Vancouver City Council has unanimously approved a rezoning application that clears the way for the long-awaited Olympic Village Elementary School to move forward — with one additional storey to accommodate more students in one of the city’s fastest-growing neighbourhoods.
Thursday’s decision does not approve a new school use for the waterfront site right on the seawall — that has been embedded in the Southeast False Creek Official Community Plan (OCP) since the 2000s — but instead allows extra height for one additional floor for a three-storey school building with more enrolment capacity, as opposed to two storeys.
The change reflects how dramatically the area has evolved since the original vision for a “complete community” was created, with the OCP made to support the construction of the Vancouver Olympic Village ahead of the 2010 Winter Games.
Vancouver School Board staff framed the project as the culmination of decades of planning and years of frustration for families.
“We recognize that this school represents a large change for the neighbourhood, but it also represents the conclusion of decades of planning work to realize the vision of a complete community,” said School Board staff during the second public hearing date on Thursday.
“We heard from families during the public delegation and through the hundreds of written submissions. They shared their personal stories of the challenges they experience when local schools are over capacity. The uncertainty and the strain this causes, and the stress that this adds to their lives in a city that can already be challenging and unaffordable.”
While school district-wide enrolment has not grown evenly, downtown Vancouver and surrounding areas have experienced sustained capacity pressure.
The existing catchment facility of Simon Fraser Elementary School is experiencing major capacity issues, and the nearby schools to the north in downtown Vancouver and to the south are also above capacity.
Students who live in the area are consistently being placed at schools located further away. In fact, the School Board notes that there are currently about 800 more elementary students than the capacity of the four closest schools.
In 2025, over 250 kindergarten students were placed outside their home catchments due to space constraints.
“Students from grades one to seven have expressed their desire to walk to school in their neighbourhood. They’ve also told us about their lives in urban neighbourhoods and about the multi-story residential buildings that have rooftop gardens and play spaces that they cherish and help build community,” said School Board staff.
Southeast False Creek OCP, which includes the Olympic Village. The location of the planned elementary school at Hinge Park is circled in red. (City of Vancouver/Daily Hive)
Site of Olympic Village Elementary School. (McFarland Marceau Architects/Vancouver School Board)
The large open grassy site at Hinge Park in Vancouver’s Olympic Village is slated to become an elementary school. (Kenneth Chan)
The school will be built at the northern foot of Columbia Street, using a 29,000 sq. ft. City-owned open grassy area at Hinge Park as its footprint. This three-storey building will have 85,000 sq. ft. of total floor area, providing capacity for 630 students, as well as a gymnasium, multi-purpose rooms, 60 before- and after-school care spaces, and a rooftop outdoor play space.
Due to the geotechnical challenges from the size of the site and the poor soil conditions historically created by land reclamation and in close proximity to the water, no underground parking is planned, as it would be technically challenging and financially unfeasible. As a result, the project will only provide four accessible vehicle parking stalls at ground level.
The provincial government has set aside $150 million in funding to build this project. School Board staff warned that relocating or downsizing the project could jeopardize that funding and significantly delay construction, with the funding attached to the specific site, capacity, and construction timeline. The intent is to have the school open in 2029.
City of Vancouver staff similarly emphasized that the debate was not about whether a school belongs in Olympic Village.
“The importance of reinforcing that the text amendment tonight is not for a school or the land use of a school here. It’s for the addition of one extra storey, 18 ft. on top of a school that’s already been secured through the zoning,” said City staff.
May 2025 highly preliminary concept of Olympic Village Elementary School. (McFarland Marceau Architects/Vancouver School Board)
May 2025 highly preliminary concept of Olympic Village Elementary School. (McFarland Marceau Architects/Vancouver School Board)
Since the site was first identified, Southeast False Creek has largely built out, while nearby areas have added substantial residential density, with much more still to come within the Northeast False Creek Plan and Broadway Plan areas.
Approximately 85 per cent of future students are expected to live within 1 km of the site, meaning active transportation — walking and cycling — is anticipated to be the primary mode of travel, according to City staff.
Several city councillors acknowledged strong feelings expressed during the initial public hearing earlier this month when they listened to public speakers, including concerns raised about vehicle traffic and pick-up/drop-off congestion on Columbia Street’s northernmost end, which is a narrow roadway, as well as preserving access to adjacent open grassy spaces at Hinge Park.
To help address those concerns, City Council approved amendments put forward by ABC city councillor Sarah Kirby-Yung directing City staff to explore placing the pick-up/drop-off area about 50 metres to the south on West 1st Avenue — which is a larger roadway, instead of immediately adjacent to the school on Columbia Street — and maintaining public access to the triangular-shaped open grassy area immediately north of the school building.
The School Board wants to use the triangular-shaped area — Hinge Park’s remaining open grassy area after the development of the school site — as a dedicated outdoor play space for students, which would introduce restricted general public uses to the space. This is in addition to the rooftop outdoor play space.
During the public hearing, City staff also suggested this strategy would reduce the operating and maintenance costs for the Vancouver Park Board from the heavy wear-and-tear of students using the grassy area and other parts of Hinge Park.
Kirby-Yung’s other amendment stipulating that the triangular-shaped open grassy area is to remain unenclosed without any asphalt surfacing — maintaining it as natural green space for public use — was approved.
“I think that we need to balance both the needs of a growing city with the fact that once you lose parkland, you never get it back. There was always a clear expectation that there would be a school here. There’s widespread support for the school, some debate and difference of opinion between the size of the school, but what wasn’t contemplated as part of the master plan for Olympic Village was taking this additional piece of green space,” said Kirby Yung.
“Would I put this school today in this location? I probably wouldn’t. I would want to lay it on the City-owned land on West 1st Avenue, adjacent where you could have better pickup and drop off. And you could have school playing fields and maybe build out a turf field that could be used for the community and other types of facilities there. I think that would make sense in conjunction with mixed use.”
September 2025 revision of the application, expanding the Olympic Village Elementary School project to also include a dedicated outdoor play space on the triangular-shaped open grassy area. (City of Vancouver)
May 2025 highly preliminary concept of Olympic Village Elementary School. (McFarland Marceau Architects/Vancouver School Board)
She otherwise called this school project “long promised and overdue.”
One of the main criticisms from project opponents was that the school — with an enrolment capacity for 630 students — is too big for not only the location, but also optimal learning.
But countering that was also an expressed need to provide near-term relief capacity for nearby schools currently at capacity and plan for long-term demand, especially with the future major residential developments in the Northeast False Creek Plan and Broadway Plan areas.
“I think that it’ll be full the minute that it opens, like many schools. And what we need to do is sort of turn our attention to building more capacity when we’re originally planning for these,” said Kirby-Yung.
ABC city councillor Peter Meiszner, who lives in downtown Vancouver, said the consequences of overcrowding are visible.
“I have many friends in the community who have kids that are going to school outside of the catchment because of not enough capacity in the neighbourhood. And I know that’s the case for many schools downtown and surrounding downtown. And this has a lot of negative impacts on families. It’s disruptive. It adds vehicle traffic to our roads because people can’t walk their children to school and there’s other downsides to this,” said Meiszner.
“We’re finally at the stage where the school is ready to be built, and I don’t want to put any more roadblocks in front of that.”
ABC city councillor Lisa Dominato, a former School Board trustee, said overcrowding in schools located in and around downtown Vancouver has been a persistent issue for years.
“When I was a School Board trustee, which was almost a decade ago now, I was a liaison to all of the downtown area schools. And I can tell you the thing that was uniform to all of those schools in and around the downtown core was that they were bursting at the seams,” said Dominato.
“It was definitely a reflection of a changing market of density and families making choices that they wanted to be in the city of Vancouver, but they couldn’t afford a detached home. And so, they were choosing to live in condos or apartments.”
Dominato also emphasized that “one of the common complaints we hear is that we under-build schools.”
Mayor Ken Sim similarly said such decisions must weigh long-term growth and infrastructure needs. Vancouver is expected to add tens of thousands of new residents over the coming decade — growth that will include families and school-aged children
“We have to make decisions not based on the next two years or five years. We have to take at least a 30-year view,” said the mayor, recalling how the Jim Pattison Pavilion tower at Vancouver General Hospital was originally perceived as over-built.
When the prominent hospital tower reached completion in 1991, it was built to a vacant shell-space condition. Hospital operations progressively expanded into the tower as more spaces were furnished; the facility saw its first uses in 1996, and by 2003, the entire building was fully used.
“Less than a quarter of a century later, the conversation is completely different, where our thing is underbuilt, and we need more hospital space everywhere,” said Sim.
More school capacity will be coming to downtown Vancouver in September 2026, when Seaside Elementary School on the Coal Harbour seawall opens. The school is located within a new 11-storey, mixed-use building, with a 43,000 sq. ft. school space spanning the first three levels, providing a capacity for 317 students. The fourth level contains a 9,600 sq. ft. childcare facility for 64 kids, while the remaining six levels in the upper half of the building will provide 60 social housing units.
Construction progress on the new 11-storey Coal Harbour building with social housing and Seaside Elementary School, as of Nov. 28, 2025. (Kenneth Chan)
Construction progress on the new 11-storey Coal Harbour building with social housing and Seaside Elementary School, as of Nov. 28, 2025. (Kenneth Chan)