It is, without question, the biggest change to come to West Vancouver in generations. After more than a decade of planning, council has given their approval for Cypress Village, a new, dense, mixed-use community of 3,700 homes off Cypress Bowl Road.
Chopping down forestland to build a new neighbourhood on the side of a mountain may not sound like solid urban planning in 2024 – because it’s not – but it surely beats the alternative.
In 1931, West Vancouver residents voted 1,329 to 26 in favour of selling most of the Upper Lands to British Pacific Properties with approval to build single-family homes sprawling all the way to Horseshoe Bay. That truly would have been madness.
The Cypress Village plan consolidates that growth into a smaller, walkable area in keeping with best practices in urban planning. In exchange, British Pacific Properties has turned over 262 acres of land to the district, which council will dedicate as park space.
Five per cent of the Cypress Village units are slated to be below-market rental and 15 per cent market rental, numbers that are comparatively low at a time when "affordable housing" is on top of most priority lists. West Van council could have pushed for more of both. The neighbourhood will be reliant on commuters to staff its shops and services, and while BPP is providing a bus service to Park Royal, this will still likely be a very car-dependent community.
If all goes according to plan though, in 25 years there will be a new neighbourhood of 6,900 people with shops, services, a school and other things that make a community complete.
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