A development company says it's building a 29-storey tower in Coquitlam City Centre but city staff say it's only 25 floors.
So where did the other four levels go?
They're there but invisible, Jim McIntyre, Coquitlam's general manager of planning and development, said yesterday, noting Cressey Development Group's proposed highrise for the southwest corner of Pinetree Way and Glen Drive won't have fourth, 13th, 14th or 24th floors.
In some cultures, those numbers are considered bad luck.
"It's a common practice to exclude them," McIntyre said, adding, "I guess it's part of our changing community."
Aversion to or fear of the number 4 - called tetraphobia - is a superstition in Asia; in Chinese, Japanese and Korean, the word for four sounds like the word for death. Moreover, 14 and 24 are also avoided because they contain the number four.
In some residential buildings, those numbers are replaced with floors 3A, 13A and 23A, and in Hong Kong, developers often skip floors from 40 to 49. As a result, floor 39 is followed by floor 50.
In Western cultures, 13 is generally considered unlucky.
Cressey's plans, which were approved by the city's land use committee Monday and are expected to be given final reading and a development permit by council next week, show a concrete 169-unit residential highrise called Metropolitan 2 and an adjoining nine-storey office building, each with retail space at the base.
The project, if approved, would tie into the Evergreen Line along Pinetree Way and form part of the new and growing City Centre commercial core.
But some councillors questioned the amount of pile driving needed for the two buildings - a source of contention for area residents and businesses. The constant thud of machines in City Centre generated many noise complaints last summer.
City staff have looked for ways to lessen the impact with different equipment but "we are finding the alternate technologies aren't all that applicable here in the City Centre area because of the ground conditions," McIntyre told the committee.
Council will receive an update soon from the city planning and engineering departments on pile driving operations, and neighbours will be contacted about the work before it starts, McIntyre added.
Coun. Brent Asmundson said he wasn't thrilled with the M2 design: Too many new buildings in Coquitlam are being constructed with straight lines. "I would like to see some uniqueness and 'wow' going on," he said, referring to the city's push towards a "wow-factor" appeal in architecture and beautification.
The number of parking spots for M2 didn't please Coun. Neal Nicholson. Cressey is asking for 41 fewer parking spaces than zoning requires - an 11% variance allowed by the city for projects in transit-oriented hubs. The City Centre plans permit up to a 30% reduction, McIntyre said, as the city and developers don't want to under-utilize the land.
Coun. Mae Reid, chair of the city's land use committee, said the city needs a review of its parking ratios for new buildings, a study that McIntyre said is already in the works.
Representatives for Cressey did not immediately return a call for comment.
