A 90-acre agri-tech development in Abbotsford has been shelved indefinitely by the developers after council rejected it in its current form.
The decision on the Abbotsford Tech District (ATD) was made at the council meeting on Tuesday afternoon (June 25).
Gavin Dew, ATD chief strategy officer, said in a statement Wednesday morning to The Abbotsford News that the project will no longer proceed.
“After years of delay and uncertainty, we couldn’t keep spending time and money without a clear signal that council actually wanted this investment and a clear sense of their conditions for getting to yes," he said.
"I know a lot of people are disappointed, and I really want to thank the many stakeholders and supporters who came to the table, helped shape the vision, and gave us the energy to keep trying.”
City staff recommended in a report that council deny an application for an amendment to the Official Community Plan (OCP) that would have allowed the development to proceed to the next stage.
Blake Collins, the city’s director of development planning, told council that the project is of a “density and scale that is inconsistent and incongruent with our urban structure.”
“We have 14 centres across the city. So we’re really trying to gain continuity between all those centres and treat them all the same,” he said.
The ATD proposal included a new regional innovation centre with a focus on agriculture, research and development; aerospace; AI; robotics; advanced manufacturing; and venture capital.
It also included the development of a centre of innovation and food security, as well as townhouses, six-storey apartments and high-rise complexes with no height limits.
The estimated completion time of the project was 30 to 40 years.
The property owners, Auguston Town Development, were seeking amendments to land-use designations for portions of the project under the McKee Neighbourhood Plan.
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The ATD land is currently designated as McKee Village, urban 2 ground oriented, urban 4 detached, and open space. The applicants were seeking a new land-use designation – mixed use innovation centre.
That land use permits developments with a floor space ratio (FSR) of up to 3.2, but lands in the area designated as McKee Village currently allow a maximum density of 2.0 FSR with a maximum building height of six stories.
(FSR is the measurement of a building’s floor area in relation to the size of the property the building is located on.)
“From a density perspective, with a proposed maximum FSR of 3.2, this proposal represents a significant departure from the city’s overall urban structure, general growth principles of the OCP and the policies of the McKee Village land use designation. As such, staff do not support the application as proposed,” the staff report states.
Collins told council that the proposed ATD encompassed a total floor area of almost 11 million square feet – 49 times the size of the city’s tallest building, the 26-storey Mahogany Tower; 19 times the size of Sevenoaks Shopping Centre; and 21 times the size of University of the Fraser Valley.
All the councillors, except Les Barkman, voted to deny the bylaw amendment. (Coun. Mark Warkentin recused himself from the discussion and vote due to a possible conflict of interest.)
Coun. Dave Loewen said the project does not fit in with the vision for the city that has been developed and implemented over the years in relation to the OCP and neighbourhood plans.
“The scope of this proposal is just not contemplated in our various master plans,” he said.
Coun. Patricia Ross said she cannot support the project in such a large scale and in such an environmentally sensitive area.
“While I applaud the agri-tech concept for the city, the results of the environmental studies of the lands we did in regards to McKee Park … revealed that something of this magnitude is not appropriate for this area,” she said.
Ross said approving the ATD in its current form would put the whole McKee Peak plan “in jeopardy.”
Mayor Ross Siemens said he is “100 per cent in favour” of a technology and innovation hub, but the issue with the current ATD proposal is the density.
He referenced a letter that the Abbotsford Chamber of Commerce sent to the city in support of the ATD, saying they are “significantly concerned about what appears to be a set of unclear goal posts and direction from council.”
Siemens said the process for the ATD has been the same as for any other development project requiring an OCP amendment.
“I want to be very clear that Abbotsford is a vibrant, innovative and progressive entrepreneurial hub,” he said.
“That is evident with everything that is going on with our city, and I want to be very clear to our friends at the Chamber of Commerce that we are working very hard on our economy, and I appreciate your comments, but I don’t appreciate your commentary.”
Council passed a second recommendation that staff consider an increase in the FSR in the McKee Village area to a maximum of 2.5 and broaden the permitted land uses to include institutional and other technology-sector uses.
Barkman and Ross voted against the motion.
In a letter to the city on behalf of the ATD prior to the council meeting, Brian Horton of O2 Planning and Design Inc. said that if the two staff recommendations were approved by council, the project would have to be terminated “immediately.”
“(Both options) confirm the project has no place in Abbotsford, and that a project vision that can significantly improve housing affordability, employment opportunities and recreation investment is not valued by Abbotsford administration and Abbotsford council,” the letter stated.
He wrote that the property owners had set a deadline of Sept. 30, 2024 to either move forward with the project or to shelve it.
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