British Columbia’s Tall Wood Initiative Expands to 21 Communities

British Columbia’s tall wood initiative, which permits mass timber residential and commercial development up to 12 stories, is expanding with 21 communities now participating. The City of New Westminster is the latest to join the growing list of B.C. municipalities. Vancouver has its own similar program.

B.C.’s Jobs, Economic Recovery, and Innovation Minister Ravi Kahlon told the Journal of Commerce in an interview that “More and more keep expressing interest, so where we’ve decided to put our focus is on building code changes. Certainly, our hope is that as we move forward, the next generation of the B.C. Building Code will be closely harmonized where it’s possible with the National Building Code. Our hope is we won’t need to have individual communities sign on to the initiative, every community can just start to build with this technology.”

Kahlon went onto say that the mass timber initiative supports the province’s CleanBC climate goals of making every building more efficient, it encourages construction of more sustainable buildings with smaller carbon footprints, and creates more jobs and economic opportunities while also supporting B.C.’s forest sector.