About this project
The City of Burnaby is developing a new community plan for the Edmonds neighbourhood in southeast Burnaby. This plan will establish a vision and policy direction to guide the growth of a diverse, sustainable and resilient Town Centre and shape how this area will redevelop over the mid to long term.
In addition to creating a thriving regional Town Centre with a focus on creating public spaces that promote health, happiness, and well-being, the Edmonds plan will lay out a range of opportunities for the area, including:
- new or enhanced parks, trails, public spaces, community services and amenities for residents
- an expanded mix of market and non-market housing options
- the accommodation of regional growth
- local and regional employment opportunities
- reinvestment as the existing building stock ages
- the shift to more sustainable forms of transportation (walking, transit, cycling)
- the enhancement and connection to the natural environment, including streams, riparian habitats and other environmental assets
- building community resiliency
- a carbon neutral community by 2050
The Edmonds Town Centre area is located along the boundary of the City of Burnaby and the City of New Westminster, southeast of Metrotown and the City of Vancouver.
What's happening now
In January 2023, City Council endorsed the community planning process for the Edmonds Town Centre Community Plan to go forward. In spring 2023, upon Council approval, Phase 1 public engagement will begin to introduce the community planning process and to gather input on the preliminary vision, goals and directions for the new plan. Stay tuned for more information and the opportunity to share your thoughts on a future identity and policy directions for this neighbourhood.
Our goals
The development of the Edmonds Town Centre Community Plan supports significant actions in This is Climate Action, a framework developed to guide how the City will put into action its commitment to be carbon neutral by 2050. Preliminary goals for the Community Plan will support housing, sustainability and resilience, strengthening links between local and regional jobs, housing and transit, and advancing sustainable community design.
Ask a question
Read our questions and answers below to learn more about the community plan process. We will update the questions and answers based on the common themes from questions we receive prior to the start of Phase 1 in spring 2023.
If you have any questions or would like to provide a comment, please contact our project team at [email protected] or 604-294-7828.
Did you know? The City is also developing new community plans for the Royal Oak and Cascade Heights Urban Village neighbourhoods. Read more about the Royal Oak Plan. For more information on the Cascade Heights Plan, please contact [email protected].
Questions and answers
Community plans are documents that guide the mid- to long-term future development, growth, and change of a Burnaby neighbourhood, in alignment with the Regional Growth Strategy, the Official Community Plan, and other city-wide strategies and policies.
More recent community plans include policy direction for topics such as land use and development, sustainability, housing, community amenities and services, transportation and parks and public spaces that will help the community grow and thrive in a well-managed and strategic manner.
As we develop community plans, we consult extensively with the public including area property owners, residents and other community partners before presenting the final plans to City Council for consideration and adoption. Examples of recently adopted community plans in Burnaby include the Bainbridge Urban Village Community Plan (2022) and the Lochdale Urban Village Community Plan (2022).
As community and development needs change over time, Council may amend or update community plans. The Edmonds Town Centre Community Plan was originally adopted in 1994. Since then, many priorities and directions have shifted at the neighbourhood level, city-wide and beyond–for example, around transportation, land use and development potential, housing needs, population growth, climate action and resiliency.
Edmonds is a significant Town Centre neighbourhood in south Burnaby that is located close to the SkyTrain. A new community plan for this continually growing neighbourhood would take a renewed look at future policy direction in line with these shifting priorities and community needs.
City Council endorsed an introductory report at the January 23, 2023 Council meeting that briefly described the Edmonds community planning process over the coming years. This process will involve several phases of public engagement before a final community plan is developed and presented to Council for consideration.
Public engagement for Phase 1 is anticipated to begin in spring 2023. At that time, we will provide information about the community planning process and invite the public to engage and learn more about the project. We will also be gathering feedback on the broad-level vision and concepts for the community plan moving forward, and input on whether the current plan area boundary should be revised or expanded.
Before we begin Phase 1 public engagement, we will share more information about how you can become actively involved and provide your input.
Once a community plan is adopted by Council, development does not necessarily begin immediately or in all areas of the neighbourhood in the short term.
If a property owner and/or developer is interested in redeveloping a property in line with the policy directions of the community plan, they are still required to submit a site-specific development application, which often includes opportunities for further public input and Council consideration (e.g. development rezoning application) prior to the redevelopment being approved. Further, community plans are meant to provide policy direction for land owners when they are interested in exploring options for their land, which is why growth and change in a community occurs incrementally over the long term.
In Burnaby, tenants are protected from displacement due to rezoning redevelopment through the City’s Tenant Assistance Policy (TAP). For more information, please see the Burnaby Tenant Assistance webpage.
We expect the new Edmonds Town Centre Community Plan will include direction for the TAP to be applied to future redevelopments in the neighbourhood, where applicable, in order to protect existing residents during the redevelopment process.
Throughout the community planning process, we will work with Council and the community to ensure that the new plan is directly aligned with the City’s recently-adopted or updated policies, priorities and strategies, as well as ongoing initiatives, including:
- Burnaby Official Community Plan Update (Burnaby 2050)
- Burnaby Housing Choices Program
- Burnaby’s HOME Strategy
- Burnaby’s Climate Action Framework
- Burnaby’s Tenant Assistance Policy
- Burnaby’s Transportation Plan
- Burnaby Urban Village Design Guidelines
- Burnaby Town Centre Standards
- Burnaby’s Economic Development Strategy
- Burnaby’s Environmental Sustainability Strategy
- Burnaby’s Social Sustainability Strategy
If you have general questions about the community planning process, please email us at [email protected] or call 604-294-7400. We will update the questions and answers based on common questions and comments we receive prior to the start of Phase 1 in spring 2023.