At the November 17 meeting, council moved to defer a plan to adopt a new Residential Development Plan “as a council-approved guiding document to support future residential growth, land use planning, and development decision-making for the District of Tumbler Ridge” until they had more time to discuss some of the issues in a closed meeting.
The Residential Development Plan was first initiated in 2024 to “address current and future housing needs, respond to renewed economic activity, and support Tumbler Ridge’s goals for sustainable and diversified growth,” according to a report from Jessie Olsen, Director of Economic and Community Development.
“The plan provides a comprehensive framework to guide residential development, ensuring the community can attract, retain, and accommodate residents over the long term,” Olsen writes. “The Plan builds upon the 2024 update to the Housing Needs Report and reflects community input gathered through a key stakeholder workshop and a community survey, both of which confirmed a need to increase housing variety, address barriers to development, and ensure that future growth aligns with Tumbler Ridge’s identity and values.”
The Residential Development plan “identifies three potential development sites on district lands and assesses their feasibility, confirms the Upper Bench site as the preferred location to explore first for future residential development based on servicing proximity, natural features, and community alignment, provides recommendations to encourage housing supply, address development barriers, and support a phased approach to future growth and establishes values and priorities to inform development form, design, and community character.”
Once approved, the plan will allow staff to begin implementation, making informed development-related decisions, and communicate a clear direction to the community and development partners.
According to the plan itself, it is intended to provide a framework for sustainable residential development in the District of Tumbler Ridge and to help address current and future housing needs and demand. “Tumbler Ridge is focused on diversifying its economy, supporting tourism and outdoor recreation opportunities, and attracting new businesses, and understands the need for a strong residential development plan to attract and support community members, businesses and visitors.”
This plan is a continuation of the work that began with an update to Tumbler Ridge’s Housing Needs Report, which provided information about current conditions in the community and anticipated future housing needs. “Community and interest holder engagement at the outset of the project informed the direction and recommendations in the final report,” says the plan’s executive summary. “The district facilitated a workshop and community survey to gain insight into current barriers, opportunities and residential development priorities in Tumbler Ridge. The number of respondents compared to Tumbler Ridge’s population, along with the quality of responses, should give the community confidence in the feedback that informs this report.”
In order to focus the plan’s direction and objectives, Tumbler Ridge community members were asked to identify core values and priorities to guide the plan and future development in the community. “These priorities align with the original town plan goals of balancing growth and environmental sustainability and highlighted the importance of Tumbler Ridge’s natural environment in attracting and retaining residents, businesses, and visitors.”
There are several vacant lots for sale in Tumbler Ridge, but a lack of housing construction seems to indicate there are additional barriers to development beyond availability of land, says the report, which has a section on atypical development process and associated costs with new development in an effort to understand where these barriers may exist.
“General considerations for future development, including the importance of retaining the character of Tumbler Ridge, prioritizing environmental sustainability and walkability, and the need for housing variety helped inform the concept plan. Finally, this report includes a recommendations section summarizing key themes and findings with a focus on addressing barriers and moving residential development forward.”
According to the report, Tumbler Ridge will need about 395 new houses in the next 15 years, based on provincial growth estimates, about 100 of which will need to be built in the next five years.
Tellingly, though, when asked how much they would be willing to pay for a home in Tumbler Ridge, over half of respondents indicated that they would be willing to pay between $200,000–$300,000. “Only seven percent of respondents would be willing to pay $350,000, and only four percent would be willing to pay up to $500,000.”
The trouble is, says the report, the cost to build a typical new home in Tumbler Ridge today would put it in the top four percent.
Based on recent home construction costs in Dawson Creek and Fort St. John, and assuming labour, material, and profit costs to construct a new home in 2025 are equal, the cost of a comparable home in Tumbler Ridge would be $470,000 to build. The cost of a serviced parcel would be $17,000. (That’s for 103 Meikle Avenue, currently owned by the district), making the cost of a new home at least $487,000. With the average assessed value of a home in Tumbler Ridge $203,000, says the report, “this difference can amount to both a real and perceived risk and may be a barrier to new home construction in the community. Community survey written responses reinforce this – there is a hesitancy to invest in the value of a new home with people citing past housing market fluctuations experienced in Tumbler Ridge as concerns.”
For the past decade, the district’s economic development team have been promoting municipal-owned parcels for sale as a method to encourage private development. “These parcels range from $10,000 to $730,100, can be serviced or unserviced, and include various zoning such as residential single-family, residential multi-family, commercial, and industrial,” says the report. “However, from 2014 to 2024 only two land sales occurred – one commercial and one industrial lot.”
However, that might be changing, as in the first two quarters of 2025, there are three pending municipal land sales.
If the plan is adopted as presented, the district would most likely move forward with developing the north end of the upper bench across from the saddle club, in the triangle-shaped space between Mackenzie Way, Highway 52 and the north end of town.
“Following the site inventory and analysis, workshop and community survey, the Upper Bench site was identified as the best option for future residential development due to its proximity to existing utilities and services, relatively flat grade, and proximity to existing trail networks and the town centre. The project team prepared a conceptual development plan and associated cost estimate to inform future planning and development considerations, beginning with an initial 10-parcel phase of development off of Wolverine Avenue.
“The success of the Upper Bench concept assumes that there is a sufficient market where people willing to pay a premium for larger, single family serviced lots where the main driver of the increased costs is that fewer parcels must bear the cost of linear infrastructure such as roads and utilities. Assuming most people seeking out these larger single-family lots are currently living in a single-family home elsewhere in Tumbler Ridge, the local shift in housing markets should make available existing smaller single-family homes which could be taken up by suppressed household formation, additional local demand, and anticipated growth. The concept also includes duplexes/triplexes and multi-family in subsequent phases. If the uptake of larger, single-family homes in Phase 1 is low, future phases could decrease the lot sizes, thereby increasing the density and lowering the cost per lot. Other higher-density zoned parcels could also demand a higher cost per lot, thereby reducing the cost per lot of single-family residential lots.”
Whatever the District decides to do, there are some key guiding principles presented in the report, including honouring the town’s original identity, taking steps to design for wildfire resistance, practicing low impact development to prevent flooding during extreme weather events, designing with nature in mind and preserving access to green spaces, and keeping the community walkable.
The report is available as part of the agenda package for the November 17 meeting and is fascinating reading, though it has yet to be approved.
Trent is the publisher of Tumbler RidgeLines.
