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The hard bargaining the city needs to do so all residents benefit from the viaducts

November 27th, 2015 · 6 Comments

There’s a lot of suspicion about whether Vancouver will really benefit from the viaducts or whether removing them will result in another new neighbourhood that seems to exist mostly for the benefit of investors and visitors (Coal Harbour anyone?).

Two people who were intimately involved in extracting public benefits for the city when the first part of the Expo lands were built — Larry Beasley and Ralph Segal — weighed in for my story on this question. They were part of a team that got a seawall, a school, a childcare centre, a substantial amount of social housing, several parks, and more in the early days of negotiations with Concord Pacific.

The city has promised to set up a stewardship group in order to get community input as the planning for the area goes forward. Beasley suggests something much bigger should happen: a giant public series of events to get the whole city talking about what should go into this new neighbourhood. That should be going on while the city negotiates with developer Concord Pacific and the province, so the power of the public conversation helps shape the deal. And Segal said city teams need to be empowered to bargain hard — something that hasn’t been the guiding principle of recent, according to him.

A side story to the main question I looked at was exploring what is under that dirt around the viaducts, the last of the old industrial land of early 20th-century downtown Vancouver.

I got to spend some fun hours looking at pictures from the Vancouver Archives that were a reminder of what used to be. Boats used to chug along under the old viaducts, when False Creek extended up to Prior Street. There were squatters huts on the shoreline. And there was a lot of junk that got used for fill as False Creek slowly got transformed in that area from swamp to land. Plus a lot of lovely chemicals that soaked in.

The archaeological report the city had done to check on the history underground has some cool maps showing the shifting shoreline, along with the locations of old industrial operations. Plus some historical pictures.

It was all a reminder that what happens next is far from a done deal. The conversation is just starting.

Categories: Uncategorized

  • MB

    I completely agree with Larry Beasley that a development plan should follow another set of public consultations, presumably a series of in-depth workshops with local residents and interested parties facilitated by professional staff. Following through with documentation of the public input is also an imporant step. It has to be proven that the input actually informed the plans already developed, or will lead to appropriate revisions.
    The public consultation process was seen to be broken not so long ago. Vision now has to prove it has changed its outlook on development in and near established neighbourhoods and learned from the pushback in Mount Pleasant and Grandview Woodlands that almost cost them the last election.

    Today there is organized resistance against what is perceived as pre-ordained development approvals on single sites or corridors. But there is also reticence on both sides where myopic and loud NIMBYism is feared as much as the steamrolling of massive projects, and reasonable proposals can be overwhelmed. So this begs the question about the quality of public consultation.
    I suggest the processes used in City Plan and the Citizen’s Assembly could be built upon to develop a new standard. Having several groups representing a cross section of residents give their input independently in neighbourhood workshops, then in they are brought together in a second step to establish common ground, may be the best way to avoid a situation where one group purports to speak for all without permission.
    I also suggest that some hard questions and challenges should be directed at residents about accepting their fair share of growth, and asking them to define their limits. This will be difficult for both residents and city reps because of the huge economic and growth pressures that are exerted on the city. It may make complete dense to planners to densify a rapid transit corridor, but at the same time it is non-sensical to continue to treat the standard lot zoning as sacrosanct even given the power of the voters who live there. To continue in this vein will result in the great incongruities that are developing now, such as approving the transit-justified massive increase in density of Oakridge that will overshadow the wasteful and unaffordable 50-foot lots to the north. One day the city will need to look for middle-ground solutions.

  • Gordon in Vancouer

    I agree public input is important.
    At the same time the generic public interest needs to be protected against narrow interests. This is land that is currently used for viaducts and which was previously industrial. Redevelopment should result in a profit for the city. Also this land is walking distance to the central business district. If significant density can’t go here, I can’t imagine where new residences are to be built.
    We should learn the lessons learned on public land at SE false creek, and I mean what happened long before the Olympics. There was a plan for that area which would have seen something similar to the old Expo lands. The plan would have generated a very significant profit for the City. The push back which followed resulted in the planning process being handed over to people who insisted on lower density and the inclusion of every fad and new technology, ready for use or not. This contributed a lot to the unthinkable: it became possible for the City to sell acres of waterfront residential land on the edge of downtown for a loss.
    The City could make a mess of it again with just a couple of bad decisions.

  • peakie

    I got to spend some fun hours looking at pictures from the Vancouver Archives that were a reminder of what used to be. Boats used to chug along under the old viaducts, when False Creek extended up to Prior Street.

    And a reminder from the many “Troops marching across the Georgia Viaduct” photo captions in your search [ searcharchives.vancouver.ca/search/advanced?f=&m=1637575&h=true&l=198&sd=&ed=&so0=and&sq0=%22georgia+viaduct%22&sf0 ] above , that the Beatty Street Armories were connected to the CN train station near Main.

  • IanS

    I’m not terribly optimistic that any public consultation in this matter will be effective, at least from the perspective of the “public”, but I would love to be pleasantly surprised and I wish the best for those who decide to participate in whatever process is ultimately established.

    I will be moving out of the area before the viaducts come down, but will watch with interest.

    On this point from the article – “In the early years after the idea was first proposed in 2009, the anger
    was about traffic. Now it’s about what exactly will arise from this
    significant piece of land on the northeast shore of False Creek” – I don’t think that concern over what will be done has replaced the concern over traffic. It’s more of an additional concern, at least in my opinion.

    The historical pictures are wonderful though, both in the report and in the Vancouver archives.

  • jolson

    The entire development discussion for NEFC has become muddled by the efforts of a few to knock down the viaducts. The truth of it is that it doesn’t matter if the viaducts are there for the next forty years or one hundred years for that matter. We can still build the City of tomorrow. The viaducts were built in 1972 according to the seismic code of the day. Expo 86 fit the viaducts into the plans for BC Place, Pacific Blvd., and Expo Blvd., the Skytrain guideway, and Stadium Station. Then International Village and Andy Livingstone Park fit into the plan. Later the Arena tucked in nicely between the viaducts, and Concord built out the block to the west over the Costco store. All these projects were built and fit nicely with the urban structure originally established by the presence of the viaducts. Building around and under the viaducts is a work in progress and an investment in the future that needs to continue if we are to have any credibility when seeking infrastructure funding from the Feds and the Province.

  • peakie

    And in Los Angeles, another bridge/overpass across the Los Angeles River is coming down, to the consternation of many.
    http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/03/us/los-angeles-gentrification.html