Dear Bob

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Kissing Goodbye to the Spiritual Core of Vancouver

A couple of weeks ago, I had the immense pleasure of having dim sum in Chinatown with architect Joe Wai and a couple of other friends who have been working on finding solutions to help preserve the Historic Area against being steamrolled by market forces. Five condo towers of 150 feet are being proposed for Main Street just north of the viaducts.

My feelings about the Historic Area Height Review and approving towers in the heritage district are well documented — I oppose this plan and feel it is sheer stupidity and greed that is driving it. Vancouver stands to lose and/or denigrate its historical core by letting this happen. In a city becoming increasingly homogenized, sanitized and void of unique neighbourhoods, the HAHR plan seeks now to extend the awful modernist, car-centric urbanism of the City Gate towers north into the unique, human-scaled urbanism of Chinatown. It’s the thin edge of the wedge, one that of course started with the Woodwards towers, and the rampant speculation by developers that followed its approval.

Joe Wai, a man with a long and honourable history in Chinatown, has a slightly different take, which he has articulated in The Tyee:

Why Chinatown Needs to Grow Taller

Vancouver’s historic district is struggling for its spiritual identity. If done right, higher buildings could help it succeed.

By Joe Wai, 16 Mar 2011, TheTyee.ca

Last Thursday eleven major Chinatown organizations held a media conference in support of the Vancouver planning department’s Historic Area Height Review Report.

The zoning changes recommended in the report, which will be open to public discussion at tomorrow’s city council meeting, would allow taller buildings in Chinatown — though nothing like the soaring towers proposed in the past. If this report is approved, in Chinatown’s historic core, building heights could rise 10 feet above their current height, to a new limit of 75 feet. And the southeastern corner of Chinatown could see buildings of 120 feet — even, in one stretch of Main Street, 150 feet.

Chinatown’s united front backing this vision includes the merchants, residents, cultural and service groups that do not always agree on all community issues. Evidently the Historic Area Height Review is an issue that all Chinatown groups can come together around, just like their opposition to the freeway planned to go through Chinatown some 40 or so years ago.

The irony is that the adjacent neighbourhood organizations, in particular the Carnegie Action Committee and the Downtown Eastside Neighbourhood Council, would prefer to have a local area planning process started for the related area, including Chinatown, before considering  any higher buildings in the district.

But the Chinatown groups had been working on their plans through the Vancouver Chinatown Revitalization Committee with city planning for the last 10 years. The groups are totally fed up with the prospect of yet another round (and years) of more meetings.

The Historic Area Height Review was debated in public information meetings from April 2009 to January 2010. This version is what city council asked the planning department to proceed with after listening to over 75 speakers in January 2010.

It is a tragedy for neighbourhoods to be pitted against one another.

Those who oppose this proceeding immediately are concerned that higher density and taller buildings will

displace the low-income residents. I don’t believe that has to be the case. There is a need for Chinatown to evolve with some flexibility for increased density, which would be helpful as long as the streetscape character can be maintained and its spiritual identity reinforced.

How to deal with community evolution

Before we attempt to proceed with this current debate, let us step back a little.

With emancipation and citizenship in 1947, Chinatown began a process of slow change. The rest of Vancouver took two decades to notice. The civic mindset, however, remained the same from city hall’s point of view. As cities grew, new vehicular access was deemed a necessity whether the local residents knew it or not. That meant a freeway running through the slum-like “Chinatown” of the planners’ imaginations.

How many people really cared about Chinatown in the mid-1960s? Well, apparently enough, even besides those who lived and worked there. However well-meaning, the society at large still viewed Chinatown as an oddity, though a worthwhile area where by then food and evening entertainment had wider appeal. The younger generation of all ethnic backgrounds found it an inexpensive venue. Most of the “opium and gambling dens” that had supposedly festered prior to World War II were now gone.

In proposing to demolish all of this with a freeway, city hall decided to compensate Chinatown with new grandeur. For example, the 20-foot-high ramp over Pender and Carrall Streets could be designed with two levels of retail shops — just like the Ginza in Tokyo (where they had no other choice). A tranquil park space on Pender Street would be a memorial to Chinese-Canadian history: ‘See, we honour you poor Chinese.’

Academics and activists, from UBC in particular, helped to orchestrate a protest against the freeway and formed a new civic party that encouraged change of societal values. Hope stirred in those who valued better communities. Jane Jacobs was only middle-aged. The talk was about vibrant neighbourhoods, with people relating to each other rather than to cars. The debate took seven years to calm down.

As late as 1973, remnants of the freeway system would surface for city council’s review and approval, even though the system had been defeated in 1967 and 1969. The imaginary “Chinatown” still had a grip.

So, what is it about Chinatown? Why do some of us think it is valuable? Valuable to whom? Thirty years and many events after the first phase of the Chinese Cultural Centre, these questions remain.

Thirty years of demographic change

During the past 30 years, the demographics of Vancouver’s Chinese-origin people have changed radically. Numbers have quadrupled, mostly by immigration from Hong Kong, then Taiwan and recently the PRC. We estimate that these immigrants comprise about 70 per cent (or 250,000) of all people of Chinese origin in our region. They brought with them different values, different aspirations and different expectations. They even started their own Chinatowns, in Richmond, the Westwood Plateau, South Vancouver, Burnaby, and Vancouver East. In short, they have different cultural characteristics and different visions of “Chinatown.”

So, what do we do? Tear down Chinatown and rebuild it with maximum return in mind? Why do we even contemplate revitalizing it? What is there to revitalize? Who should be party to making such suggestions? The planners are no longer paternal (well, most of them anyway) and they are no longer English, or middle-aged males.

Since the Freeway Debates (1966-1973), many other groups have formed in addition to the traditional “ancient” associations or societies. They didn’t necessarily agree with each other. But they led to the Vancouver Chinatown Revitalization Committee (VCRC), as set up by city planning in 2001.

Over the past decade, the VCRC, which is made up of many Chinatown residents, conducted 26 “visioning” sessions to prioritize its needs. City Planning, meanwhile, commissioned studies on market housing on the tight 25-foot-wide sites. It started a heritage incentive program that offered density transfers and tax exemptions in exchange for the restoration of heritage buildings. City planning also supported the Chinatown Association Buildings Society and contributed significantly to the consultants’ studies on what to do with such venerable century-old iconic buildings.

Finally, when something like a “community plan” emerged after a decade, City Planning unveiled the Historic Area Height Review (HAHR) in April 2009. It felt as if the old planners were back in force, with visions of 300-foot towers in the Historic District (HA.1) zoning — one proposed immediately next to the cultural centre and the classical garden.

So what was this all about? The explanation was yet another effort to provide a “landmark” for Chinatown in its struggle to “revitalize.” Those who cared viewed this as the second coming of the Freeway Debates. Once again, sleepy Chinatown was asked to undergo another drastic facelift.

The spiritual identity of Chinatown

What is “Chinatown” anyway? If it is no longer an opium/gambling den, would the non-Chinese be glad to have it back with neon lights everywhere? With some fully restored 1900-era buildings, could we say that we as a city support “heritage” (and would we draw more tourists)?

Or do we have new “contemporary, green” 12-, 15- or 30-storey condo towers and other luxurious or “fusion” facilities, which save one floor for a “Chinese Cultural Centre” at its present site?

To some, it is none of the above. Firstly, it is a spiritual identity: the integration of history, culture and physical characteristics.

Simplistically, it is like skating on the frozen Rideau Canal in Ottawa, or playing hockey on backyard Prairie ice rinks. It is the identity of the place and the people, integrated with their cultural history. It is their sense of place.

These qualities are an expression of Chinatown as it was and as it is. The “spiritual identity” factor has also changed to ensure its survival. Some Chinatown institutions need to be sustained: the associations, the different retail and commercial outlets, the restaurants and food suppliers. In other cases, the old institutions are gone. The gambling clubs have been replaced by the cultural centre, the social services centre, S.U.C.C.E.S.S. multi-care facility, the large parkade, and the classical Chinese garden, among others. Thus Chinatown has seen significant organic growth, albeit comparatively slowly.

The district schedule has also changed. In 1989 a few colleagues and I were asked to conduct a review for such change. This resulted from complaints within the Chinatown community over the restrictive development parameters of 1974.

In our discussions, someone suggested allowing a good portion of the Historic District to be rezoned “HA.1A,” with far less restriction on height and design directives. I was appalled until I reflected further on the few designated blocks and the already-changing activities and demographics of Chinatown. The HA.1A idea was further reviewed in 1992 by other consultants under a much more conservative senior heritage planner.

Chinatown went ballistic and accused the planner of discrimination. This was another one of those times when I had to explain that, “City hall does that to every neighbourhood and not just Chinatown,” because heritage was its focus at that time. Over 125 hours of volunteer meeting time were expended to arrive at a “compromise,” which included the 90-foot height limit in HA1.A, and 65 feet in the HA.1 zone.

Predictably, there was not much redevelopment because of the land ownership pattern upon its enactment in 1994. The current Historic Area Height Review has had its debate in multiple public consultation meetings, culminating with city council’s January 2010 approval of an incremental height increase to 75 feet for the HA.1 and 120 feet for HA1.A.

Keep architecture on a human scale

Based on observations of the past 41 years, I didn’t have much difficulty with this. My concerns are with the 150-foot height allowable from Keefer and Main southwards. The most galling possibility is that the high street wall would resemble any other “downtown” street.

Now, to me, this is a fundamental point of what “Chinatown” is. Spiritual identity, history and cultural activities are indispensable. However, the architecture is that of a human scale; the architectural identity is that of a particular rhythm and character, without which it could not begin to house any semblance of similar spiritual identity, let alone abide the erasure of what remains of the cultural history.

While it is essential to retain Chinatown’s scale and character, this would not preclude the use of innovative design to complement the truly iconic buildings and would reinforce the overall streetscape experience.

“Chinatown” may yet further evolve into another phase. The HA1.A area today is already far different from what it was in 1994. Virtually new communities have been formed on the 200 block of East Georgia and Union Streets. Happily, these seem active and sometimes even chaotically vibrant. These streets have 10-storey buildings, but they are well set back from the street, and show two or three storeys, which respect compatibility with the streetscape.

This is the intention for HA.1A. Denser developments are required by those who develop them, but it is critical to maintain a streetscape compatible with the “spiritual identity” and activities of a vibrant street life. Perhaps then we shall indeed see more organic growth in “Chinatown,” whatever we think Chinatown means.

It has been 10 years since the city began its consultation with the VCRC. Many public information sessions have been conducted, including the “visioning” process, the market housing and the associations’ building studies. Frankly, “Chinatown” interests, whether the associations or the merchants, are fed up with the continuing delay for a public hearing to proceed on the decisions they made with city council’s general approval in January 2010.

One exception is city staff’s proposal of the 150-foot street wall on Main Street. If allowed to build straight up from the property line, or even with a ten-foot setback at 70 feet, it would indeed be the new “Great Wall of Chinatown.” This needs much further review regarding the depth of the setbacks and streetscape livability before being considered.

My aspirations for “Chinatown” are related to its ability to retain its spiritual identity while meeting the different levels of change that are not limited to physical annihilation, but cultural subversion.

If an organism has managed to survive a period of successive crises, it has the resilience and resourcefulness to prevail. In a world of increasing homogeneity, distinctive cultural character, integrity of form and cultural expression are both hard to find and hard to maintain. However, the form is less important than the essence, as long as such essence can continue to regenerate its spiritual identity.

– Joe Wai has been involved with senior/social housing and a volunteer in Chinatown community issues for over 40 years. He is also the architect of the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden, the Chinatown Millennium Gate, the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum and Archives, the Chinatown Parkade and Plaza, and the Commemoration of Block 17 as well as many restorations of the early Chinatown Society buildings.

Death of the Pantages Theatre?

“They’re in the old tailor shop at 134 E Hastings tearing up the hardwood flooring, and salvaging timber. They’ve built pass-throughs from there into the old Blue Eagle at 130 E Hastings and into the building to the east, doing the same work – so basically all 3 of the low rise buildings in the land assembly. The worker I spoke to said they’re going to move east to the 2 storey building directly beside the theatre, then on to the theatre itself. Looks like only a matter of time now. I wondered since the For Sale signs dissappeared.”

From a citizen named Ron, on January 28th, 2011.

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I swear to God, if our current City Council lets this happen, they will live in shame for the rest of their lives…

- GJG

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Powell Street Festival Returns to Oppenheimer

Octogenarian Architect Speaks Out Against City Planning

Roger Kemble, aka Urbanismo, is a mariner, but he’s all about the land. At 82, he appears to be having the time of his life. He clearly doesn’t give a shit what anyone thinks about him, nor does he like bullshitters — he challenges people all the time to be truthful. But where other commentators like old Gassy might come off as fucking hacks or partisan wonks, Urbanismo has literary gusto, writing wildly punctuated fragments in a high modernist style. And he frequently drops cultural references into his blog comments that would make Douglas Coupland’s head spin.

After a long career as an architect in Vancouver and educator at UBC that stretches back to the 1960s, Urbie isn’t afraid to call out the current Vancouver Planning Department as dimwitted and drunk on power. He strongly believes the current direction of City policy — and the public consultation process — is badly in need of a new planning paradigm. In my own isolated experience with the Historic Area Height Review, I found myself agreeing with Urbanismo more and more.

While his take on Vancouver being a failed city? may lead some to scratch their heads, there’s no doubt a lot of truth to what he says. And while I and others dither over the details, Urbanismo just went ahead and plotted a new planning paradigm over the course of a couple of rainy afternoons. If you like cities and urbanism, and non-pedantic writing, it’s worth taking a look at the pages.

A Sun Yat-Sen Moment, After Things Get Weird

Well, I have to say, Sunday was a long, strange day, for many reasons. And one of the odder moments occured about 10 minutes before I took the picture of the fish….

Since posting some opinions about the Historic Area Height Review earlier in the week both here and on the Bulablog, I wanted to get some more pictures of the tower sites that had been approved. But I had a busy week and didn’t have time to do it during daylight hours until Sunday morning, during a little down-time between hockey games in Burnaby and Richmond.

On the right of the picture below (taken on Carrall) is the sign on the NW corner of the Sun Yat-Sen Garden’s white wall. The two-story grey building in the middle is 8 Pender, the site of the new tower that Council approved. The red building is one of the Heritage buildings on the north side of Pender, with the 8-storey hotel behind, and, on the far left, the Pennsylvania at Hastings and Carrall. Fifteen storeys is planned for this site, nearly double the height of the West Hotel.

So there I was, taking lots of pictures, wondering if this wasn’t just a dead issue and a waste of time, when suddenly a couple of large SUVs come squealing around the corner and pull up beside the grey building. As I’m walking up the block taking pictures, I notice that these two SUVs have illegally parked right on the bike path of the new Carrall Street Greenway.

“Assholes,” I say under my breath, as one typically does when you see jerks in SUVs doing, well, jerk-type things.

A group of 5 or 6 well-dressed, well-coiffed guys hop out and convene a little meeting on the sidewalk. These guys are players. They look like money. They act important.

And not only are they driving two big, black, emission-spewing SUVs, they don’t even bother to turn off the engines as they chat over on the sidewalk. Wow! The arrogance! These are the kind of guys that people love to rant about on blogs and call-in shows, you know? Too rich to care about gas prices or bike lanes or parking fines or pollution. Oh look! They parked by a fire hydrant, too…

Anyway, I’m getting a little agitated as I’m walking up to the group. I’m trying to formulate a cutting satirical remark that is nevertheless subtle enough that it might not lead to me getting shit-kicked into the pavement by the five of them.

Then one of the guys walks over to the side of the building and, pointing to the wall, says, “It’ll be right here.” He draws an imaginary line that extends up (way up) into the sky.

Wait a second. These guys are here on a Sunday morning having an animated discussion about the tower that’s going up at Carrall and Pender?

That’s weird since, here I am, camera in hand, taking pictures of the tower site and I’m trying to wrap my head around what a fifteen storey tower will look like on this spot, too.

One of the guys looks me up and down, glances at my camera, and shoots me a real nasty look as if to say, “Why the hell are you taking so many pictures of this thing for?” He clearly didn’t like me poking around them, snapping photos, and I thought he was going to tell me to bugger off.

I smiled.

And then I kinda recognized this guy. And then I definitely recognized the guy who was pointing where the tower was going to be. And, oh yeah, I recognized one of the other guys, too.

Now, that’s really ironic. I mean, what the heck are these guys doing in Chinatown having a mini-charette about this tower on at 10 am on a Sunday morning?

Looks to me like the clock is ticking on the Vancouver’s Historic Area much faster than we thought…

Fear of Commitment: The Morning After Walk of Shame

Players will say anything to bed a mate. Big promises, compliments, pick-up lines, rosy pictures of the future, declarations of love. Anything that will get you invited to the old dance, eh?

But when it comes time to following through on those promises — of making a long term COMMITMENT – players vanish into thin air. The morning after, they embark on their walk of shame, never to be seen again. Hey, they got what they really wanted… what did you expect?

Zero respect for other people. Using them for your own gratification, then tossing them aside like so much garbage. Pigs!

Well, VANOC has proven to be no better than a slimy Guido, making big promises to win the Games, but once they got the prize, what happened to all the promises?

Claims of a Carbon Neutral Games are one thing, but quite another was the promise that the Games would be unique because they would show the world social responsibility in action. The billions of dollars flowing through Vancouver would have a hugely positive impact on the Downtown Eastside, leaving a legacy of jobs and housing that changed the milieu from desperate to admirable. Community consultation, fiscal transparency, civil liberties, everyone would be shown nothing but the highest respect.

VANOC even put it down on paper, in a document that could be held up by all to measure their success: The Inner City Inclusive Commitment (ICIC).

But, from everything I have seen happening in the inner city these past six years, pretty much every one of the ICIC promises has been broken, forgotten, not addressed at all. And, to cap it all off, over the past two weeks a police sweep has depopulated the DTES to a virtual ghost town, leaving an empty feeling in one’s belly not unlike the feeling you get when you’ve just been used for a one night stand.

But don’t take my word for it. You be the judge. Here are some of the many promises, quoted verbatim, in the Inner City Inclusive Commitment. Personally, I can’t find one on this list that has been kept. Can you?

Excerpts from: “The 2010 Winter Games Inner-City Inclusive Commitment Statement”

Business Development

- Develop opportunities for existing and emerging local inner-city businesses and artisans to promote their goods and services

Civil Liberties

- Provide for lawful, democratic protest that is protected by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms

- Commit to a timely public consultation that is accessible to inner-city neighbourhoods, before any security legislation or regulations are finalized, subject to lawful and legitimate confidentiality requirements

Employment

- Create training and a continuum of short and long-term employment opportunities for innercity residents to encourage a net increase in employment

Financial

- Provide disclosure of all financial aspects of the Games, including expenditures and revenues, in the bidding and organizing phase of the Games

- Commit to a comprehensive annual financial audit

Health

- Showcase a commitment to public health issues, including a comprehensive alcohol and drug strategy

Housing

- Ensure people are not made homeless as a result of the Winter Games

- Ensure residents are not involuntarily displaced, evicted or face unreasonable increases in rent due to the Winter Games

- Provide an affordable housing legacy and start planning now

Input to Decision-Making

- Work with and be accessible to an independent watchdog group that includes inner-city residents

- Develop full and accountable public consultation processes that include inner-city residents

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Heightened Senses: A Late Night Walk in the Rain

What’s that you say? Public support for any tower proposal was virtually non-existent?

At the risk of being tossed in the klink for a sideways glance on Day Six of the DES popo pre-Olympic sweep, last night I took a late stroll around Chinatown to check out the only TWO tower sites approved, right? Huh? Right? Um, well, unless we consider… the financial considerations… cause someone, I’m not sure who, might have maybe inquired, so we thought maybe we’d look into it, on the City’s dime…

Nothing like a walk in the rain to heighten your senses! It’s money well spent, so to speak. Unlike other things….

I reconfirmed in my own mind that the Budget Rental site one could sorta swallow a high rise on, given Fung owns it and it’s still under the height of the Sun – pretty much anything will improve this intersection, And hey, now someone will be there to complain to Alex Tsakumis about the pissing drunks, loud groups of girls, too many furries coming and going, or the constant reek of McDonald’s deep fryers from across the street in Tinseltown.

But 8 East Pender on the SE corner at Carrall (bordering the new Greenway no less) is right across the alley to the north of Sun Yat Sen. So how the heck is this site any different than the site Council nixed at Keefer Square or the Cultural Centre site that didn’t even make it to Council? It’s still 150 feet over and above Sun Yat Sen, and much closer to it than Keefer Square. Remember, the business plan here says: go for UNESCO World Heritage Site. But, but… the Scholar’s Room won’t see this one unless you stand on your tippy toes, so, yeah, its totally OK, and there’ll be no shadows coz it’s to the north? A fine logic, indeed.

Yes, a tower and podium proposal to set it back …yawn… and lessen the spatial impact, but then, on the other side, across the street on Pender, a string of heritage pearls lie low, awaiting polishing. Either way, aspect ratio be damned, the sun will hardly illuminate the pearls, you know. And we’re gunning for FIFTEEN storeys here! Blah! It won’t matter what size plate you serve this thing up on…

And speaking of nimbys, I bet all these new high risers on Carrall will band together and force Rennie to take down Everything Will be Alright, or at least turn it off by nine pm so they don’t have to stare at it every bloody night from their roosts.

And, in an ode to how fast council quorums can make real estate decisions, the For Sale sign is already up on the old (unprotected heritage) service station in Keefer Square – the one tower site that got nixed by Council. I guess there’s really no point in updating the Heritage Register at this point, eh? It certainly wasn’t on the agenda presented to council by Planning, because hey, this review is all about high ideals, right? Groans (from speculative heights). More groans.

Twelve storey Paris-style apartments traversing the Hastings parade route! Think of it, even higher than the ugly Luxling! Quick, wall that whole sucker in before an Area Plan process is approved! The 20% is already institutionalized; so there’s really no limit to what we can do here now, old boy! Ever been to Greenwich, mate?

For Wendy P, and all the starving or successful artists who used to live around here, a final thought to ponder about the INTENSIFICATION! policy that’s behind all this, as quoted from a Skyscraper:

“These changes should allow the populate to increase from 8000 today to just under 17000 upon build-out in about 20-40yrs.” (Sic)

Most of you will be dead by then anyway, eh? It doesn’t really matter if it’s livable.

And either way, I’ll still be a ghost.

So I’ll give it a rest, already…

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Resigned, I Appeal to Creativity

(New Woodwards going up, with the Dominion building in the background. At the time it was built in 1910, it was the tallest building in the British Empire. If I’m not mistaken, Harbour Centre, on the right, was for many years Vancouver’s tallest building, too.)

OK, Toderian did reply regarding the HAHR, with what’s a pretty reasonable shakedown of the process, I guess. Now that I’m resigned to more height and high rises (WTF can I do?), I offered up a challenge that may appeal to our planners and builders and architects’ sense of pride and integrity. Hey, I still have some vestiges of idealism left in me! Anyway, below is my latest salvo on the bulablog…

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Admittedly, I am somewhat mollified by Mr. Toderian’s comments, and the decisions by council in the context of his explanation. The Budget site, being across from Tinseltown (and same block as Shanghai Alley but outside the Chinatown gates), seems a decent choice if a high rise had to go anywhere, since the heritage in that area is pretty much screwed already, and a heritage tower (the Sun Tower) is almost kitty corner to the west – it won’t necessarily stick out like a sore thumb.

(Woodwards going up, seen from Alexander Street. The green domed building in the background is the Sun Tower, built in 1912, which replaced the Dominion as the tallest in the British Empire — see the theme?)

On the other hand, Pender and Carrall (I assume the southeast corner, since the other corners are heritage?) does not really seem like a good place for a tower at all, for all the reasons I pointed out earlier, including its proximity to many great 3 storey buildings across the street. I’m not sure a high quality design could counter its placement near the core of Chinatown, although, as David H. pointed out a few threads back, there is a fair amount of junk around here already (one of which would be demo’d to make way for this high rise), so maybe it would work?

I still don’t buy the more density=revitalization argument, and have no idea why this appears to be a given and unchallenged. I fear that those who put it forth are really only interested in making money, and don’t give a damn about history or architecture or revitalization at all…

I am very suspect about tiering so quickly up to 120 feet to the south, that’s a really big jump, and will create a serious wall-in effect, which will really become the antitheses of human-scale. The streets are too narrow for this to work without making it claustrophobic.

(Lux building going up, a new social housing unit. The old heritage Lux Theatre — anyone remember the raves here back in the 90s? — was demo’d to make way for this. It pushes the max height limit, and is very imposing; imagine a whole street of these faux-heritage monstrosities, and you get what I mean by the streetscapes getting walled in. BTW, this was a Carnegie Community Action Project rally against the Concorde condos. A sign of things to come, perhaps?)

I would also point out that, heading south from Gastown, the sheer number of non-protected sites vastly out-numbers the protected ones (see the HAHR models or VanMap). Which means that the newer buildings will, over time, eventually overwhelm the heritage buildings, leading to the denuding effect. And that’s where this becomes really problematic, and where Urbanismo’s oft-repeated message about design quality, and Lewis’ concerns over human scale and ratio, will certainly come into play.

So, will we end up with more junky faux-heritage sites that everyone agrees are crap, or will architects and Planning demand something more, say, Gaudiesque; take some real risks and maybe make the 21^st century buildings something cool and unexpected, adding some real excitement to the district? Hopefully, the lessons of Concorde’s Greenwich proposal will not be forgotten, and the standard of design will be held to only: ultra high. There won’t be much hope for a UNESCO World Heritage site if we build to the lowest common denominator, and remake the streets where the sun don’t shine but for three weeks a year when it’s directly overhead…

(Concorde’s massive lot on Hastings, where the old San Francisco Pawn Shop used to be. The ultra ugly, bland-as-hell design of their Greenwich building proposed for this site met with huge opposition, not just from DTES activists, but heritage groups, designers and architects, and even Planning department thought it was horrible. The recession hit soon after it went back to the drawing board, and it’s sat empty since. I’m sure Concorde’s Terry Hui, whose yacht Councilor Ray Louie frequents, is happy that he can build an even larger monstrosity — his buddy Ray was the main Council pusher to accept the height increases….)

Nevertheless, resigned to the changes, I hearken back to the original debates on the bulablog last May, where I suggested near the end of one the threads that maybe one of the future Form Shifts should call for innovative and exciting designs for the heritage district.

It seems to me that, if we are going this route of higher buildings that will remake the district (and it will, given the high proportion of non-heritage sites), then let’s try to make it an exercise in building a new legacy of 21^st century heritage, one that could be bold, daring, and yes, maybe controversial. Let’s make it a challenge for our architects and designers and planners, and hold them accountable to the highest possible standards and creativity. Isn’t that why you all got into the building profession? Not to make money first and foremost, but to build beautiful, cool, exciting and creative buildings? To make the city you work in great? If the status quo is changing, let’s also change the status quo of Vancouverism, and shift away from the monotonous, lazy, tiresome designs we’ve all grown so utterly sick of…

Think about yours and the City’s legacy as you go forward to build in this historic district, please!

Just my humble suggestion…

(The building sticking out near the middle of the skyline is the first Woodwards tower going up (and not yet at full height), which gives some perspective of just how out of place it is on the low rise heritage side of downtown. This was taken from Stanley Park, near the lighthouse, but it’s even more dramatic how out of place it is when you approach from the harbour on the Seabus.)

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