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Transit-Oriented Development Areas (Bill 47)

Also known as: TOD · TOA · TOD Areas · Bill 47 · TOD Zoning · Transit-Oriented Development

Areas around transit where the province requires municipalities to permit a minimum density, under Bill 47, whose regulation was made December 7, 2023. Within 200 metres of a SkyTrain station that floor is a floor-area ratio of 5.0 and 20 storeys, stepping down through bands out to 800 metres.

Bill 47, the Housing Statutes (Transit-Oriented Areas) Amendment Act, 2023, is the companion legislation to Bill 44, the Small-Scale Multi-Unit Housing (SSMUH) Act. Its Royal Assent was November 30, 2023 and its regulation was made December 7, 2023. It designates prescribed transit hubs as Transit-Oriented Development Areas (TOD Areas) and requires municipalities to permit minimum density and height in tiered distance bands: Tier 1 (within 200m of a SkyTrain station or 100m of a designated bus exchange) up to 5.0 FAR / 20 storeys; Tier 2 (200-400m / 100-200m) up to 4.0 FAR / 12 storeys; Tier 3 (400-800m of SkyTrain) up to 3.0 FAR / 8 storeys.

The provincial framework overrides most low-density municipal zoning within the TOD area; municipalities had to designate areas in their bylaws by June 30, 2024.

Price the transit-oriented designation into the transaction. A detached house sitting inside a Tier-1 TOD area may carry assemblage value well above the lot's detached-housing comparable. Buyers paying retail for a "tear-down" sometimes discover after closing that the lot was worth 30-50% more to a developer. Conversely, a strata unit inside a TOD area faces real near-term redevelopment pressure, with depreciation reports showing accelerated obsolescence and a wind-up vote eventually on the table.

Lower Mainland designated SkyTrain hubs include Surrey Central, Gateway, King George, Lougheed Town Centre, Production Way–University, Coquitlam Central, Lincoln, and Burquitlam.

Related terms

  • Bill 44 (2023): SSMUH — BC legislation requiring most municipalities to allow three to four homes on lots zoned for a single house or duplex.
  • Bill 44 (2022): Strata Reform — BC legislation effective November 24, 2022 that voided all strata rental-restriction bylaws and limited strata age-restriction bylaws to 55+ only.
  • Depreciation Report — A reserve study that BC strata corporations of five or more residential units must obtain every five years.
Sources: Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, BC Government(7)
Review dates, licence and how to cite this entry
Rule effective
2023-12-07
Last verified
2026-10-13
Next scheduled review
2027-04-09
Cite this fact

Use any of these formats. Codex content is licensed under CC BY 4.0 — attribution required.

BibTeX — LaTeX, academic
@misc{bronsonjob-bc_tod_transit_oriented_development,
  author       = {Job, Bronson},
  title        = {{Bill 47 (2023) — Transit-Oriented Development Areas Act}},
  howpublished = {BC Real Estate Codex},
  year         = {2023},
  url          = {https://www.bronsonjob.com/codex#bc.tod.transit_oriented_development},
  urldate      = {2026-10-13},
  note         = {Fact ID: bc.tod.transit_oriented_development, version 3.}
}
APA — Press, journalism
Job, B. (2023). Bill 47 (2023) — Transit-Oriented Development Areas Act. *BC Real Estate Codex*. Retrieved 2026-10-13, from https://www.bronsonjob.com/codex#bc.tod.transit_oriented_development
Plain link — Slack, email, Twitter
Bill 47 (2023) — Transit-Oriented Development Areas Act — Bronson Job PREC, BC Real Estate Codex (2026-10-13). https://www.bronsonjob.com/codex#bc.tod.transit_oriented_development

Fact id: bc.tod.transit_oriented_development · v3 · machine-readable: /api/v1/facts/by-id/bc.tod.transit_oriented_development.json

License: This definition is licensed under CC BY 4.0. Cite as: "Transit-Oriented Development Areas (Bill 47)", BC Real Estate Glossary by Bronson Job, https://www.bronsonjob.com/glossary/transit-oriented-development-areas.

Bronson Job PREC, REALTOR® at Momentum Realty Inc.. GVR Member #6015742 · FVREB Member #FJOBBR