🏙️ Metro Vancouver is changing — fast. Within a generation, most residents will live in apartments instead of single-family homes. That is a huge shift... That forecast carries massive implications for how we plan, finance, and deliver infrastructure across the region. For decades, growth in Metro Vancouver followed a horizontal pattern suburban expansion, long utility corridors, and car-based connectivity. The next era will be vertical: compact communities, transit-oriented development, shared amenities, and mixed-use environments built around sustainable systems. This shift is more than a housing story. It’s an infrastructure story. Density concentrates demand. Water, wastewater, energy, and transit systems will face higher peak loads within smaller footprints. That requires smarter asset design modular, efficient, and increasingly digital. Underground networks must be adaptable to serve evolving neighbourhoods, while stormwater and public-realm infrastructure will need to integrate with green space, energy systems, and community amenities. At the same time, funding and governance models must evolve. Development cost charges, rate structures, and infrastructure financing were built for a different era, one that assumed urban sprawl. Denser, transit-connected communities call for shared investment models and lifecycle thinking: lower per-capita service costs, but higher upfront intensity per hectare. Land-use policy is also transforming. Provincial legislation now encourages small-scale multi-unit housing and up-zoning of single-family lots. Municipalities are redesigning corridors around rapid transit. With that comes the need for new design standards, new servicing assumptions, and faster, more integrated project delivery. Traditional project sequencing: plan, design, tender, build may no longer be fast enough. Infrastructure and development teams must work in parallel, guided by collaborative frameworks that balance certainty with flexibility. A new way of building communities - At Maven Consulting Limited, we see this transition not as a challenge, but as an opportunity to modernize infrastructure delivery across Western Canada. By combining practical engineering with strategic foresight, we can be read for the next generation of residents. The question for all of us in the industry is simple: Are we ready for density? And more importantly, are our frameworks and delivery models built for the communities of tomorrow? read more here: https://lnkd.in/gJuEVwr9 #Infrastructure #UrbanDevelopment #MetroVancouver #Planning #PublicInfrastructure #Sustainability #EngineeringLeadership #SmartCities #MavenConsulting
Nick Thomas
3d
I love this post and would agree that transit orientated development is key. More infrastructure for micromobility whether that be from urban planning in a city or for spaces within buildings for bikes will continue to be important as cities becomes more dense with population.
Planner, Engagement & Stakeholder Relations Lead - Healthy Waters Plan at City of Vancouver
1wIn Planning school we were taught that the best transportation plan is a good land use plan. But they never went further to state this - the best land use plan is a robust and well-managed system of utilities!