In line with a commitment to preserving our heritage, the City of Kelowna is conducting a review of the Abbott Street and Marshall Street Heritage Conservation Areas (HCA) Development Guidelines.

The Abbott Street and Marshall Street Heritage Conservation Areas hold unique significance in our city's history, and the public was invited to provide input to help shape their future.

Kelowna’s heritage is reflected in our historically and architecturally significant buildings, structures, natural landscapes, historic neighbourhoods/districts, archaeological sites and other places of heritage value.

Heritage Management Review of Kelowna’s Heritage Conservation Areas (HCA) allows the City to reflect on what has been achieved through the existing heritage management framework and consider how best to modernize our heritage management tools, meet current community goals, and better align with best practices including the Standards and Guidelines for the Conservation of Historic Places in Canada.

The HCA review will help provide much-needed clarity ahead of the larger Heritage Strategy update, which is identified as long-term 2040 Official Community Plan implementation action item. The main outcome of this Review will be and update to the 1997 HCA Guidelines.

Progress to date

Phase One of the HCA review provided insight into how the HCA Guidelines are meeting intended outcomes when compared to their defined objectives. It provides a quantitative review of the HCAs with the understanding that further data will be collected in future phases that assess more subjective aspects including the retention of neighbourhood ‘historical character’ and ‘sense-of-place’. The key findings from Phase 1 – Quantitative Review of the HCA Development Guidelines were:

• The Development Guidelines guide alterations and redevelopment but do not require heritage protection or enforce heritage conservation;
• The Development Guidelines Permit demolition of buildings and replacement with new builds that follow the Guidelines;
• The Development Guidelines permit flexibility in form, scale, and style;
• The Development Guidelines are oriented towards retaining overall aesthetic rather than the heritage value;
• The Development Guidelines subject all properties to the same evaluation criteria regardless of heritage value; and
• The Development Guidelines were created before the National Standards for Heritage Conservation Guidelines, resulting in a lack of alignment.

In Phase Two of the HCA review, staff gathered feedback through targeted engagement to better understand the viewpoints of those who interact with HCAs, including City representatives, community partners, residents, heritage professionals, and the development community. Read the engagement summary.

Work underway

The Third Phase (2024-2025) of the process involves updating the HCA guidelines, using the review findings provided in Phases One and Two. Draft Guidelines were presented to Council for consideration on January 13, 2025. Once adopted, the updated guidelines provide refreshed guidance, along with additional certainty to residents on how these neighbourhoods will evolve in the future.