SF and Seattle, etc.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seyMIhry1M8 

The SF and Boston land area can almost both fit into Seattle. However, the SF Bay Area and Greater Boston still have a lot more people than the Seattle-Tacoma Area.

Unfortunatly, growing poverty and substance abuse, combined with more job losses makes for a tougher situation, overall.

Seattle's Economic slide https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxB8-RotFIU 

 Massive layoffs hit Seattle tech companies as city struggles https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLvbQGr0Xmg

Seattle’s Downtown Isn’t Coming Back the Same https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLRMYCSm1Cs

Sydney's First 300m Towers

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUuy94brhLI Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, GC City & Perth, are all allowed to have taller buildings than little stumpy provincial Vancouver, Canada.

How Sydney´s Skyline Will Change by 2030 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lzz6aXvTZko Unfortunatly, the AI voice nation wasn't set to an Australian standard.  

https://jfdatalinks.blogspot.com/search?q=NSW

Tree-inspired office tower concept proposed for revived Waterfront Station project

 https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/601-west-cordova-street-vancouver-waterfront-station-tower-cadillac-fairview-james-cheng 

Singapore, Perth, Sydney, Seattle, SF and Miami are allowed to have tall buildings right near the water, because they are allowed to be big and tall cities.

https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/555-west-cordova-street-vancouver-the-crystal-office-tower-opposition 

Vancouver has several restrictions which prevent it from becoming a proper big city.

Dallas’ $8B Gamble to Rebuild the City

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJitOoB0KoA

The City of Memphis Built Light Rail in 1993 and Now It's Abandoned

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZSKfDj_rhI 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MATA_Trolley#Reopening_and_resuspension

City of Vancouver eyes federal and provincial loans to demolish Dunsmuir and Georgia viaducts

 https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/dunsmuir-georgia-viaducts-vancouver-demolition-northeast-false-creek-plan-federal-provincial-loans-update

Perth, WA, Australia

 https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/travel-information/driving-in-wa/driving-in-perth 

https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/technical-commercial/smartfreeways While WA take a spart aproach, backwards BC still takes a dumb approach to things.

https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/projects-initiatives/all-projects/metropolitan/smartfreeways/ 4 lanes each way with 2 track in the middle. You won't find that in Vancouver or anywhere in backwards BC. 

https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/projects-initiatives/all-projects/metropolitan/canning-bridge-bus-interchange 

https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/technical-commercial/smartfreeways/how-to-use-a-smfy/making-way-for-emergency-vehicles

https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/projects-initiatives/all-projects/metropolitan In contrast, the Metro Vancouver Region is a joke!  

"Perth is Australia’s fourth biggest city, with a population of 2.3 million. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhS-fiJ14GU Perhaps surprisingly, Perth has an expansive suburban railway network. 8 lines, 85 stations and 270 km of track – it’s a large system for a relatively small city." 

https://jfdatalinks.blogspot.com/search?q=Perth

Vancouver mayoral candidate pitches plan to build 4,000 City-owned and affordable homes

 https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/vancouver-mayoral-candidate-william-azaroff-pitches-affordable-homes Providing more affordable housing in Vancouver would certainly be of great benifit. 

In some cases, if a developer was allowed to build Toronto, Sydney and Melbourne sise towers, provided they agreed to build some affordable housing, it could be of mutual benefit.

San Francisco’s Biggest Development Projects That Will Change the City

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsIBAwdmWjY  

Safeway is disappearing across San Francisco https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbKl6Kerfbo

The Great SkyTrain upgrade (potential)

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_D2CXdZ_4Ro 

Unfortunatly, the first 2 Skytrain lines were designed to only have 80m stations and trains. The 3rd line to YVR and Richmond was only designed to have 50m stations. In contrast, the Montreal Metro has stations long enough to accomodate 152.4m long trains. Thus, the greatest mistake was to not enable the Skytrain to eventually become a very high capacity train system. Combine that with mostly narrow bridges and roads in Greater Vancouver and you have the epitome of congestive urban planning. 

At least by late 2025 some of the new 5 car trains were out, along with some of the old 6 car little box trains on the 1st line. The 2nd and 3rd lines are still running 2 car joke trains, but that symbolically fits right in with the, KEEP BC SMALL AND BACKWARDS mentality. 

A proper big city long-term plan would have been to allow for 10 car trains, with at least 5-6 car trains at the start when each line opened.

Public washrooms in the City of Vancouver

https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/vancouver-public-washroom-strategic-framework 

 https://www.vancouverisawesome.com/local-news/metro-vancouver-weather-sun-last-cold-january-2026-11745119 

Hardly subtropical, but no snow to shovel during this winter, so far.

Vancouver residents decry lack of government action after London Drugs closure

 https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/vancouver-london-drugs-closure-gastown-residents 

Vancouver and BC just gave up and let that part of the city go to $HIT!

https://vancouversun.com/opinion/columnists/david-eby-warning-london-drugs-closure

SkyTrain's Canada Line service disruption

(service disruption ends after 14 hours) https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/skytrain-canada-line-service-disruptions-january-14-2026 

For a rapid transit line that opened in 2009, on the surface, it sure wasn't designed to be an efficient high capacity line for the future. It's still just a 2 car joke of a train. Fortunately, most real cities around the world planned for not only 6 car trains, but even 8-10 car trains. 

Unfortunatly, Vancouver has been hit very hard with a multigenerational agenda of continually imposed small scale infrastructure. Vancouver has water on 3 sides, as its on a peninsula. Since the powers that be couldn't build a Boundary+Road moat or trench, the next best thing was to symbolically show the reluctance to build proper big city size infrastructure. This stunted approach to things is about symbolically holding the scale of the city back for as long as possible. 

Despite backwards Vancouver not being able to apply a castle-moat-and-drawbridge control system, the next best thing was to symbolically keep things smaller than what normal or proper big cities allow. 

Here are some of the best examples of holding the size of things back. The 3 lane joke that is the Lions+Gate+Bridge has never had a rapid transit rail tunnel and no express bus tunnel next to it. Especially, no 6 lane highway tunnel. It's a classic BC bottleneck-chokepoint, by design.

From a 3 lane joke of a bridge to a two car Canada+Line joke of a train. It met the symbolic requirement to be shorter than the LRT in Edmonton, the C Train in Calgary and the trains in Seattle and Portland. 

The+Post+building+complex could have been Vancouver's first 50 story office tower, it's not even 25 floors. It would be impressive if it were in Victoria, Kelowna, Kamloops or Prince George. That's the unfortunate thing about Vancouver, so much is done to only be impressive to small cities or towns.  

https://jfdatalinks.blogspot.com/search?q=The+small+Westin+Bayshore+Hotel+in+Vancouver

Things have been kept so small in Vancouver throughout its history, that any big city stuff might seem overwhelming. There has been an unofficial KEEP THEM OUT mentality, but since the city cant have checkpoints, building things small symbolically demonstrates the perpetual reluctance to not allow a big city in backwater BC. 

Since Vancouver can't control Burnaby and can't stop Surrey from eventually becoming the biggest city in BC, they are able to build things on a larger scale than Vancouver.

https://jfdatalinks.blogspot.com/search?q=YVR-Canada+Line

Mild Victoria, BC

Victoria has been a provincial backwater for most of its history. Despite being in a mild winter setting, it's so small when compared to Edmonton, Winnipeg, Quebec City and Halifax. 

https://victoria.citified.ca/news/35-storey-one-victoria-place-mixed-use-tower-unveiled-blanshard-st-pandora-ave

https://www.onevictoriaplace.ca 

https://skyscraperpage.com/diagrams/?cityID=37&status=15  

While Edmonton was eventually allowed to have a tall building, even by Toronto, Calgary and Montreal standards, Victoria was always supposed to have shorter buildings than Winnipeg, Quebec City and Halifax. That's part of the KEEP THINGS SMALL mentality on V. Island. 

Victoria should have had its first LRT line by now, but that might improve urban mobility. Eventually, Victoria and Nanaimo will merge into one linear urban area. Eventually, the Comox_Valley_Regional_District will have over 100,000 people, the Regional_District_of_Nanaimo will have over 200,000 people, the Cowichan_Valley_Regional_District will exceed 100,000 people and the Capital_Regional_District will have over 450,000 people. 

Of course there doesn't seem to be any big regional scale planning from Sooke to Courtenay. Perhaps the island's urban planners will wait until there is 800,000 and over a million residents on the island.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vancouver_Island#Demographics 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_Rail_Corridor#Vancouver_Island_Transportation_Corridor_Coalition

So, as more people discover that Victoria and Vancouver are the mildest winter cities in Canada, more people just might want to move there. Especially, when Canadian Snowbirds don't feel as comfortable with Florida, Texas & California.  

https://jfdatalinks.blogspot.com/search?q=population+growth

Is Seattle the Opposite of a Natural City?

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-mQyPCrqAs

The 17 Mile Area That BROKE California's Megalopolis Why Los Angeles Is Americas Most Confusing City

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vzfvk1sl3E 

Why Los Angeles Is America's Most CONFUSING City https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJWb50AUAxc 

Why Los Angeles Is Americas Most Confusing City https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUclitPknhE 

LA

The $40B Plan To Extend New York City

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDgVKA4ish8

From 6 to 4 lanes

 https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=10163196613962377&set=a.10152101514842377 

Several cities are able to build bike and foot bridges in their downtowns. Unfortunately, backwards Vancouver has taken a congestion approach to transportation planning for several decades. The Burrard-Bridge could have remained 6 lanes wide if a proper bike+bridge had been built next to it. 

https://www.cyclingthread.com/bicycle-bridges-18-stunning-routes-18-unique-crossings-2025 

https://momentummag.com/here-are-10-incredible-bicycle-bridges-around-the-world/

https://www.arch2o.com/10-amazing-bridges-passageways-bikes  

https://medium.com/@raydelahanty/what-is-north-americas-busiest-bike-bridge-3ac84cf8b8c3

https://jfdatalinks.blogspot.com/search?q=Burrard+Street+Bridge 

https://jfdatalinks.blogspot.com/search?q=Tilikum+Crossing+in+Portland Unfortunately, it looks like the biggest city in BC won't be getting anything like the Tilikum Bridge in the foreseeable future. 

Original cars on SkyTrain's Canada Line set to be refurbished

 https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/skytrain-canada-line-original-trains-refurbishment 

Perhaps allowing for enough future station clearance to accommodate 10 car trains would require too much forward thinking in backwards BC. However, this line should have been started with at least 5 car trains. Unfortunatly, the very short stations were only designed to accommodate 2.5 car trains. As of 2026, only 2 car joke trains are still being run.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SkyTrain_(Vancouver)#Canada_Line It's one thing to say that having very short stations can save on construction costs, but to not allow for significant future expansion defeats the purpose. Someone clearly didn't want the Canada_Line to eventually have proper, long big city trains. 

There still is hope that this Half-A$$ED, small-scale line can become a little closer to that of a proper big city train, someday. 

Feb 12, 2020 https://www.richmond-news.com/local-news/canada-line-continues-to-break-records-translink-3116818 "On an average weekday last year, the Canada Line had an average of 150,000 boardings, continuing to “outperform projections,” according to TransLink."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_Line "During the 17 days of the 2010 Winter Olympics, the line carried an average of 228,190 passengers per day."

https://jfdatalinks.blogspot.com/search?q=YVR-Canada+Line

The Transamerica Pyramid in SF

The Transamerica_Pyramid was permitted to be about 400 feet taller than the LA+City+Hall. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transamerica_Pyramid#Gallery  

The very narrow pyramid in SF is almost twice the height of the tallest pyramid in Egypt. Will LA ever be allowed to have a pyramid tower as tall or taller than the one in SF?