Steve Milani mail-out is off by a factor of 21

Claim: Steve Milani’s opponents support housing resulting in population growth exceeding the OCP by 16,300 residents.

Verdict: Egregious whopper. He’s off by a factor of 21!

In a mail-out sent by the Milani campaign to residences in Port Moody, a number of claims have been made that are keeping us busy. Milani claims that 3 developments constitute growth of 16,300 new residents over and above an unspecified plan, which we presume must be the Official Community Plan (OCP). In this, he demonstrates a significant misunderstanding of Port Moody’s OCP.

His mail-out overstates the potential population growth beyond the City Plan attributed to Coronation Park, Oceanfront, and Woodland Park by 21 times!

To start, the 3 neighbourhoods Milani mentions—Woodland Park, Flavelle Oceanfront and Coronation Park – have all been included in the City’s current OCP for years.

Woodland Park

Milani proudly states that he voted against a project (the only Councillor to do so) that delivers approximately 325 subsidized homes provided by BC Housing, in addition to 151 market rentals and 1590 strata apartment homes. Milani estimates these 2,066 homes will be occupied at a rate of 2 persons per unit, to get to an estimate of 4,200 residents.

Here’s what he got wrong:

1. MilaniMath didn’t account for the 200 existing market rental homes, containing around 400 residents.
2. MilaniMath also doesn’t consider that the existing OCP, prior to the Edgar proposal, permitted new development on the site up to 6 storeys. That density would commonly work out to around two times the overall site area in terms of built form. Using that measure, the 23.4 acre site under the un-modified OCP could have potentially permitted 2.038 million square feet of building area. The Edgar proposal, featuring slightly more height, totals 2.14 million square feet. In addition to more homes, benefits of the approved proposal are the ability to create a childcare centre, two public parks, a new trail, bike paths, and a public art walk.

By our estimate, Woodland Park adds only about 123 homes, or approx. 246 residents, more than the un-amended OCP.

Flavelle Oceanfront

Since 2018 following a community visioning process, the City’s OCP supports transforming the heavy industrial site into a mixed-use community with full public access to the waterfront and park expansion. It permits an overall density of approximately 3.84 million square feet including employment space.

Any development that conforms to this is firmly part of the OCP, so there would be zero growth exceeding the Plan.

Coronation Park

Milani states that he didn’t support Coronation Park and recently said that he’s more worried about protecting trees in single family yards. His math (I use the term with reservation) estimates that 5,100 new residents will move to Port Moody as a result of Coronation Park above and beyond “the Plan”, which again, is the City’s OCP which Milani clearly has not read.

Prior to the Wesgroup proposal, the City’s OCP permitted a transit-oriented development at Coronation Park, including high-rises up to 26 storeys and multi-family residential areas. The OCP did not stipulate a density, but a reasonable assumption based on TOD areas with a similar mix of building heights would be a floor area ratio of 3.0 times the lot area at final build-out.

What did Milani get wrong?

1. As with Woodland Park, MilaniMath forgets there are existing residents of Port Moody in Coronation Park. There are 59 single family homes in the community. At a typical single family household size of 3.2, that works-out to 189 existing residents.
2. MilaniMath assumed that the City Plan said nothing would happen at Coronation Park! At the 2017 OCP permitted building mix, a density of up to 3.0 times the lot area could have been achieved—allowing approximately 1.93 million square feet, 2,325 homes, and 4,650 residents.

By our estimate, Coronation park adds only about 262 homes, or approximately 525 residents, more than the old OCP.

Conclusion

All 3 projects have been permitted by the OCP for years, including before recent amendments. Even if we take those amendments to be somehow illegitimate because Milani doesn’t like them, we calculate that the 3 projects would add around 770 residents (not 16,300!) more than envisioned in the old versions of the OCP—which is entirely consistent with a document intended to be a statement of neighbourhood planning guidelines.

The Milani campaign knows what it’s doing in keeping its most blatantly incorrect claims to mail-outs, which influences a demographic that spends little time online. Please consider sharing these facts with friends and family who spend less time in the weeds than us nerds—regardless of political leanings, it’s better for everyone that democratic debate is based on facts.