Plans for a new craft brewery in Lower Gibsons have the Town considering an update to its zoning bylaws and the parking strategy for the Landing.
Gibsons Tapworks wants to set up shop in a vacant building on Cruice Lane. The proposal includes a small brewery and a tasting lounge.
The councillors at the Sept. 20 committee of the whole meeting all voiced support for the idea, and said the business would be a welcome addition to Gibsons Landing.
But, Mayor Wayne Rowe and Town planner Andre Boel also pointed out a couple of larger issues that the application was bringing to light: parking and the fact that the Town’s zoning bylaws don’t include any references to craft breweries in non-industrial zones.
The brewery’s backers are asking for a variance to reduce the number of dedicated parking spots required under the current rules. There aren’t, however, a lot of other options for parking in the immediate area.
“The reality is that if we want the lower town to develop the way the Harbour Area Plan foresees it, and I think the way that this council in part sees it, parking is something that’s going to have to be resolved,” said Rowe. “I think at some point we’re going to have to have a municipal parking lot.”
At Rowe’s urging, the committee voted to recommend a review of a 2007 Gibsons Landing parking study, and the Town’s overall parking policies.
Boel told the committee that a business like Gibsons Tapworks is “an interesting land use from a planning perspective” because it’s part industrial and part commercial. He said a tasting lounge fits the area’s C5 zoning, but a brewery doesn’t, so staff are proposing updates to the bylaw that would allow brewing as an “accessory use” in the commercial zones, provided the brewery doesn’t take up more than 50 per cent of the total floor area.
At its regular meeting Tuesday evening, council voted in favour of the parking study recommendations, and to give first reading to the proposed zoning amendment.
Council also agreed to start public consultations on Gibsons Tapworks’ application to the B.C. Liquor Board.
