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Entries from July 2015

Debate over art gallery draws standing-room and thoughtful crowd

May 21st, 2010 · 19 Comments

It was packed last night at the Robson Square Theatre as people came out to hear the debate over whether and where the Vancouver Art Gallery should move to, along with contributing their own opinions. Fourteen people spoke in all. Seven were outright in favour of the gallery moving to a new site, including documentary […]

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City manager’s bike stolen from city hall

May 21st, 2010 · 28 Comments

I ran into Penny Ballem at Bob Rennie’s UDI speech at the Hotel Vancouver yesterday and was surprised when she waved a booklet of bus tickets, saying they were her way of getting around these days. I’ve only ever seen her on her bike until now. What happened, I wanted to know, thinking perhaps she’d […]

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Dunsmuir bike lane trial up tomorrow: One submission here

May 19th, 2010 · 37 Comments

The trial for the Dunsmuir bike lane (soon to be followed by a trial Burrard or Thurlow lane, is my guess) is being voted on tomorrow morning at the 9:30 committee meeting, item 4 on the agenda. I think there might be some strong opinions on this (a joke, get it?) so I’ll get the […]

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New design out for PCI’s Marine Gateway tower

May 19th, 2010 · 19 Comments

Thanks to Gord Price at his blog Price Tags, here’s the latest rendering for the new Marine Gateway complex down on former industrial land near the Marine Drive Canada Line station. The unique design is from Peter Busby’s firm. Things to ponder. – Look at the sheer size of this project. At 952,000 square feet, […]

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Events listing: Debate on Vancouver Art Gallery future

May 16th, 2010 · 11 Comments

A group outside the VAG — UBC, SFU and Architecture Canada — have organized a public debate on where the gallery should go. May 20, 7 p.m., Robson Square Theatre. Be there or be out of the biggest cultural/urban planning/architecture debate this city has seen in decades. VAG.MAY20POSTER

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Vision decides it’s time to release 78-per-cent approval poll for Robertson

May 15th, 2010 · 24 Comments

Aha, the Visionistas have decided to strategically give out their latest poll on Gregor Robertson’s popularity. The highlights here in the Vancouver Sun. Would have been nice to see all of the questions in the poll — maybe a PDF? I’ll let all of you do the analysis.

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Intergovernmental guy gone at Vancouver

May 14th, 2010 · 10 Comments

This memo concerning Robin Adair went out yesterday at city hall, which didn’t come as much of a surprise to me. I’d heard a rumbling a couple of weeks ago that things were not going well in the last while. They’d started out rosy but something happened in the last while. Although I know Vision […]

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Commercial Drive park closure sparks backlash

May 14th, 2010 · 16 Comments

People are unhappy when their parks get closed. We heard about it with Oppenheimer Park last year (now opened with grand new design) and now we’re hearing it a Grandview Park. Here’s the news release from one group. Not sure what the counter-arguments are from others in the area, but perhaps posters can enlighten us […]

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Affordable, sustainable housing — West Van style

May 14th, 2010 · 1 Comment

There isn’t a growing community in North America that isn’t at least a little bit concerned about how to create lower-cost housing and how to create denser communities with less environmental impact. Even so, it will probably surprise some to hear that West Van is one of those communities. The city has negotiated with British […]

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In search of the elusive book in Hawaii

May 13th, 2010 · 8 Comments

As I noted in a previous post, I’m living the hard life in the backwoods of Oahu. I didn’t realize how hard until I discovered that I had left my only novel behind at my hotel the first night and was trapped in the wilderness without anything to read. I’d frankly rather go without water […]

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