Approve Item 2 – 6525-6577 Oak Street
Motion 7 · Public Hearing, July 23, 2026
Summary
- Approved ODP amendment and CD-1 rezoning for an 18-storey, 189-unit mixed-use rental building at 6525–6577 Oak Street, replacing a gas station and sporting goods store.
- Includes a ground-floor No Frills grocery store and a privately operated 160-space childcare facility on level 2.
- Height and density exceed the Cambie Corridor Plan's 12-storey maximum; relaxation supported to deliver rental and below-market rental housing.
- Councillors noted the grocery store addresses a food-access gap and the site's proximity to transit reduces dependence on private vehicles.
- Passed unanimously by all present.
Vote
Transcript
17 segments
And when do the finance approvals occur?
After a certain amount of pre-sales to the satisfaction of the bank.
All right. Thanks.
Yeah. I just want to quickly jump back into the option to purchase. Now... So in the event that things don't phase appropriately, the option to purchase, am I reading this correctly, that the city would have an option to purchase for $184 million?
Just to clarify, Councillor, the option to purchase is for $10, which is just a numerical value that we have to put in for some value recognition in any contract. The letter of credit or security that the applicant is providing is for the $184 million, which is the current estimate of the amenity to be delivered on Abbott Street. Those securities will be updated and refreshed twice, at least through the process, once before enactment and once before permit issuance, so that the city holds sufficient securities to ensure that project can get delivered.
Okay, so that's, okay. Thank you. Okay, just for the applicant, because, I mean, obviously this is pretty new territory, and we haven't even contemplated buildings of this height and scale, and I'm imagining that it comes with unique considerations, like, in addition to obviously NavCam, but are there issues around wind? We don't... like at that height? And are there, how deep is the excavation to support a building of this scale? And obviously we don't have shadow studies, but I imagine it would cast a pretty long shadow.
No, that's a good question. I can answer it. Okay. These buildings do have significant differences to the buildings we normally do in Vancouver. We have brought on Arup, who's the international engineering firm out of England, and based out of New York, we have David Farnsworth, who's done all of the tall buildings in the world that we all know about. And things like elevators, believe it or not, are the most complex part of the whole thing. The hotel itself will have, I think, 28 elevators.
16 elevators, and then the other ones altogether will add up to over 28 elevators. So these are significant changes from what we normally do, and we're committed to work through them with the experts in the world to help us do them.
What kind of considerations do we have for life safety in the event of some kind of catastrophic situation, fire access, that kind of thing? Surely there must be some different systems in play.
There's a whole building code and life safety plan that's going to have to be developed. And that's part of later parts of the permit process, which many experts will be brought in to make sure that it's fulfilled. Arab does all these buildings all over the world, and we'll be probably working on a bunch of equivalencies to make sure everyone's safe and everyone gets out of the building in time if there's a problem.
And so resiliency to earthquakes and extreme weather and different kind of pieces are all going to be baked into this final application, ultimately.
Yes.
Well, we are going to be doing geo-exchange. And so we're proposing a site-wide utility such that we will be net zero operating carbon. So we're trying to be pretty much off-grid in terms of what were requirements for energy.
So through a geothermal, because that's how deep you're going to... We're going very deep, yes. Okay. Okay, well, we've got lots of questions ahead, so I'll leave it there.
Thanks. Thanks to a question, just one that I forgot to ask. I know that with the SkyTrain tunnel underneath that area, Is going below ground for parking and other necessities, what's that going to look like? Because I know that, for example, in any conversations around the Hudson Bay site, that that is a factor in terms of being able to go down deeper underneath it. Can you tell us a little bit about it?
Yeah, good evening. Neil Peacock, I'm an associate director within engineering services. So, yeah, as part of the application, the applicant proposed a connection more direct to the actual TransLink facility underneath Seymour Street. It was determined sort of through a preliminary technical analysis. That's actually much more difficult. It could also add operational costs for TransLink for Farragate and things. So we're looking at an alternative just slightly south of that location, which would connect into the bay. and take advantage of other underground connections. So we're looking at both this site as well as other ones adjacent to kind of resolve what is otherwise a pretty confusing underground network. And we hope, yeah, that would extend to the eventual Bay redevelopment.