Should Vancouver help convert office space to pod hotels?

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Two Vancouver city councillors are proposing Vancouver look at changing the building bylaw to make it easier to convert empty, post-pandemic office space to pod hotels.

Pod hotels were first built in Japan and designed for an affordable one person stay.

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Councillors Sarah Kirby-Yung and Lisa Dominato say this could help travellers who can’t afford to stay in the city’s expensive hotels with an accommodation shortage during upcoming sporting events, such as the Invictus Games in 2025 and FIFA World Cup Soccer in 2026.

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Their motion goes before city council on Wednesday.

The councillors say current hotel proposals under review will take years to complete rezoning and approvals, but pod hotels can meet the demand for affordable overnight accommodation and reduce the pressure for short-term rentals on limited rental housing stock.

“The aim here is to give the opportunity to get something done for FIFA, but I do want to stress it’s not just for FIFA, that these pod hotels have value beyond that to become part of our hotel stock so that people have options, particularly more affordable options,” said Kirby-Yung.

“If it becomes so expensive in the hotels, you’re limiting who can afford to visit and we want to have a strong tourism sector. We want to let people come and experience the city, and not just people who can afford to pay really expensive hotel rates.”

The new-office construction boom combined with changing workplace attendance post-pandemic has created significant vacancies, say the councillors, particularly in older office buildings and commercial heritage buildings.

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“There’s an opportunity to actually use sort of the adaptive reuse of existing office space because we’re finding that we have a surplus of that,” said Kirby-Yung, adding there used to be about a four per cent vacancy rate for office space, but it now sits at about 12 per cent.

Building bylaws could be updated so hotel companies could redevelop the office space before the World Cup.

“It’s rezoning space that already already has commercial zoning,” she said. “And so you’re not doing this to residential areas, you’re not touching housing stock, you’re staying within your commercial footprint.”

The motion calls on Vancouver councillors to acknowledge that pod hotels could help fill the accommodation gap leading up to and in time for FIFA 2026 and directs staff to report back as soon as possible on what building code changes may be required.

Richmond and Whistler have pod hotels: Richmond’s Panda Pod Hotel opened in 2019, and Whistler’s Pangea Pod costs as little as $49 a night.

Kirby-Yung recently visited the pod hotel in Whistler, which she said was comfortable and affordable.

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“Maybe they are inspired by hostels, but it’s not the hostel you remember. It’s better quality, more like a boutique hotel experience with a nice restaurant,” said Kirby-Yung.

In 2022, when Vancouver was named one of 16 host cities in North America, the B.C. government said the estimated costs for planning, staging and hosting five 2026 World Cup matches would be $240 million to $260 million. The updated estimate released last month is between $483 million and $581 million to host seven matches.

With files from Dan Fumano

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