Late last year, the Vancouver City Council put the kibosh on large new warehouses within the city. And yet, with the hot industrial real estate market in Vancouver and beyond, developers are still planning new industrial buildings. They’re just not warehouses. Clark County is an appealing spot for warehouse developers wanting to have space near major highways and close to amenities. But the Vancouver City Council voted in December to put in place a six-month moratorium on new warehouse projects over 100,000 square feet. In February, it was eased to 250,000 square feet. Warehouse applications flowing through the city’s planning process have slowed to more of a trickle since the moratorium was put into place. But developments have still been proposed, primarily as light industrial buildings rather than warehouses. This leads to the question: What is the difference? Warehouses are specifically used to store and move large amounts of products, and they’re associated with “significant” truck and rail traffic, according to Rebecca Kennedy, deputy director of community development with the city.

Light industrial buildings are in a broader category that encompasses a number of light clean industries, including industrial services, manufacturing, research and development, warehousing and general office uses, Kennedy wrote in an email. These spaces are often advertised on commercial realty websites as flex industrial space. “Typically, the light industrial and flex space uses are for a company or multiple companies, which manufacture and warehouse products, and (are not for) the large distribution centers,” Greg Tuner, Vancouver’s land-use planning manager, wrote in an email. While these light industrial buildings are still working their way through the pipeline, most haven’t surpassed 250,000 square feet, according to Turner. What’s in a name? When asked, commercial real estate agents were tight-lipped on what distinguishes a warehouse from an industrial space. But a page on the website of logistics real estate giant Prologis describes what the company sees the difference as being.

“People tend to use the terms ‘warehouse space’ and ‘industrial space’ interchangeably, but they are actually two different types of facilities,” the website reads. Prologis is currently building more than 560,000 square feet of industrial space in Vancouver. A commercial warehouse space, the Prologis website said, is mostly used to store inventory but could also house machinery, offices, a loading dock and other necessary elements. A distribution center could also be considered a commercial warehouse space, it added. Industrial space, meanwhile, identifies a building that could be used for manufacturing, production, fabrication, assembling or holding meetings. “While industrial space can also include warehousing tasks, it doesn’t always have to be a warehouse property,” the website read. Often, a single business may operate in an industrial space, so it may combine both offices and manufacturing or warehouse areas, it noted.

“If you choose a warehouse when you actually need industrial space, you might have to retrofit the building to accommodate your equipment needs, which would cost time and money,” the website read. Moratorium decision soon In the weeks leading up to the end of the city’s warehouse moratorium, the city staff’s study on the topic is nearing, but not yet reaching, a conclusion. In a presentation for Monday’s Vancouver council workshop on the warehouse moratorium, community development director Chad Eiken lists what his team has found in its study so far. To accommodate a 250,000-square-foot building, a developer would need about 14 acres of property, according to the presentation. After looking at every light industrial and heavy industrial building district in the city, Eiken’s team found that few parcels large enough to build that big of a warehouse exist, except on property belonging to the Port of Vancouver and in Section 30, which is zoned for employment center mixed use. The Vancouver City Council will hold a workshop on the warehouse moratorium at 5 p.m. Monday. Eiken’s presentation mentions asking the council to extend the moratorium but shorten the overall timeline.