, businesses that are redefining the meaning of industry, how and where we live and what our cities look and feel like. But as Vancouver city councillor Andrea Reimer recently noted, the city’s infrastructure, services and bylaws were created to serve a bygone economy that relied on resources and industrial processing. “It doesn’t make sense anymore,” she says.
Vancouver's origins as a resource town shaped the city's infrastructure for decades, but times, and our needs, have changed. (Photo: City of Vancouver Archives.)
And yet no one is sure how to build innovative, mixed-use communities that combine industry, retail and residential. Reimer, for her part, agrees the separation between business and residential districts no longer makes sense. Nor does maintaining industrial areas that shut down at 5 p.m. But she admits adapting city planning to support an “innovation economy” is challenging, in part because the nature of work is changing so fast. Cities everywhere, not just Vancouver, are grappling with these changes and trying to come up with policies that will protect job space while avoiding residential silos. It’s a tricky balancing act and Vancouver is struggling to figure it out.
Take the recent redevelopment and zoning announcement for the False Creek Flats. After 20 years of careful consideration, the City of Vancouver has decided to create and protect an industrial zone in the heart of the city using what’s left of available land. Smart. However, there are extremely limited provisions for new housing in the area. What this means is that all the jobs they are protecting in that area will be filled by people who travel in from the suburbs in a reverse commute. It makes no sense. Ask anyone on the train into New York from New Jersey.
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If they included provisions for more housing in the area and allowed for buildings that could include a mix of uses—industrial, retail and residential—employees coming into the area (estimates are up 20,000) could live where they work. That would include employees at the new St. Paul’s Hospital, Emily Carr University, The Centre for Digital Media, MEC and the many medical, biotech and start-ups moving into the area. Those people could help create a new vibrant and dynamic neighborhood, next to one of the city’s busiest transit stations. Seems obvious, right? We need residential density in industrial areas, especially in a city suffering from a lack of affordability. Take a look at what’s happening in Mount Pleasant for an idea of how our future could unfold. On the site where Hudson Plating used to manufacture powder coating and plating for metal products at 5th Avenue and Ontario, there will soon rise a new building. The site will go from employing 40 heavy industry workers to over 350 tech workers. Hudson Plating has now moved to Delta where they have a less expensive workspace and more space in general. It’s a similar story down the street where a company that was a wholesale distributor of sewing products and a longtime presence in the area departed for the suburbs, soon to be replaced by Saje, a health and wellness company. Saje will move into a renovated, revamped industrial heritage building, taking the site from 20 employees to about 250.

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As noted by the Brookings Institute, innovation districts provide a strong foundation for the creation and expansion of companies and jobs. They offer “dense enclaves that merge the innovation and employment potential of research-oriented anchor institutions, high-growth firms, and tech and creative start-ups in well-designed, amenity-rich residential and commercial environments.” Does that sounds like what The Flats could be? There are vibrant, mixed-use innovation districts in Oklahoma City, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Detroit, San Diego and many more. Globally, Barcelona, Berlin, London, Medellin, Montreal, Seoul and Stockholm have evolving districts. There are innovation districts developing in Boston, Brooklyn, Chicago, Portland, Providence, San Francisco and Seattle where underutilized areas, particularly older industrial areas, are being re-imagined and remade.

Have your say! Send editorial submissions to VanMag Senior Editor Jessica Barrett at Jessica.Barrett@Vanmag.com