If all goes as planned, by late 2025, the significant expansion of SkyTrain’s Oakridge-41st Avenue Station should be fully complete.
This will greatly increase the station’s ingress and egress capacity for handling passengers, which is a necessary improvement to help meet the station’s anticipated significant ridership growth over the short and long term.
Daily Hive Urbanized first reported on the finalized design of the upgrades in August 2024, and construction work necessitating temporary changes to station access and the availability of the elevator began on September 16. The project is expected to reach total completion in about a year.
New detailed artistic renderings of the finalized station design were subsequently released, showing more perspectives of the expansion and reconfiguration of the existing street-level entrance and the changes to the station’s underground ticketing concourse level.
The existing staircase and only escalator reaching street level will be retained, but two additional escalators will be added next to the staircase, enabling both up and down escalators for the station.
2024 finalized concept for the expansion of SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Quadreal Property Group/Westbank/TransLink)
2024 finalized concept for the expansion of SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Quadreal Property Group/Westbank/TransLink)
The existing elevator from street level at the Cambie Street side of the station entrance will be removed, and a new replacement elevator will be built on the West 41st Avenue side, immediately adjacent to the bank of new escalators.
The existing station entrance structure will be completely removed and replaced with a brand-new glass enclosure and roof, which will feature a honeycomb-like mass-timber frame and skylights to allow natural light to flood the station. The covered footprint of the entrance structure will also be significantly expanded, with the addition of a partially enclosed waiting area on the Cambie Street side and a widened roof overhang to cover more of the plaza area.
Down below, the west wall of the existing underground ticketing concourse level will be knocked down to create both the landing area for the new bank of escalators and the secondary entrance into the station.
This underground second entrance leads directly into a retail-lined corridor of the new Oakridge Park shopping centre, with the corridor ending at one of the main common areas of the new indoor mall.
The improvements will also provide new public art for the station interior.
Existing condition:
The existing street-level entrance for SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Dialog)
Future condition:
2024 finalized concept for the expansion of SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Quadreal Property Group/Westbank/TransLink)
2024 finalized concept for the expansion of SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Quadreal Property Group/Westbank/TransLink)
It is noted by TransLink that Oakridge Park — developed by Quadreal Property Group and Westbank — will pay for most of the project, with the public transit authority providing additional funding for new escalators from its existing capital projects program.
Henriquez Partners Architects, the principal design firm for Oakridge Park, also designed the station upgrades. Over the years, a number of concepts were contemplated for the station improvements, including concepts that were far larger and more ambitious, such as a canopy stretching the expanse of the public plaza and adjacent intersection. But a simpler concept was ultimately chosen for the final design.
The 2009-built Oakridge-41st Avenue Station’s original architectural firm is Dialog.
Existing street-level entrance condition:
The existing street-level entrance for SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Dialog)
The existing street-level entrance for SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Dialog)
The existing street-level entrance for SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Dialog)
Future street-level entrance condition:
2024 finalized concept for the expansion of SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Quadreal Property Group/Westbank/TransLink)
In June 2024, Chrystal Burns, the executive vice president of Canadian retail for Quadreal Property Group, told Daily Hive Urbanized this underground retail-lined corridor between the new indoor mall and the underground ticketing concourse is expected to open on or near the mall’s opening day in Spring 2025.
The upgrades at Oakridge-41st Avenue Station are necessary to enable the station to better handle the expected passenger demand growth that can be expected from Oakridge Park, which will have 1.2 million sq ft of retail/restaurant uses (double the previous mall), 3,000 homes (condominiums, rentals, and social housing) for over 6,000 residents, 700,000 sq ft of office space for about 3,000 workers, a one-of-a-kind nine-acre urban public park on the indoor mall’s rooftop, and a 100,000 sq ft community centre with a new Vancouver Public Library branch. The redevelopment will have a relatively low capacity of 2,000 free vehicle parking stalls for its wide range of significant public uses.
April 2022 diagram showing the underground transit concourse corridor between Oakridge Park (Oakridge Centre) and SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Quadreal Property Group/Westbank)
April 2022 diagram showing the underground transit concourse corridor between Oakridge Park (Oakridge Centre) and SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Quadreal Property Group/Westbank)
Diagram of the underground transit concourse corridor between Oakridge Park (Oakridge Centre) and SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Quadreal Property Group/Westbank)
Diagram of the underground transit concourse corridor between Oakridge Park (Oakridge Centre) and SkyTrain Oakridge-41st Avenue Station. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Quadreal Property Group/Westbank)
The station will also see added volumes from high-density developments in the surrounding area within the municipal government’s designated Oakridge Town Centre district and growing ridership on the R4 41st Avenue RapidBus service. Moreover, overall ridership on the Canada Line is expected to grow significantly in 2027, when the Millennium Line’s Broadway Extension opens and turns Broadway-City Hall Station into a major regional interchange.
According to TransLink statistics, Oakridge-41st Avenue Station was the 24th busiest station out of 53 stations on the SkyTrain network, with 2.31 million boardings recorded in 2023. It saw averages of 7,000 boardings per weekday, 5,600 per Saturday, and 4,500 per Sunday/holiday. Ridership at the station is considerably down compared to before the pandemic due in large part to the previous mall’s closure and demolition.