A west Abbotsford neighbourhood got what they wanted from the city Monday, as council agreed to ban secondary suites in their neighbourhood, while permitting both mobile homes and height-restricted single-family homes.
Land use in the neighbourhood – located in a triangle of land south of Highway 1 and north of Marshall Road – is currently governed by land-use contracts that restrict house types to mobile homes and which date back to the 1970s.
Those contracts must expire in 2024, according to a 2014 law, but some property owners have asked for their early removal in order to build larger homes.
That triggered concern among other residents of the area who worried about escalating home prices and asked for the preservation of the modest neighbourhood.
Monday’s decision came after a public information meeting at which residents asked for the land-use contracts to remain in place until 2024 and for the creation of an underlying zone to permit both houses and mobile homes. But that zoning only comes into effect once the land-use contracts are removed.
Councillors noted that some residents feared the early removal of land-use contracts would result in the city forcing owners to move or replace their existing mobile homes. That wouldn’t have been the case.
Under the current land-use contracts, mobile homes can only be replaced by other mobile homes. Until 2024, residents will still need to apply to council to remove the contract on their property if they wish to replace their mobile home with a larger house.