SharonM
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The Encyclopedia of Global Goverance over Local Interest
There were many things to be done by cities to be a green city on the globe. Ambitious sustainability targets would need to be set. Cities would need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, implement green building codes, and increase access to local food.
In response to UN SDGs, cities shifted their Building Bylaw (VBBL) to mandate near-zero operational emissions for new buildings, focussing on heat pump technology, enhanced insulation, and embodied carbon reporting. Key changes include mandatory electrification of heating and hot water, stricter greenhouse gas intensity limits, and mandatory embodied carbon reduction targets to ensure a zero-emissions building stock by 2040. This has contributed to housing unaffordability.
The UN SDGs, particularly SDG 12: Climate Action, SDG 11: Sustainable Cities, and SDG 7: Affordable and Clean Energy, have deeply influenced many cities zoning bylaws. They drive the city towards high-density, mixed use and eco-friendly development, aiming for net-zero by 2050 through stringent green building standards, increased transit-oriented development, and increased density in previously single-family areas. This also has contributed to housing unaffordability.
Many cities have taken steps to align its Healthy City Strategy with the UN 2030 Agenda (SDG 3: Good Health and Well-being, and SDG 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities), influencing land-use policies that prioritize green spaces, active transport, and healthy living environments.
Cities discourage automobile use through prioritizing walking, cycling, and public transit, infrastructure changes that reduce road capacity for cars, and increases costs for driving. Changes to infrastructure include lane reductions, curb extensions and in-lane bus stops to make driving less efficient, concrete barriers to prevent through-traffic and reduce speed, and convert vehicle lanes to bicycle lanes. With regard to policy and regulation, many cities' official policy ranks walking as the top priority, followed by cycling, public transit, and commercial goods movement, with the private automobile ranked last. Cities have reduced free parking, increased parking fees, and introduced parking permits to make driving less attractive. New developments are often designed with fewer parking spaces to discourage car ownership. For the future, a “congestion tax” on drivers entering the downtown core, 15-Minute City zoning to ensure 90% of residents live within an easy walk or roll of their daily needs by 2030, and aim for 2/3 of all trips to be made by public transit. Cities are actively working to electrify its municipal fleet. The costs involved are not for the faint of heart.
The province of British Columbia unanimously passed the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act (DRIPA) on November 26, 2019, becoming the first in the world to legally adopt UNDRIP. Vancouver has also adopted UNDRIP, making it the first city in Canada and the world.
On October 25, 2022, Vancouver Council passed the “Vancouver UNDRIP Strategy” which was developed in partnership with Musqueam Indian Band, Squamish Nation, and TsleilWaututh Nation. In June of 2024, Vancouver officially approved the “UNDRIP Action Plan (2024-2028). This 5-year plan aims to embed indigenous rights and leadership into City policies addressing housing, cultural visibility, and environmental justice.
The implementation of DRIPA has caused unimaginable chaos and uncertainty, particularly over the issue of land title. The BC supreme court has granted land title rights to the Cowichan Indian Band over 800 acres in the City of Richmond currently held, for the most part, by individual land owners with fee simple title.
The Prime Minister of Canada, Mark Carney, has given land rights to the Musqueam Indian Band over Metro Vancouver’s land area, water ways, shore line, and ports. The question over who owns the land and what powers of control the First Nations have over development has caused a flight of investment capital from the province. This does not bode well for the BC economy.
Vancouver home owners are now faced with the fallout from the enactment of the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). Up until now they believed that their property was secured by fee simple title and constitutionally protected. Thanks to DRIPA, that is now in doubt, with the application of Indigenous land title right over the entirety of Metro Vancouver.
Vancouver now sits as the 4th least affordable housing market in the world. As a result, today, the population of Metro Vancouver is now declining, for the first time in 151 years. The fertility rate in BC has dropped 34% since 2008 to 1.02 child per woman, far below the placement rate of 2.10. Development cost levies, permit fees, the changes to building and zoning bylaws required to meet UN SDGs have added greatly to the cost of housing. It would appear that the United Nations’ decades of pushing the ideology of global Sustainable Development have achieved the exact opposite. Perhaps it is time for us to apply the United Nations’s “precautionary principle” to the agendas of the United Nations.
There were many things to be done by cities to be a green city on the globe. Ambitious sustainability targets would need to be set. Cities would need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, implement green building codes, and increase access to local food.
In response to UN SDGs, cities shifted their Building Bylaw (VBBL) to mandate near-zero operational emissions for new buildings, focussing on heat pump technology, enhanced insulation, and embodied carbon reporting. Key changes include mandatory electrification of heating and hot water, stricter greenhouse gas intensity limits, and mandatory embodied carbon reduction targets to ensure a zero-emissions building stock by 2040. This has contributed to housing unaffordability.
The UN SDGs, particularly SDG 12: Climate Action, SDG 11: Sustainable Cities, and SDG 7: Affordable and Clean Energy, have deeply influenced many cities zoning bylaws. They drive the city towards high-density, mixed use and eco-friendly development, aiming for net-zero by 2050 through stringent green building standards, increased transit-oriented development, and increased density in previously single-family areas. This also has contributed to housing unaffordability.
Many cities have taken steps to align its Healthy City Strategy with the UN 2030 Agenda (SDG 3: Good Health and Well-being, and SDG 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities), influencing land-use policies that prioritize green spaces, active transport, and healthy living environments.
Cities discourage automobile use through prioritizing walking, cycling, and public transit, infrastructure changes that reduce road capacity for cars, and increases costs for driving. Changes to infrastructure include lane reductions, curb extensions and in-lane bus stops to make driving less efficient, concrete barriers to prevent through-traffic and reduce speed, and convert vehicle lanes to bicycle lanes. With regard to policy and regulation, many cities' official policy ranks walking as the top priority, followed by cycling, public transit, and commercial goods movement, with the private automobile ranked last. Cities have reduced free parking, increased parking fees, and introduced parking permits to make driving less attractive. New developments are often designed with fewer parking spaces to discourage car ownership. For the future, a “congestion tax” on drivers entering the downtown core, 15-Minute City zoning to ensure 90% of residents live within an easy walk or roll of their daily needs by 2030, and aim for 2/3 of all trips to be made by public transit. Cities are actively working to electrify its municipal fleet. The costs involved are not for the faint of heart.
The province of British Columbia unanimously passed the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act (DRIPA) on November 26, 2019, becoming the first in the world to legally adopt UNDRIP. Vancouver has also adopted UNDRIP, making it the first city in Canada and the world.
On October 25, 2022, Vancouver Council passed the “Vancouver UNDRIP Strategy” which was developed in partnership with Musqueam Indian Band, Squamish Nation, and TsleilWaututh Nation. In June of 2024, Vancouver officially approved the “UNDRIP Action Plan (2024-2028). This 5-year plan aims to embed indigenous rights and leadership into City policies addressing housing, cultural visibility, and environmental justice.
The implementation of DRIPA has caused unimaginable chaos and uncertainty, particularly over the issue of land title. The BC supreme court has granted land title rights to the Cowichan Indian Band over 800 acres in the City of Richmond currently held, for the most part, by individual land owners with fee simple title.
The Prime Minister of Canada, Mark Carney, has given land rights to the Musqueam Indian Band over Metro Vancouver’s land area, water ways, shore line, and ports. The question over who owns the land and what powers of control the First Nations have over development has caused a flight of investment capital from the province. This does not bode well for the BC economy.
Vancouver home owners are now faced with the fallout from the enactment of the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). Up until now they believed that their property was secured by fee simple title and constitutionally protected. Thanks to DRIPA, that is now in doubt, with the application of Indigenous land title right over the entirety of Metro Vancouver.
Vancouver now sits as the 4th least affordable housing market in the world. As a result, today, the population of Metro Vancouver is now declining, for the first time in 151 years. The fertility rate in BC has dropped 34% since 2008 to 1.02 child per woman, far below the placement rate of 2.10. Development cost levies, permit fees, the changes to building and zoning bylaws required to meet UN SDGs have added greatly to the cost of housing. It would appear that the United Nations’ decades of pushing the ideology of global Sustainable Development have achieved the exact opposite. Perhaps it is time for us to apply the United Nations’s “precautionary principle” to the agendas of the United Nations.
