This past Tuesday, Vancouver City Council approved a new Development Approval Procedure (DAP) By-law, streamlining the rezoning process by eliminating public hearings for many projects. While the change was prompted by provincial legislation (Bill 18), it also reflects a growing recognition that time is a critical and costly factor in housing delivery.
The newly adopted DAP By-law allows projects that align with Vancouver’s Official Development Plan (ODP) and are at least 50% residential to bypass the public hearing stage. These projects will now move directly to Council for a decision, eliminating a procedural hurdle that historically added months—if not years—to the process.
This change is part of the Province’s push to speed up housing delivery through Bill 18, which requires municipalities to consolidate and clarify their development approval processes. But because Vancouver is governed by its own legislation—the Vancouver Charter—it operates differently than other BC municipalities, which follow the Local Government Act.
As a result, the City of Vancouver is currently in the process of establishing an Official Development Plan based on the Vancouver Plan, as it does not currently have a city-wide ODP and instead utilizes a collection of area-specific ODPs. The City anticipates that an interim city-wide ODP will be adopted in June 2026, which means most rezoning applications will still be subject to a public hearing until then, as they have been for the past year. (The City amended its Procedure By-law in July 2024 to introduce the new process for rezoning applications and is now consolidating that by-law into a new DAP By-law.)
Additionally, developers proposing projects that diverge from established plans will now be required to submit a rezoning enquiry early on. This step, already common in other jurisdictions, enables earlier collaboration with City staff and reduces costly redesigns down the line.
By aligning with Bill 18 through the DAP By-law, Vancouver will be joining other municipalities in reducing unnecessary procedural delays and creating clearer pathways for housing to move forward.
THE REAL COST OF DELAY
While the City is moving in the right direction, aligning under the new DAP framework will take time—a fact that underscores the cost of operating within multiple, misaligned systems. But this alignment is ultimately a good thing: it lays the groundwork for faster approvals and more predictable processes in the future. Vancouver is taking the time now to build clarity that could save years of delay down the road.
For HAVAN and our members, this alignment between the City and the Province signals a welcome, pragmatic shift. The costs of delay—inevitably passed on to the final price of a home—are no longer just a developer’s problem; they’re a housing affordability issue. In today’s climate of market instability, unpredictability can make or break a project.
Even under the best of circumstances, prolonged approvals add up: property taxes, interest payments, consultant fees, and more. In today’s volatile market, those costs aren’t just inconvenient—they can push a project from viable to shelved.
A NECESSARY COURSE CORRECTION
This policy change alone won’t solve Vancouver’s housing crisis. But it’s a move in the right direction—and a sign that senior levels of government are grasping the urgency of time and our supply chain challenges. Notably, Vancouver dropped from 12th to 17th place in the CHBA Municipal Benchmark Study released earlier this spring, a clear signal that improvement is needed.
Alignment at the provincial and municipal levels is, quite frankly, essential as Canada grapples with escalating supply chain issues—the most recent blow being a 50% increase in U.S. tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum this past week. At the same time, labour shortages, inflation, and land constraints continue to pile on the pressure.
UNCERTAINTY AND THE DOMINO EFFECT
Uncertainty is the enemy of progress. Lack of consumer confidence—with prospective homebuyers increasingly sitting on the sidelines, waiting for market stability, largely due to global economic conditions, makes it all the more essential to align at the local and provincial levels.
For builders, waiting isn’t an option. Financing often depends on pre-sales, and in most cases, at least 70% of units must be sold before lenders will release funds. When approval timelines are unpredictable and market conditions are soft, pre-sales stall—and so do projects. And, as projects are put on the shelf, prospective buyers potentially remain renters, placing added strain on that segment of the market with a domino effect felt across the housing continuum.
This is why a more consistent, transparent, and predictable approval process isn’t just about red tape—it’s about enabling homes to get built in the first place.
THE BOTTOM LINE
With supply chain volatility, rising material costs, and labour shortages already impacting the cost of home delivery, builders need every tool available to keep projects viable. Time is not a luxury, it’s a constraint. And in a world where pre-sales dictate financing and delays can kill a project, streamlining approvals isn’t just good policy. It’s essential for housing delivery.
We can’t afford to waste time because when timelines slip, so does affordability. Aligning Vancouver’s approvals process with Bill 18 and meeting its unique requirements under the Vancouver Charter gives builders a clearer runway to do what they do best: build homes. The faster we move from plan to shovel, the better chance we have of delivering the housing our region so urgently needs.
HAVAN continues to work with CHBA BC and CHBA to advocate for all levels of government to work together to address the challenges of the housing industry including zoning restrictions, density limits, and NIMBYism.
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