VANCOUVER – Vancouver City Council has approved a new hotel development policy to help address the city’s significant room shortage.
With 13,000 hotel rooms city-wide, and a net loss of over 500 rooms between 2020 and 2022, Vancouver risks falling behind on visitor accommodation, a news release says. According to Destination Vancouver, the city needs 10,000 additional rooms by 2050 to keep pace with demand or it could risk losing $30.6 billion in economic output, $16.6 billion in GDP, 168,000 full-time jobs, and $7.5 billion in tax revenue across all three levels of government.
In August 2024, Vancouver’s average daily hotel rate downtown hit $422, nearly double the Canadian average. Summer occupancy was also over 90 per cent.
As a result council has approved updates that will:
- Replace the outdated 2018 interim policy with a new hotel development policy to better support investment and increase hotel supply;
- enable more flexible hotel development in key areas like the Central Business District, the Broadway Plan area and near transit hubs;
- support the development of mixed-use hotel and residential projects;
- encourage a broader range of hotel types, including affordable options outside the downtown core and long-stay units for visiting professionals.
Coun. Kirby-Yung also introduced an amendment to remove further barriers to hotel development by exempting recreational amenities and back-of-house areas from development charges. The amendment also asked for the consideration of proposals on narrower sites to enable more unique and innovative hotel concepts, the release reads.
With approximately 4,200 hotel rooms already in the development pipeline, staff will monitor progress and report back to council in early 2026 with an updated hotel supply assessment and updated regulations to support pod hotels and micro-suites.
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