UFV to lease out campus lands to developers

The University of the Fraser Valley is getting into the development business.

UFV is looking to lease out large blocks of land on its Chilliwack and Abbotsford campuses to raise money for new facilities and projects and finally kickstart long-standing ambitions.

Developers would be expected to build mixed-use projects with hundreds of housing units, along with commercial, retail, and potentially research space. The university hopes the projects would turn under-used land into millions of dollars that could pay for facilities that would otherwise depend on funding from the provincial government.

In Abbotsford, the university thinks leasing the land will help it create a long-sought after “university village” that brings life to a campus that largely goes quiet when classes are not in session. And in Chilliwack, the plans, if brought to fruition, would connect UFV’s sleepy campus there with existing growth and developments in and around Garrison Crossing.

The property trust

To turn its hopes into reality, UFV has created a property trust company called Campus Communities. The trust will function as planner, promoter, and landlord for the land in question. The trust has its own CEO and board, and is built to mimic similar entities run by the University of British Columbia, Simon Fraser University and Thompson Rivers University.

In a March press release (that wasn’t distributed to the press), Campus Communities is described as “an independent company, separate from UFV, created to manage the development of under-utilized land and transform the UFV Chilliwack and Abbotsford campuses into vibrant, pedestrian-friendly, sustainable communities.”

In both Chilliwack and Abbotsford, the company will apply for rezoning to set the stage for development. Once that process—which can add millions of dollars of value to land—is complete, the property trust would then lease out the land to individual developers on 99-year terms.

The Campus Communities website says money will go to UFV and UFV Foundation. And a spokesperson said concrete plans for revenue haven’t been made. But the website says the project is intended to “create revenue that would not otherwise be available for the development of on-campus facilities including classrooms and other education and student-centered facilities.”

The university’s annual capital plans have cycled through various plans for facilities that have failed to stir enthusiasm from the province, whose money is needed to finance any large capital project. Eight years ago, the university was seeking $30 million for a high-tech “Digital hub” building. Last year’s capital plan featured a new life-sciences building, a multi-media performance space, and a new health sciences lab in Chilliwack.

University brass has handed the trust a mandate to “enhance the educational experience of students at each UFV campus, and to build community,” a spokesperson told The Current in an email. The Campus Communities website says that the trust will do so by “creating a wider variety of amenities and housing options in pedestrian-friendly neighbourhoods integrated with each campus.”

Abbotsford

The plans for UFV’s Abbotsford campus are the furthest along and have the potential to allow the university and the city to finally make good on plans that have been sitting on a shelf for nearly a decade.

In Abbotsford, UFV has handed its property trust three separate parcels totaling about five and a half acres. All three lots are currently used for parking and sit to the immediate west, south, and east of Abbotsford Centre.

The largest block sits at the junction of University Way and King Road, east of Abbotsford Centre and next to the main access road to UFV. That 4.25-acre parcel has long been eyed as the future site of “university village,” with four to five multi-storey buildings that include homes, offices, and retail units.

The university village concept is nearly a decade old, having been enshrined in UFV’s 2016 campus master plan and the city’s UDistrict Neighbourhood Plan, which was adopted by Abbotsford council the same year.

The shared vision of the site, and the fact UFV’s current plans already align with the city’s neighbourhood plan, is expected to expedite the development process. Godron said UFV hopes to apply for rezoning early next year. Consultation with the public will follow.

“If all goes as planned then we will be in a position to make sites available for 99-year prepaid leases to developers in 2026,” Godron wrote.

Although the university’s campus master plan laid out the long-term plan for the site eight years ago, there has been little progress towards that vision since. The university clearly hopes that the property trust will provide a way to push those goals forward without relying on financing from the provincial government.

An artist’s rendering of the large University Village site foresees four multi-storey buildings four to six storeys high. It envisions commercial units on the ground floor of the building at the intersection of King Road and University Way, which currently functions as the gateway to the university lands.

The replacement of hundreds of parking spaces with new buildings will create questions about parking—and not just for students.

While the new buildings will have underground parking to serve its tenants, the lots are also used by students, faculty, and visitors to the Abbotsford Centre.

The preliminary plans suggest officials are considering building a new parkade on the opposite, western side of Abbotsford Centre. And the university says it will need to approve any changes to parking plans by the trust.

Chilliwack

In Chilliwack, the property trust has the potential to turn a large swath of vacant land into an urban quarter that connects the university to nearby rapidly growing neighbourhoods. In doing so, it has to reshape the future of both the campus, and its surrounding area.

UFV currently holds 78 acres of land north of the Vedder River. Its campus has several buildings, including a large industrial building that houses the vast majority of UFV’s trades programming, the university’s agriculture “Centre of Excellence,” and a central campus building that has a library, student facilities, classrooms for arts courses, and offices for faculty and administrators.

But the bulk of the university’s land holdings are vacant. There is no student housing on site and the core of university life in Chilliwack remains some distance from south Chilliwack’s new commercial centre in Garrison Crossing.

The new property trust plan would break off the eastern third of the Chilliwack campus lands and turn them over to developers to potentially bring both housing and commercial spaces closer to the campus.

The trust lands are located in three separate blocks, all to the east of the university’s existing buildings. Construction of new buildings would not only add more homes and business to the university’s immediate vicinity, it would bridge the existing gap between the campus and the housing developments in the Garrison Crossing area.

Online renderings show two rows of multi-storey buildings separated by a pedestrian and cycling path.

The scale of the project could be significant. In Abbotsford, just up the road, a similarly sized chunk of land near the historic downtown is being developed and will have more than 600 homes when complete. The Chilliwack property trust lands could be built to a similar scale—or even higher density if city and university officials agree on that path. The Campus Communities website suggests two possible phases—the first focused on building and paying back debt obligations, the second which could include more-ambitious buildings that could include research and health-related elements.

But nothing will happen immediately.

The scope of the plans will require an amendment to Chilliwack’s Official Community Plan, along with rezoning and subdivision. That process will require the university and the city to agree on the scale of the development, the type of uses to be allowed, and the provision of amenities and infrastructure like parking. The city and university will also need to hammer out a financial agreement. Like with any developer looking to make millions by rezoning land for higher uses, the city will look for a cut of proceeds to help pay for infrastructure, parks, and other amenities.

Those conversations will also inevitably touch not just on the benefits of significant development, but the downstream costs.

The development will increase the number of residents, students, and workers in a part of Chilliwack with increasingly congested roads. The Campus Communities website suggests that traffic concerns can be mitigated by building walkable communities, including homes where residents will both live and work.

“While new development can bring increased traffic, this must be balanced against the overall benefits of building density within walking distance to UFV and surrounding amenities,” the project’s website says.

UFV’s communication director, Jeboah Godron, said in an email that the university is “in the early stages of dialogue with stakeholders” in Chilliwack and will have more information on timing by the end of the year.

Meanwhile, as the university plans to lease one-third of its land to developers, it is also reconsidering its vision for its remaining Chilliwack campus properties. That includes the creation of a new campus plan that lays out where new student housing figures could be built. The result is likely to be a more-compact, denser campus—especially if the university gets money from the provincial or federal governments to construct much-needed student housing. We’ll have more on those plans in a subsequent story. Make sure you are subscribed to get it in your inbox next week.