City at Scale: Interactive VR Platform with Metro Vancouver

Urban planning information is often complex, technical, and difficult for the general public and key stakeholders to interpret. For Metro Vancouver, a core challenge lies in communicating planning concepts like zoning, floor-area ratios, and permitted land uses in ways that are accessible and meaningful to non-expert audiences. Stakeholders range from municipal boards and planning professionals to general public visitors, who frequently struggle to understand how these concepts interact, how cities grow over time, and what long-term planning actually looks like on the ground. Traditional tools like static maps, 2D visualizations, and dense written reports create significant barriers to meaningful engagement and understanding. There is a clear need for more intuitive, immersive ways for people to explore planning information and connect proposed changes to real places they recognize. 

Building on the navigation and spatial exploration framework developed in Part 1, Part 2 expands the VR experience into a richer, more interactive platform. The prototype, built in Unity using GIS data from Metro Vancouver, now incorporates multiple town centers visualized through a region-wide map and individual 3D models. Users can toggle ArcGIS-based data layers including zoning, floor-area ratios, and commercial/residential allocations to understand the logic behind planning decisions, while gamified and discovery-driven elements encourage deeper engagement and improve learning outcomes. 

A key goal of Part 2 is scalability. The platform is designed to be flexible and reusable, allowing Metro Vancouver and its member municipalities to adapt it for future planning proposals, scenario testing, and public presentations. The experience is intended to run as a standalone Unity build on Meta Quest 3 headsets, without requiring a tethered connection or internet access. Deliverables include a continued and expanded VR prototype with interactive data layers, a cohesive user journey, and optional features such as future development scenario visualizations or a walkable room-scale version of the model in a roughly 20-by-30 foot space. User testing will be conducted to assess reliability and practicality for live public environments, with the prototype targeted for demonstration at 8 public community events in Vancouver. The final build will be accompanied by comprehensive documentation outlining the technical stack, user journey, and data sources.