Agenda Index City of Vancouver

POLICY REPORT
URBAN STRUCTURE

TO:

Standing Committee on Transportation and Traffic

FROM:

General Manager of Engineering Services, in consultation with the Director of Current Planning, the Director of City Plans, and the Director of Legal Services

SUBJECT:

Amendments to the Parking By-law for Hotels

 

RECOMMENDATION

GENERAL MANAGER’S COMMENTS

COUNCIL POLICY

Relevant Council policy includes:

· Parking By-law
· Vancouver Transportation Plan

PURPOSE AND SUMMARY

This report brings forward proposals to amend the Parking By-law in regard to hotels. The proposed amendments would reduce parking required for hotels in the city centre, while formalizing passenger space requirements, for both cars and buses, for hotels city-wide. Also, loading and service needs are updated, with reductions in requirements proposed.

BACKGROUND

Staff continually review parking requirements, but parking and loading for hotels had not been reviewed for a number of years. Some developers and consultants have suggested that the City of Vancouver could reduce the parking requirement for downtown hotels. Some suggest that demand by staff, guests, and other visitors could be satisfied by other nearby sources of parking. Reduced parking requirements, they suggest, would lower costs without compromising service and function.

Meanwhile, over the past several years staff have required, as a condition of approval in “conditional” districts, that hotel developments include on-site passenger loading spaces for registering guests, taxis, valet activities, charter buses and airporters. In 1995 City Council approved by-law requirements for passenger spaces for medical offices and special needs residential facilities, but hotel use was not addressed. Staff now seek to formalize passenger space requirements for hotels in the Parking By-law.

DISCUSSION

The Parking By-law requires one parking space for every two hotel rooms that are “sleeping or housekeeping units”. This is applied uniformly across Vancouver except in HA districts, where parking requirements are calculated on floor area. [The parking requirements for hotel dwelling units (i.e., self-contained units with kitchens), which are not the same throughout the city, are not the subject of this report.]

Staff undertook a study of hotels and found that the City’s Parking By-law standards need to be revised. The study examined a number of issues:

· The need to differentiate between a downtown hotel and an outlying motor lodge.

· The need for a maximum standard for downtown hotels, to ensure no unneeded parking for auto commuting.

· The need to assess parking for hotel meeting rooms and ballrooms, as well as other on-site uses that support the hotel.

· The need to establish requirements for passenger loading, an essential hotel activity.

Copies of this study are available through the office of the General Manager of Engineering Services. The study incorporated the results of a survey of local hotels, a review of practices of other cities in Canada and the United States, studies of hotel parking needs by Vancouver transportation consultants, and consideration of local experiences over the years.

Key findings in the study are:

· A suitable rate for central “stand alone” hotels lies in the range of 0.28 space to 0.33 space per room to address the demands of guests and staff. This could be reduced when hotels are developed in mixed-use projects with significant other uses such as offices or a convention centre.

· Provision rates vary widely among downtown Vancouver hotels, some of which are in multiple-use complexes (e.g. Four Seasons and Waterfront Centre); however, parking provision generally is found by managers to be more than adequate.

· It is common for cities to have reduced parking standards downtown. Typical rates are one space per 3 or 4 rooms (or 0.25 space to 0.33 space per room). Vancouver’s rate of one space per 2 rooms (or 0.5 space per room) is at the upper end of the range.

· In larger hotels, typically 30 to 45 percent of convention or meeting attendees also are staying at the hotel, while from 5 to 15 percent of those attending ballroom functions are staying at the hotel.

· Downtown hotels in Vancouver typically provide one on-site passenger loading space per 35 to 55 rooms, and provision was found adequate most of the time. Hotels with limited or no on-site passenger loading spaces reported difficulties.

In addition, delivery and servicing requirements have been reviewed; restructuring of requirements has been found necessary to respond to needs (see page 6).

Parking - The staff study found parking provision to average about 0.56 space per room in responding hotels, slightly in excess of the minimum standard for the rooms alone. As well as for room guests and staff, parking demand includes components for visitors to on-site meeting rooms and ballrooms, and, to a minor extent, customers of restaurants, lounges, and shops on the site. Demands peak in the daytime for meeting rooms, hotel staff, and shops, and in the evening for hotel guests, ballrooms, and restaurants. Typically the office uses on-site relate to hotel administration rather than a separate function. Similarly, restaurants, lounges, and shops typically exist to serve those already at the site, and generate minimal additional parking demand.

While total parking demand may well approach the City’s standard of 0.5 space per room, it has been observed that significant proportions of guests, staff, and visitors park off-site in lower-priced parkades, including those of nearby offices with ample parking available in the evening. This allows a reduction in the parking needed to serve the remaining hotel demand. There is also some variation in the hotel’s demand to do with occupancy levels, the time of day, and interplay between hotel guests and meeting room/ballroom attendees. The proposed standard is based on ensuring that the hotel supplies sufficient parking to meet cumulative daytime demand since off-site parking is scarce then.

With the reduction in the per-room parking standard to a level that essentially serves only hotel guests and staff in the daytime, a distinct requirement is necessary for conference facilities (normally exempted to date). From a review of local studies of conference facility parking needs, for typical amounts of meeting room and ballroom space, it is appropriate to employ a parking rate that is much less than what would be assessed a similar facility as a stand alone use outside the city centre. For example, a 500-room hotel could be expected to have some 1000 square metres of meeting room and 500 square metres of ballroom space (assembly areas). For a design basis event, these facilities may be expected to generate demand for 40 or more additional spaces. Recognizing that the nature of activity varies seasonally and that demand is intermittent and variable, staff propose a relatively low standard which represents about one space per 10 persons at maximum attendance.

Restaurant, lounge, retail, and administrative office uses are essentially ancillary to other hotel functions and should be exempt from a separate parking requirement, as long as these uses are not out of scale with basic hotel needs. Where large amounts of these uses occur parking should be required, with assessment based on prevailing Parking By-law rates. Recreational facilities intended to serve hotel guests, such as a fitness centre, swimming pool, or tennis courts, should continue to be fully exempted from parking assessment.

Currently hotel use bears no maximum permitted parking standard. This can create a situation in a mixed-use project in which parking is unlimited, and undesired parking is supplied contrary to the City’s mode split policies. It is necessary, therefore, to introduce a maximum parking standard for hotel use Downtown, proposed at 0.5 space per room (the current minimum). With parking to be required and permitted for meeting rooms and ballrooms, hotels would still be able to provide what, to date, they customarily have been supplying.

In Downtown Vancouver, substantial office use is present to supply a pool of evening parking. Hotel parking should be required and permitted as follows:

· A basic requirement of 0.30 space per room should be provided for guests and staff. To preclude extra parking provision to serve commuters, a maximum standard permitting 0.5 space per hotel room should be applied.

· Certain hotel-related uses, specifically administrative office, restaurant, lounge, and retail, should be exempted to a maximum of 4m2 per room. Areas in excess of the exemption should satisfy applicable minimum By-law rates; any applicable maximum rate would pertain for the total floor area of these uses.

· Meeting room and ballroom assembly space should be assessed parking at a minimum rate of one space per 40 square metres. Maximum parking 10 percent above the minimum should be permitted.

With the above standards in place, a typical 500-room hotel should realize a reduction of some 50 to 60 spaces in its required parking.

The changes proposed above should, for now, be applied in the Downtown area, generally as circumscribed by Map 4.3.1 of the Parking By-law. The 201 Burrard CD-1 (Burrard Landing) also requires amendment, since hotel use is permitted and likely. After considering whether the proposed standards should be extended to Central Broadway, staff have concluded that it would be premature to do so given the development pattern, level of transit services, and expectations of Central Broadway and neighbouring communities.

Passenger Loading - Provision of adequate on-site passenger loading is critical to the smooth operation of the hotel and safe operation of adjacent streets and sidewalks. Despite the absence of any By-law requirement, City staff normally apply a condition requiring one automobile-sized (Class A) passenger space per 50 hotel rooms. Commonly called a “taxi space”, these also provide space for registering guests and valet services. The study supports the formalization of this standard; however, as a result of feedback received, staff recommend a reduction in the standard whereby a rate of one space per 75 rooms should apply above 200 rooms. Thus, a 500-room hotel would be required to supply 8 instead of 10Class A passenger spaces. The practice of not imposing a one-space requirement on very small hotels should continue, in order to avoid a sidewalk crossing. On-site provision would therefore be required at a minimum of 75 hotel rooms.

As well, staff routinely specify the requirement of tour bus loading for hotels, at a rate of one space per 200 rooms. The study supports formalization of this as well, but at a reduced marginal rate for large hotels - one space per 300 rooms after the first 400 rooms. This is appropriate due to a lesser likelihood of multiple simultaneous arrivals. Definition of a “Class C” Passenger Space within the Parking By-law is necessary to facilitate requirement of tour bus spaces. The proposed text amendments also must deal with the increased heights of newer and anticipated tour buses to ensure on-site accessibility; a minimum clearance of 4.3 metres (14.1 ft.) is recommended.

Passenger space requirements for hotels should be required on a city-wide basis, since these needs are present regardless of hotel location.

Goods Loading - Hotels must accommodate frequent delivery truck activity, and experience additional visits by smaller service vehicles and couriers. The By-law presently requires a minimum of one loading space per 2800 square metres of gross floor area for hotels. With typical hotels having roughly 50 to 60 square metres of gross floor area per room, the By-law, then, requires one loading space for every 45 to 55 rooms, more or less. Additional spaces are then required for other uses on the site. This leads to an excessive requirement, which routinely ends up getting relaxed by half or even more and having some loading spaces down-sized as so-called “courier spaces” or “service spaces”.

Rather than using floor area to base loading requirements on, the City should rely on the number of rooms, since associated uses are usually in scale with the hotel size. Based on observations from detailed on-site studies, coupled with survey responses from local hotels, staff recommend loading requirements as set out in Appendix C. Thus, a typical 450-room hotel would have a requirement of 2 reduced-size (Class A) spaces and 3 standard full-sized (Class B) spaces instead of 9 full-sized loading spaces. Definition of Class A and Class B loading spaces within the Parking By-law is necessary to formalize the requirement of the smaller service vehicle spaces. The standards proposed would adequately serve needs while lending economy and certainty to applicants. As well, they would be applied on a city-wide basis. Supplementary loading space requirements (e.g. for on-site restaurant or retail uses) would normally be waived by using the mixed-use provisions of the By-law, but not when these uses are unusually large.

Processing Implications - With respect to processing of development applications, the changes would not have sufficient impact to warrant additional staff. Applications may take additional processing time, and more information will be required from the applicant at an early stage in the process.

COMMENTS FROM AFFECTED GROUPS

In December 1999 draft proposals for changes to hotel parking, loading, and passenger loading were mailed to 50 interest groups, including hotels, design professionals, the development industry, downtown business agencies, and Bus Impact Task Force members. Comments received have been largely supportive, confirming the need to reduce parking and goods loading requirements, and to provide on-site facilities for passenger loading, including spaces for buses.

Input from six hotels was received, with particularly strong support for provisions for tour buses, even for a hotel as small as 50 rooms. There was concern that the standards not be applied to existing hotels (which could only happen as part of an application for expansion). Also, it was recommended that the Class A (small) passenger space requirement be reduced to one space per 75 (rather than 50) rooms; as a result, a one-per-75 standard has been incorporated for hotel rooms above 200. The manager of a smaller hotel expressed concern that accommodating passenger spaces, particularly buses, on-site would compromise urban design. It is noted that relaxation provisions in the Parking By-law would be available for all passenger space requirements, such that in locations that are particularly design-sensitive or where other solutions are preferable, requirements could be relaxed or eliminated.

Concern over streetscape quality was echoed by an architect commenting on behalf of Marathon Developments; furthermore, he suggested that meeting rooms should not be assessed for parking. The parking requirements are largely based on local Vancouver hotels’ needs. A single, per room standard, with the meeting space parking component built-in, is punitive toward those hotels with less than average meeting space. By including a distinct requirement for meeting rooms, the City would be assessing parking needs most accurately. Built into the standards is a significant reliance on the use of parking in nearby facilities, particularly in the evening.

Finally, two members of the Bus Impact Task Force commented. The representative from Charter Bus Lines supported the proposals, and advised that the Class C (tour bus) passenger space standard represented an absolute minimum need. He also endorsed the dimensional specifications for the tour bus space. A citizen representative of the Task Force valued sheltered passenger loading areas and sought greater liaison with industry. He also sought ways to encourage existing hotels to meet passenger loading needs, including tax incentives.

SUMMARY

After detailed study, staff recommend changes to the Parking By-law with respect to hotel parking, passenger loading, and goods servicing. Proposed changes are:

· In the Downtown area, parking should be provided at a minimum of 0.30 space per room, rather than the current 0.50 space per room; a maximum of 0.5 space per room should be permitted (at present there is no maximum standard).

· In the Downtown area, hotel-associated uses, including office, restaurant, lounge, and retail, should be exempted to a maximum of 4 m2 per room. Areas in excess of the exemption should satisfy applicable minimum By-law rates; any applicable maximum rate would pertain for the total floor area of these uses.

· In the Downtown area, parking should be provided for meeting room and ballroom assembly space at a minimum of one space per 40 square metres. Maximum parking should be permitted up to 10 percent above the minimum requirement.

· City-wide, registering guests, taxis, and valet services should be provided for on the hotel site at a rate of one Class A passenger space per 50 rooms up to 200 rooms, and thereafter one space per 75 rooms, except no requirement would be assessed for less than 75 rooms. Loading for tour buses (a new Class C passenger space) should be provided at a rate of one space per 200 rooms up to 400 rooms, and thereafter one space per 300 rooms.

· City-wide, loading space requirements should be reduced and based on the number of rooms rather than gross floor area, as outlined in Appendix C. Provision would be split between full-sized and down-sized loading spaces.

It should be noted that existing relaxation provisions contained in the Parking By-law for heritage buildings and HA Districts would apply to all the new standards recommended in this report. Relaxations would also be available for cases where it can be demonstrated that the standards pose an unnecessary hardship on the applicant or where urban design sensitivity predominates.

* * * * *

tt000222.htm

APPENDIX A
Page 1 of 4

DRAFT PARKING BY-LAW AMENDMENTS

[Changes/Additions are shown in Italics; Deletions are shown by Strikeout]

Section 2 Definitions

Loading Space means a space for the loading or unloading of a vehicle either outside or inside a building or structure but does not include manoeuvring aisles and other areas providing access to the space and includes Class A and Class B loading spaces.

Loading Space, Class A means a designated space, clear of any driving or manoeuvring aisles or means of emergency egress, for the loading or unloading of automobiles, vans or other small vehicles used for servicing, repair or delivery activities.

Loading Space, Class B means a designated space, clear of any driving or manoeuvring aisles or means of emergency egress, for the loading or unloading of single-unit trucks and other medium-size vehicles used for servicing, repair or delivery activities.

Passenger Space means a space for the standing of a vehicle for the purpose of discharging or taking on passengers and includes Class A, and Class B and Class C passenger spaces.

Passenger Space, Class C means a designated space, clear of any driving or manoeuvring aisles or means of emergency egress, for loading passengers to or from a bus.

Section 4 Off Street Parking Space Regulations

4.3.2 Hotels - DD, CWD and HA Districts

4.3.3 Non-Dwelling Uses - HA Districts - New Floor Space

Section 5 Off-street Loading Space Regulations

 

Column 1
Bldg. Classification

Column 2
Required Loading Spaces

   

Class A

Class B
[all existing loading space requirements become Class B]

5.2.2

Hotel

A minimum of one space for a hotel with a minimum of 150 sleeping, housekeeping or dwelling units up to a maximum of 249 units, a minimum of two spaces for a hotel with 250 units up to a maximum of 499 units, a minimum of three spaces for a hotel with 500 units up to a maximum of 699 units, and one additional space for any portion of each additional 200 units.

A minimum of one space for a hotel with less than 75 sleeping, housekeeping or dwelling units, a minimum of two spaces for a hotel with 75 units up to a maximum of 399 units, a minimum of three spaces for a hotel with 400 units up to a maximum of 599 units, and one additional space for any portion of each additional 200 units.

[All other uses listed under 5.2.2 retain existing loading requirements as Class B and will have no Class A requirements.]

5.5.1 Size of Loading Spaces

5.5.1.1 All Class A off-street loading spaces shall be a minimum of 5.5 metres in length, 2.7 metres in width, and 2.3 metres in height.

5.5.1.2 All Class B off-street loading spaces shall be a minimum of 8.5 metres in length, 3 metres in width, and 3.5 metres in height, except that any minimum dimensions may be decreased by up to a maximum of 30 centimetres at the discretion of the Director of Planning in consultation with the City Engineer, provided such dimensions remain adequate to accommodate the largest vehicles intended to occupy the space while loading.

APPENDIX A
Page 3 of 4


Section 7 Off-street Passenger Space Requirements

 

Column 1
Building Classification

Column 2
Required Passenger Spaces

   

Class A

Class B

Class C

7.2.5

7.2.5.1

7.2.5.2

Retail and Service

Retail and Service, except as noted below.

Hotel

No Requirement.

A minimum of one space for every 50 sleeping, house-keeping or dwelling units up to a maximum of 200 units, and one additional space for each additional 75 units, except there shall be no require-ment for a hotel with less than 75 units.

No Requirement.

No Requirement

No Requirement.

A minimum of one space for every 200 sleeping, house-keeping or dwelling units up to a maximum. of 400 units, and one additional space for each additional 300 units.

[All other uses listed in Table 7.2 have no Class C requirement]

    .

7.5 Class C Passenger Spaces

7.5.1 Application

APPENDIX A
Page 4 of 4

7.5.2 Size of Class C Passenger Space

[Existing sections 7.5 and 7.6 are to be renumbered as 7.6 and 7.7]

DRAFT CD-1 BY-LAW AMENDMENT FOR 201 BURRARD STREET
[BURRARD LANDING]

[Additions shown in Italics]

Section 8 Parking

* This section of the CD-1 By-law also requires a housekeeping amendment to clarify the specific parking space provisions intended to be applied to uses other than office and hotel. Staff will prepare these for inclusion at a subsequent Public Hearing if the site owner agrees to pursue the changes.

tt000222.htm

 

Number of Spaces Required

Size Interval in Rooms

Class A Spaces

Class B Spaces

1 - 74

0

1

75 - 149

0

2

150 - 249

1

2

250 - 399

2

2

400 - 499

2

3

500 - 599

3

3

 

plus 1:200 additional rooms

plus 1:200 rooms over 500

Note: A Class A reduced-size space is intended to accommodate vans, pick-ups, or standard automobiles used for servicing, repair, or delivery activities. The space must be a minimum of 2.7 metres wide by 5.5 metres in length, with a minimum vertical clearance of 2.3 metres. This compares with the existing standard full-size loading space (to become Class B) of the Parking By-law, intended to accommodate small and medium-sized trucks, prescribed as a minimum of 3.0 metres wide by 8.5 metres in length, with a minimum vertical clearance of 3.5 metres.

hotel.wpd

Comments or questions? You can send us email.
[City Homepage] [Get In Touch]

(c) 1998 City of Vancouver