The District of West Vancouver has approved a large-scale plan that could eventually see 6,900 people living in a new Cypress Village neighbourhood above the Upper Levels Highway.
Essentially the plan forgoes sprawling single-family subdivisions over West Vancouver’s upper lands in favour of a concentrated clustering of dense apartment housing while retaining significant swaths of natural areas. Almost all of the many residents who spoke praised the plan for supplying a diverse mix of housing in a walkable neighbourhood hub while preserving environmental values.“It takes a village to build a village,” said Andy Krawczyk, who was chair of one of the public working groups guiding early versions of the plan. Krawczyk added he has faith the deal is a good one for the municipality.
Most of the housing in the phased development will be multi-family, with over 2,580 strata apartments making up 70 per cent of the development. Market rentals will make up about 15 per cent of the project with about 550 units, and below-market affordable rental will make up five per cent with about 185 units.
Access to the village will be through an upgraded Cypress Bowl Road and from a road to be built connecting the Westmount Road highway interchange into the neighbourhood. A bus paid for by British Pacific Properties will also provide a connection to Park Royal. “It’s a relatively small proportion of the housing,” Director of Planning Jim Bailey acknowledged, “In order to get Eagleridge, we had to make tradeoffs.”