Population and Housing

[ZEBuilder]

In a piece of news that likely surprises no one, "Ontario has over a million homes in the pipeline, but needs developers to put shovels in the ground: report" (CBC)

Toronto's chief planner Gregg Lintern said the city approved an average of over 29,700 residential units a year from 2017 to 2021. During that same period, only around 16,000 units were built annually.

The Hamiltion Spectator wrote an article to cover the topic, "1.5-million new Ontario homes already within reach: planners’ study".

The Spectator article quoted a home-builder:

Collins-Williams said he believes the province’s “decisive actions” on land supply and legislative planning changes will help get more housing built faster.

But he added the industry still faces a “perfect storm” of factors — including inflation, labour shortages and ongoing “politics around housing” — that are working against getting shovels in the ground.

The report was released by the Regional Planning Commissioners of Ontario, but I can not find any reference to them elsewhere online, nor a copy of the report. I would be interested to see if the report chose Waterloo Region as one of the 15 municipalities studied and also whether the approved, yet unbuilt, units cover the full range of housing needs, or more narrower bands of the market (eg single-bedroom units).  If the former, getting these units build would be a good thing.  If the latter, it could simply perpetuate the problem of not creating housing to match the full range needed in Canada (eg multi-bedroom units regardless of building type that are suitable for families; or affordable units; or rental units)

Looking at approved developments just for Kitchener that yet to have shovels in the ground,

Tek tower 2
Tek tower 3
Q condos
Vierra Village (4 towers at Courtland and Block Line)
1668 King St (2 towers at the old schwaben club)
1253 King St (2 towers at King and Sheldon)
The remaining 3 buildings at station park
Subdivision at Trussler and Bleams (A 
couple thousand units)
Ottawa and Pattandon
King and Borden (10 floors)

So easily 5 thousand or more units approved, under construction we have a bunch more,

Drewlo
Tek tower,
900 King St W
387 King St E
Elevate condo's (4 buildings)
595 Strasburg
599 Strasburg 
Subdivision at Ottawa and Trussler
Subdivision at Bleams and Fischer hallman 

So probably another thousand or more units U/C.

Then looking at proposed but yet to be approved,
Park and Victoria (at OLT)
22 Weber St W (at OLT)
Metz (12 buildings)
Mill and Ottawa (5 buildings)
Lower Kitchener
20 Ottawa St N
10 duke St W
130 Victoria St South 
Fischer hallman and bleams (townhomes and 4 apartment buildings)
Townhomes at 525 Erinbrook Dr
4 buildings at Huron and Strasburg (10, 2x13, 17)

So probably another 5k+ that are proposed and I'm probably missing a bunch, but just by looking at these buildings that are U/C and approved alot of them are just 1/2 bedroom condos or apartments with the odd 3 bedroom unit and the subdivisions are just more SFH, so we at least have some level of variety but the options are either suburban SFH or downtown highrise units. We still have 5 times as many units approved as are U/C so we definitely have a major problem with getting shovels in the ground. Just like every other major city based on those articles.