Bob Mackin
A North Vancouver property zoned for housing is becoming a parking lot for staff at a tourist attraction.
theBreaker.news has confirmed that the former Capilano Heights Chinese Restaurant sold for $7.1 million in June 2024 to a numbered company associated with the Capilano Suspension Bridge and owner Nancy Rae Stibbard.
The Capilano Suspension Bridge’s new staff parking lot at 5020 Capilano Road. (Mackin)
Colliers listed the 24,024 square-foot corner, mixed-use development opportunity at $7.35 million. The assessed value was $6.28 million.
“It benefits from existing zoning suitable for market condo or rental development, streamlining the path to development permit,” said the Colliers flyer.
The property, across the street from Metro Vancouver’s Cleveland Dam park, is under a District of North Vancouver temporary use permit issued in January for “31 surface parking spaces and one bus shuttle zone for use by employees of the Capilano Suspension Bridge Park.”
The permit’s initial term expires just before Christmas in 2027.
Capilano Heights Chinese Restaurant in April 2024, during a film production. (Mackin)
In 2023, the NDP government named District of North Vancouver one of 10 municipalities on the so-called “naughty list” for failing to build enough affordable housing. Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon ordered 2,838 new units in the district by October 2028.
The first year target was 499 units. A district staff report last October said 500 net new units were completed.
It is not Capilano Suspension Bridge’s only lot zoned for housing. Townline Homes had proposed replacing 1960s townhouses on Capilano Road with 30 units in five buildings south of the suspension bridge’s main parking lot. But the Richmond developer sold the three townhouse parcels to Stibbard’s company.The townhouses were demolished and not replaced.
Stacy Chala, the Capilano Group’s director of communications and events, said Stibbard was not available for an interview.
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