The man in charge of Vancouver planning says approving a project that exceeds the city’s height restrictions was a no-brainer.

Vancouver GM of planning and development Brian Jackson tells us there’s a general height limit of 500 feet for the site of the $500M Burrard Gateway mixed-use project at Drake Street (along Burrard and Hornby), but the tallest of the three buildings will hit 550 feet. (However, it still doesn't meet the 659-foot Shangri-La Tower, the tallest building in the city.)

“This site was identified for greater height in order to provide a visual terminus in alignment with the Burrard Street Bridge,” Brian says. (That sounds so suave, we're adding "nice visual terminus" to our pick-up lines.) The city’s general policy on building height restrictions identifies strategic locations for the development of higher buildings in the downtown, located on one of Vancouver’s three primary streets of Georgia, Burrard, and Granville.

A JV of Jim Pattison Developments (40%) and Reliance Properties (60%) is behind the project—a 13-storey office building, a 55-storey condo tower, and a 35-storey tower, connected by a seven-storey podium for rental housing and retail uses, including a Jim Pattison Downtown Toyota Dealership and grocery store. Amenities will include park improvements, additional bike lanes, and a community centre for the neighborhood's LGBT community, which were all part of getting city re-zoning approval. Brian adds the project also meets the city's goals for Green Building Performance with LEED Gold while advancing the city's objective for carbon neutrality by achieving a 40% to 50% reduction in energy consumption (from 2010 levels).