Monday - May 5, 2025 - Proposed Abbotsford high-rise goes to council

🌧 High #C

Good morning!

There are lilacs outside of my front door. They smell tremendous this time of year. They’re also a continual reminder of what brought my family to BC in the first place. My dad grew up in Alberta farm country south of Calgary. As the story goes, his older brother tried farm work, but fled to the BC Interior because his sinuses just couldn’t take all the pollen. His allergies were that bad. My dad eventually followed in his footsteps. (I may be getting the details wrong here, but family lore is supposed to evolve over time, OK Mom and Dad?)

The house we moved to when I was five had a massive swath of lilacs out front. And they revealed that our family sinus problems were probably a little genetic. Even today, I can still hear my Dad sneezing. My allergies aren’t quite that bad and have moderated over time. But our own lilacs, and the resulting sneezing and nose-blowing, are a reminder of why I’m here in this province. And that I need to make sure there’s always a Kleenex handy in spring.

– Tyler

Keep local journalism alive by supporting The Current. Become a Current Insider member today and help bring local stories to life.

Traffic & Weather

🌤 Local forecast: Langley | Chilliwack | Abbotsford | Hope 

🚘 Driving today? Check the current traffic situation via Google, and find DriveBC’s latest updates.

🛣 Click here for links to road cameras across the Fraser Valley, including those for the Coquihalla, Highway 7, Hope-Princeton, Fraser Canyon, and Highway 1 in Langley and Abbotsford.

News

Harrison considers adding housing to new village hall

The Village of Harrison Hot Springs needs a home makeover—literally, according to a recent report.

The village’s municipal office is currently housed in an aging house-like building on a huge lot along the main road into town. And as the municipality considers a larger building, planners have suggested adding rental housing for seniors and a daycare to the project.

• Today, Josh writes about Harrison’s plans for its new municipal office. 

Related

Need to Know

👍 A seven-year-old girl was found uninjured a day after going missing in the woods near Chilliwack [CTV] / Thieves stole equipment from a group of volunteers searching for Lily [Abbotsford News]

🚢 A huge fire aboard the derelict Queen of Sidney ferry prompted a ‘shelter-in-place’ order from the City of Mission that has now been lifted [CBC] / Police say the fire is ‘suspicious’ and are investigating [Global]

💧 Hope’s drinking water has been named the best in BC (among 14 competing communities) [Hope Standard]

⏳ A Chilliwack school is celebrating its 150th anniversary [Chilliwack Progress]

✅ Langley City council approved a 302-unit housing project that had generated community opposition [Langley Advance Times]

🚑 Two e-bike riders were hospitalized after a collision with a pickup truck [Mission Record]

🚌 Langley’s mayors are on board Translink’s plan to boost revenues and expand local bus services [Aldergrove Star]

🚔 A Surrey man was arrested near Yale after he was pulled over while carrying 80 pounds of weed in his van [Hope Standard]

Enjoying our newsletter? Help us make it even better!

Become an Insider member and help keep local journalism and storytelling alive in the Fraser Valley.

SPONSORED BY TANGLE

Burst Your Bubble

As much as we like to think everyone else is living in a social or political bubble… The truth is, we likely are as well.

Tangle is here to burst those bubbles and help you understand the opposing view.

Every day, Tangle will drop into your inbox and unpack a highly visible and often contentious issue in the news by providing the most thoughtful points from the left, right, and in-between for 340,000+ readers across the political spectrum (including our founder, a long-time Tangle fan).

Sign up for free and get a major news story broken down fairly and clearly in just 10 minutes.

Start reading.

The Agenda

Proposed Abbotsford high-rise would be rental building

Abbotsford council will decide Tuesday whether to approve a 30-storey rental high-rise next to the city’s Canadian Tire.

The Garden Street proposal, which The Current first reported on last month, would include 346 apartments, along with commercial units on the building’s ground floor. The building would include 114 studio-size apartments, 116 one-bedroom units, and another 116 two-bedroom homes. You can read city planners’ report here.

If approved and constructed, the high-rise would be the tallest building in Abbotsford and one of the largest rental-only apartment buildings in the Lower Mainland.

By pledging to rent rather than sell the units, the building will need 10% fewer parking spots than city rules would otherwise require. The building’s proximity to Abbotsford’s South Fraser Way transit corridor is also eligible for a further reduction in required parking spaces. Even so, the developer has asked for the city’s permission to provide 392 parking spots, rather than 414. In return, the developer has promised to pay the city $500,000. The builder has also promised one-third of a million dollars to go toward local park improvements and another $200,000 towards other community amenities.

City staff have recommended council approve the project. Even if the project is approved, construction won’t immediately start. A staff report notes that the building’s design has not been finalized and that there are “ongoing discussions” between the developer and financers, including the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation.

Share

You can share this newsletter by forwarding it or copy and pasting this link—https://fvcurrent.com/p/may-5-2025/—into a social media post.

Community journalism needs the entire community for it to succeed.

Become a Current member today and join 1,400+ other local supporters who help keep our lights on.

As part of a membership, you get our special weekend roundup of all the things you might’ve missed each week!

🤝 Now hiring

• Cook at Redwoods Golf Course in Langley

• Park patroller at Chilliwack Lake

• Board member for Chawathil First Nation’s economic development corporation

• Labourer at Overlanders Manufacturing in Abbotsford

• RV painter at O’Connor RV in Chilliwack

Hiring in the Fraser Valley? Reply back and let us know!

🗓 Things to do

Monty Holmes: Gallery 7 hosts performances of The Play That Goes Wrong from Friday, May 9 to Saturday, May 24. The comedy is described as part Monty Python and part Sherlock Holmes, and has both matinee and evening performances. Details and tickets online.

Community open house: The Fort Langley Community Association hosts an open house on Thursday, May 8 from 4 to 8pm. Learn about the different organizations and resources available in Fort Langley. Details online.

Have an event to tell us about? Fill out this form to have it highlighted here.

Catch up

That’s it!

Thanks for reading Fraser Valley Current today ♥️ 

If you found something useful, consider forwarding this newsletter to another local.