| Yaletown Commercial Profile
Comprised primarily of comprehensive development zoning (DD, CD-1 and BCPED) and historic zoning (HA-3), the Yaletown BIA contains high standard new developments and renovated historic sites. This mix of zoning is designed to produce a vibrant mix of contemporary residential, commercial and industrial uses, while preserving the area’s historical charm. Known for its restaurants, coffee houses and evening entertainment, the area is ideally suited for higher-end destination retail (particularly apparel and furnishings) as well as smaller business offices wanting to capitalize on downtown addresses without the downtown rents. The growing residential base is also demanding grocery, drug and hardware stores, and other personal service businesses. This report provides an overview of the Yaletown commercial market, focusing primarily on zoning and development potential as well as business and employee mix.1 The Yaletown Neighbourhood Market Profile focuses on key market information including population, household and spending statistics. 1. Unless otherwise stated, source of all statistics is City of Vancouver or Small Business BC (Statistics Canada) data files. Fast Facts
Physical Profile
2. Source: City of Vancouver VanMap. Zoning MixYaletown comprises over 49 acres of land, 2.4 million square feet of commercial area and 3.2 million square feet of residential area. City of Vancouver records indicate that the BIA consists primarily of Comprehensive Development zoning (DD, CD-1 and BCPED)3 as well as Historic Area Zoning (HA-3) as illustrated in Figure 2. This mix of zoning is designed to produce a contemporary and vibrant blend of residential, commercial and industrial uses, while preserving the external proportions, rhythm and details of the predominant circa 1900 architectural building features. There is an emphasis on achieving a high standard of design and development as well as encouraging activity-oriented use.
Assessed ValueIn terms of assessed value, Yaletown ranks second highest among Vancouver BIAs. The total 2005 assessed value of all Yaletown BIA commercial properties was $413,211,424. This represents 15% of the value of all Vancouver BIA properties outside of Downtown and contributes over $6.7 million in property taxes. Age and Quality of BuildingsThe majority of commercial buildings in Yaletown (62%) were constructed pre-1946; however many of these older buildings have been renovated such that only 15% reflect pre-1946 standards. And, with Yaletown’s transformation over the past 15-20 years, fully 21% of commercial buildings are “new construction” (post 1991). Figure 3a illustrates the complete breakdown of year built, while Figure 3b illustrates the significantly younger ”effective year” breakdown that has resulted from renovation and redevelopment efforts.
Lease and Vacancy RatesWhile Yaletown is currently in transition, with relatively high turnover for retail businesses, the vacancy rate for retail and office is quite low, with almost no retail space available in the key commercial areas.3 Some office space is available, including ground floor space traditionally reserved for retail. A January 2006 survey of the BIA found retail lease rates ranging from $35 to $50 per square foot and office commercial rates ranging from $15 to $30 per square foot. As early home of Vancouver’s technology cluster in the late 1990s, Yaletown experienced a period of high commercial lease rates. With the more recent restructuring in this sector, however, lease rates have declined somewhat to be more in line with average lease rates in Vancouver. Construction of the Canada Line rapid transit system over the next three years may temporarily impact vacancy rates, which will provide added pressure to keep lease rates at the lower end of the current price range. 3. Zonings: DD – Comprehensive Development District (Downtown), CD-1 – Comprehensive Development District, BCPED – Comprehensive Development District (False Creek - North Side), and HA-3 – Historic Area Development (Yaletown). Development PotentialYaletown is protected by Provincial Heritage Legislation; meaning redevelopment growth is primarily contained within existing historic structures wherever possible. Over the past 20 years, Yaletown has transformed from a primarily older wholesale/industrial area of the city to a vibrant residential, office and retail centre. Through this transformation, most of the redevelopment/build out of the BIA has been realized. After the initial overhype of the technology era, which saw development as well as purchase and lease rates in the Yaletown area skyrocket, the BIA is now experiencing a natural evolution as it matures. It is beginning to find a more sustainable niche and allowing new businesses to emerge. This is in large part due to the economic development work of the BIA, developers and the City of Vancouver. High assessment values resulting in high property taxes has hit the Yaletown area particularly hard and the BIA is working with the City to address concerns of long time as well as new property owners and tenants alike. Business Mix
Business TypesSimilar to the average for the City of Vancouver and GVRD, the Yaletown BIA is primarily comprised of retail and service businesses, including a significant proportion of technology related services. However, it also enjoys a mix of wholesale, finance, insurance and real estate as well as manufacturing businesses, as Figure 4 illustrates. It is important to note that in part due to relaxed zoning allowing ground floor office development, the BIA has fewer retail businesses and more service businesses than average for the City or the GVRD.
Table 1 provides a detailed breakdown of business types for the Yaletown area as compared with the Vancouver and GVRD average.
Of the 57% service businesses, the most common are business services (27%), engineering and management services (21%) and legal services (10%), as outlined in Table 2 below. Of the 21% retail businesses, most are eating and drinking places (33%), furniture, home furnishings and equipment stores (25%), miscellaneous retail (21%) and apparel and accessory stores (16%). As for individual business types, there are a significant number of restaurants (47) as well as attorneys (46), computer software (27), architects (26), Internet service (22), beauty salons (20) and associations (20).
Business SizeThe Yaletown BIA is primarily comprised of ‘micro’ sized businesses with less than 5 employees (54%), followed by small sized businesses with 5-20 employees (37%), as Figure 5 illustrates. A few small to medium businesses exist. The BIA’s largest employers include: Businesses with 100-249 employees:
Age of BusinessReflecting Yaletown’s current transition, almost one-third of businesses are 1-2 years of age. However, Yaletown also enjoys a base of long-term businesses, with 23% operating for over 10 years. Figure 6 provides more detail on the distribution of business ages.
Long-time businesses provide a stable market base, while fresh new businesses continue to increase the area’s appeal for destination shoppers. As the BIA matures, businesses catering to the needs of the growing population base will become increasingly important. Anchor Tenants and Dominant Businesses
As previously discussed, service and retail are dominant business sectors in the Yaletown area. The BIA has seven other major business clusters including:
It is noted that the BIA has a significantly higher than average representation in business services (advertising, computer designers and consultants, graphic and interior designers, and internet services), motion pictures and engineering and management services. In the new era of major construction projects over the next 10 years, engineering and management services are playing an important role in filling the available office space. Change in Business MixBetween 2000 and 2005, the number of businesses in the Yaletown BIA grew by 1.1%, significantly lower than the Vancouver average of 20.2% and the GVRD average of 13.5%. Growth was highest among the following sectors:
The wholesale, public administration and construction sectors declined in this time period, reducing by 72%, 25% and 10% respectively. All of these sectors declined by significantly more than average for the City of Vancouver or the GVRD. These declines are in part due to Yaletown’s continued gentrification, but may also be reflective of high lease rates. In terms of sub-industries, the fastest growing in the BIA were health services (25 businesses), eating and drinking places (21), personal services, primarily beauty salons and photographer studios (16) and engineering and management services (15). Figure 7 provides a breakdown of the top 10 fastest growing Yaletown BIA sub-industries, as defined by Statistics Canada.
Demand PotentialYaletown demand potential comes from three primary sources – residents in the area, BIA employees, and other employees in the surrounding area. In addition, businesses in the BIA are exposed to thousands of daily commuters and inner city residents traveling by bus, bike and car. Each of these potential customer groups is discussed below. Residential Base
The Yaletown residential base is a vibrant community of young and middle-aged individuals, ethnically diverse highly educated professionals and small, single-person households. A multi-cultural centre, the area is comprised of more residents with British, Canadian and Southern European heritage than average for the City of Vancouver. English is the dominant household language for area residents. Household sizes in this area are smaller than the City and the GVRD average. With a higher proportion of apartment type dwellings, the area is home to a greater percentage of renters than average for the City and the GVRD. Reflecting their younger and more middle age and significantly higher education levels, Yaletown exhibits higher household incomes than the Vancouver or GVRD average. The Yaletown Neighbourhood Market Profile provides more detail about this important market segment. Employee BaseApproximately 9,500 people are employed within the BIA itself.4 Surrounding businesses outside of the BIA employ an additional 3,000 workers. This provides a total estimated daytime employee market base for Yaletown businesses of 12,430. Between 2000 and 2005, the Yaletown employee base increased by 32%, whereas employment for the businesses in the surrounding area increased by only 22%. 4. Source of employee information is InfoCanada courtesy of Small Business BC. Pedestrian and Vehicle TrafficRobson Street and Pacific Boulevard are major transportation corridors running along the border of the Yaletown BIA, providing exposure to thousands of daily commuters and inner city residents. As Figure 8 indicates, major intersections along Nelson, Pacific, Smithe, Cambie, Richards, Mainland and Davie Streets see tens of thousands of vehicles per day (red, yellow and green areas on the map), while adjacent blocks that are not on major commuting routes see in the range of 1,800 to 8,200 vehicles.
With some street parking (outside of peak commuting hours), proximity to SkyTrain, the new Canada Line, as well as frequent community shuttle service, businesses in the Yaletown BIA have potential to tap into the high traffic volumes on the major routes and capture “through-traffic” as customers. Recent traffic changes from primarily one-way streets to primarily two-way streets with some traffic calming will help increase business profile for passersby. The City of Vancouver conducts pedestrian counts for approximately 250 blocks in the city, with the majority being in the downtown area. The most current pedestrian information available is for 2002. The representative locations selected by the City for the Yaletown BIA are the 200 block of Davie Street, the 700 block of Hamilton Street, the 900 block of Homer Street, the 400 block of Nelson Street, the 400 block of Pacific Boulevard and the 100 and 200 blocks of Robson Street. However, fieldwork conducted by the BIA indicates the largest pedestrian volumes are found in the 200 block of Davie Street, the 900 block of Homer Street and the 200 block of Robson Street. The 200 Davie Street block sees in the range of 1,366 (south side) to 2,094 (north side) pedestrians per day. The City ranks this combination of pedestrian activity to sidewalk size as a level of service ‘B’, which represents moderate to low pedestrian activity. This area is influenced by the lunch and afterwork pedestrian movements, with the dominant hour for pedestrian traffic being 5-6 pm on the south side and 12-1 pm on the north side. The location ranks 338th (south side) and 240th (north side) of the 501 block locations ranked in the 2002 survey. By comparison, the busiest block in the City (north side of Robson at Burrard) sees 29,182 pedestrians per day, with a level of service ‘D’ (significantly more crowded). The 900 block of Homer Street sees in the range of 837 (east side) to 888 (west side) pedestrians per day. The City ranks this combination of pedestrian activity to sidewalk size as a level of service ‘A’, which represents a relatively low pedestrian activity; however Homer Street is experiencing an increase in both retail and residential activity, which likely will be seen in the next pedestrian count study. The dominant hour for pedestrian traffic is 12-1 pm (east side) and 1-2 pm (west side). The location ranks 430th (east side) and 422nd (west side) of the 501 block locations ranked in the 2002 survey. The 200 block of Robson Street sees in the range of 1,705 (north side) and 2,287 (south side) pedestrians per day. The City ranks this combination of pedestrian activity to sidewalk size as a level of service ‘B.’ The dominant hour for pedestrian traffic is 12-1 pm (north and south sides). The location ranks 281st (north side) and 218th (south side) of the 501 block locations ranked in the 2002 survey. Since May 2002 was the first time the Yaletown BIA was surveyed, trend analysis is not currently available. What Existing Businesses SayA retail tenant assessment study completed in September 20035 identified opportunities to better serve Yaletown’s growing residential community, particularly in the categories of neighbourhood-oriented retail and service stores such as grocery and drug stores, banks, dry cleaners and video stores. In addition to continuing to build on its success as a hub for restaurants and cafes, the BIA anticipates further success for specialty retailers and personal services such as hair salons and spas. In addition to resident surveys, the Yaletown BIA conducted a member survey in 2003.6 The top five priorities for business owners were:
A renewed mandate for the Yaletown BIA includes significant goals in the areas of business recruitment and retention, cleanliness and safety, advocacy and promotion and communications. 5. Retail Tenant Assessment for Yaletown Commercial District in Downtown Vancouver, BC, Royal Lepage Advisors Inc., September 2003. 6. Yaletown Business Improvement Association Resident Telephone Survey, CV Marketing Research Inc, June 2003. Conclusions
The BIA is ideally suited for higher-end destination retail as well as smaller business offices wanting to capitalize on downtown addresses with slightly lower rents. The growing residential base is also demanding neighbourhood-oriented retail and service stores such as grocery and drug stores, banks, dry cleaners and video stores. |
The Yaletown Business Improvement Area (BIA) boundary comprises the geographic polygon encompassing Drake, Pacific, Homer, Smithe, Hamilton, Robson, Beatty and Nelson Streets, Marinaside Crescent, and Expo Boulevard at the southeast edge of the downtown peninsula. It accommodates approximately 11,600 residents, 940 businesses and 9,500 employees.
The Yaletown BIA is centrally located within the City of Vancouver – approximately 1.5 kilometres from City Hall and 0.5 kilometres from downtown.2 The 20-hectare BIA is home to 103 commercial properties and 938 businesses. Yaletown’s remarkable transformation from light industrial/warehouse district to a growing urban hub of converted warehouses filled with residents and businesses is well known. The BIA has a significant number of structures listed on the Vancouver Heritage Register (27 within the BIA itself) reflecting a desire to preserve a sense of Yaletown’s past as it continues to transform. Key elements of the BIA’s physical profile are discussed below.
The zoning mix and commercial building structure of the Strathcona BIA primarily support factory outlets with retail storefronts, distribution centers, warehousing and manufacturing, and assembly and processing. The majority of businesses in the BIA are ‘micro’ sized – less than five employees, although some significant large-scale businesses also operate here. Major business types include wholesale and manufacturing, eating and drinking establishments, business services, membership organizations, health services, automotive services, food stores and apparel and accessory retailers, as described in more detail below.
Anchor tenants in the Yaletown BIA include Urban Fare (high-end grocery), Business Objects (computer software and support company), the Roundhouse Community Centre, Glowbal Grill, Chintz & Co. (a long-time wholesale and retail fabric and home furnishing store), the Opus Hotel (hotel, restaurant and lounge) and Shoppers Drug Mart.
Just over 11,600 residents live within the BIA’s primary catchment area (Granville Street to False Creek and Robson Street to False Creek). Between 2000 and 2005, this area’s population grew by 15%.
Yaletown is a commercial and residential business area that has a broad mix of business categories, yet also has room for continued diversification. The BIA’s destination market businesses draw a strong customer base. In addition, the BIA’s proximity to downtown Vancouver as well as Granville Island (a short water-taxi ride away), and its growing residential base provide additional market opportunities. 