Update (Feb 27, 2026)
The trend line note in this post (below) hasn’t improved.
The CRD’s latest regional growth indicators report came to our Planning and Protective Services Committee this week (report and video). The trend as of 2024 – the most recent year of data – was actually a little worse: see chart above. There was still too much building in car-dependent areas, which means higher transportation costs for those residents, and more regional traffic congestion, local air pollution, GHG emissions, and more.
However it may improve in future reports:
- The above was based on 2024 housing completion data, which reflects housing approvals given years earlier. Times have changed; Victoria City Council has approved record amounts of housing, most of which is likely in 42%+ areas, and we have changed policy to further advance housing in Victoria. It generally takes two or three years and often more for homes to be completed after approvals are given. It could be that the average location of homes built has already improved since 2024, and we may see that in future years’ reports.
- The areas that are less car dependent (indicator: where 42% or more Walk/Bike/Bus) may have expanded since the 2021 Census when that was last measured. Again we might see that improvement in future reports.
(In other news, in Victoria we have made it easier to build both non-market and market homes. And new buildings are now heated by clean electricity instead of polluting fossil fuels, since we accelerated the zero carbon step code. We are also exploring how best to help accelerate the shift of existing building systems to clean electricity. We have also seen ongoing mode shift from motor vehicles to sustainable transportation. However, we need to see the needle move on regional growth.)
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(Nov. 11, 2025)
Having new growth occur in existing urban areas is the most powerful tool that local governments have to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that cause climate change.
Far-flung, sprawling new developments mean that people rely on private vehicles for most daily activities. And that results in higher GHG emissions – both tailpipe emissions from fossil-fuelled vehicles and embodied emissions from electric vehicles. It also results in more traffic congestion and crashes, as well as clearcut forests and paved over farmland, jeopardizing local food security.
To reduce this, we need more of our growth to take place in the right places – compact, complete communities that are walkable and have good transit, sidewalks, and protected bike-and-roll mobility lanes.
Our Regional Growth Strategy, which all communities in this Region agreed to, “aims to keep urban settlement compact and directs new growth to be located where it can be efficiently serviced by transit and active transportation.”
However, currently in the Capital Region we are not meeting the desired trend (see figure below). We are actually going in the opposite direction: between 2012 and 2015, just 30% of growth in net new dwelling units was in areas with good access to transit and active transportation. In the last five years, it’s even worse, at only 16%. (We are also not on track to reach our regional GHG emissions targets – a topic for another post.)
People are increasingly moving to this region, and will continue to move here because it’s a great place. Moving can’t be stopped – it’s a constitutionally-protected right. However, local governments have the ability to shape where growth occurs, via Official Community Plans (OCPs), zoning bylaws and other policies.
Municipal governments are updating these policies by the end of 2025, and they are now required to update them every five years.
If you want to see lower GHG emissions in this region, you can write to your municipalities’ Council members advocating for new growth to be in the right places, and for OCP and zoning bylaw updates and amendments to require it.
From the CRD Regional Growth Strategy Indicators Report:
