Berelowitz - Dream city Vancouver and the global imagination

Dream City

VANCOUVER AND THE GLOBAL IMAGINATION

Lance Berelowitz

Copyright 2005 by Lance Berelowitz

05 06 07 08 09 54321

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Douglas & McIntyre Ltd.
2323 Quebec Street, Suite 201
Vancouver, British Columbia
Canada V5T 4S7
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Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Berelowitz, Lance, 1956
Dream city : Vancouver and the global imagination / Lance Berelowitz.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1-55365-103-0
1. City planningBritish ColumbiaVancouverHistory.
2. ArchitectureBritish ColumbiaVancouver. I. Title
HT169.C32V35 2005 307.12160971133 C2004-906460-6

Library of Congress information is available upon request

Editing by Saeko Usukawa
Design by George Vaitkunas
Front jacket photo of Concord Pacific Place by Shannon Mendes
Maps by Eric Leinberger (except where noted)
Derek Lepper photographs copyright 2005
Printed and bound in Canada by Friesens
Printed on acid-free paper
Distributed in the U.S. by Publishers Group West

We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the British Columbia Arts Council, and the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) for our publishing activities.

The quotation from The Waste Land by T.S. Eliot, published by Faber and Faber Ltd., is reprinted by permission of the publisher.

The quotation from Polaroids from the Dead, published by HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., copyright 1996 by Douglas Coupland, is reprinted by permission of the author.

The quotation from The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power, published by Penguin in Canada and Free Press in the United States, copyright 2004 Joel Bakan, is reprinted by permission of the author.

Modified extracts of some of the text that Lance Berelowitz wrote in collaboration with City of Vancouver staff for the brochure Vancouvers New Neighbourhoods: Achievements in Planning and Urban Design, produced by the Vancouver Planning Department (Larry Beasley, Co-Director of Planning; Ann McAfee, Co-Director of Planning; Ralph Segal, Senior Urban Designer), are used by permission of the City of Vancouver Planning Department.

Images from A Plan for the City of Vancouver, commonly known as the Bartholomew Plan (1929) and a Civic Centre voter flyer c. 1946 (both documents commissioned by the predecessor Vancouver Town Planning Commission) are reproduced by permission of the Vancouver City Planning Commission.

Pages ii/iii: The downtown peninsula and False Creek.
Jeremy Woodhouse / Photodisc
Page vi: The Coal Harbour waterfront walkway. George
Vaitkunas photo
Page xii: The downtown skyline and the Stanley Park
seawall. George Vaitkunas photo

To Shelley, who first had the temerity to suggest that I might be the person to
testify in public about Vancouver and who kept the faith.

It will be noted that no mention has been made of

any human foresight having been exercised in

the control or direction of the growth of this British

Columbia metropolis. Its history is that of Topsy,

it just growed.ARTHUR G. SMITH, CHAIRMAN,

VANCOUVER TOWN PLANNING COMMISSION, FROM THE

INTRODUCTION TO A PLAN FOR THE CITY OF VANCOUVER,

1929, BY HARLAND BARTHOLOMEW AND ASSOCIATES

I ALWAYS KNEW there was a book to be written about Vancouver, from the first time I laid eyes on it. For this Vancouver, the place itself, must be credited. I just didnt know how to do it. Several people helped guide me along the way.

Without his knowing it of course, Reyner Banham first suggested the way with his inimitable treatment of Los Angeles, that alter ego to Vancouver (even if we deny it). His book Los Angeles: The Architecture of Four geologies was a seminal influence on my way of looking at and writing about Vancouver, and remains the most intelligently written modern critique of any city in the West Coast littoral. Students of Banhams work will, I hope, find something of his spirit of inquiry resonating throughout the following effort at deciphering this city.

Robert Gretton at Canadian Architect magazine was the first editor in Canada to grant me public space to air my views on this preposterously optimistic city. His faith in the view of a newcomer gave me the confidence to continue writing long after that view became that of an insider and also led to my first award for writing in Canada. Subsequent editors at Canadian Architect generously allowed me to elaborate on these views. I am grateful to them all.

Detlef Mertins and the other organizers of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canadas first national forum on The Architecture of Emerging Public Spaces (1988) and the resulting publication Metropolitan Mutations, provided a valuable opportunity to develop some of the initial themes amplified in this book, and public exposure to these ideas. The resulting positive feedback from professional peers, including Joost Bakker, Ken Greenberg and Stephen Fong, further encouraged me to conclude that my pursuit of understanding the genius loci of this city was not entirely idiosyncratic.

Many local designers, critics and Vancouver observers supported me in this work along the way, both directly and indirectly. My thanks go out to those who have indicated that there was something worth writing about and that I might be the one to do so. This includes academic colleagues at the University of British Columbia, practising architects and planners, and other confreres. In particular, my thanks to Chris Macdonald, Director of the UBC School of Architecture, who took the time to read an early draft of this story and pointed out several shortcomings. Professor Graeme Wynn of the UBC Department of Geography also read the manuscript and provided detailed comments on some of the early chapters, specifically with respect to my loose understanding of the citys geographical and environmental setting. And Professor Rhodri Windsor Liscombe tried to strengthen my tenuous grasp of the citys extraordinary modernist history, while not always concurring with me. Any remaining historical inaccuracies or misattributions are no fault of theirs.

Stephanie Robb generously and patiently explained why the Vancouver Special house deserves its name. David Beers demonstrated why I consider him to be one of the sharpest editors going, as well as his friendship beyond the call of duty, by reading the manuscript, giving acute advice and, not least, opening some important doors.

City of Vancouver Planning Department staff, led by the ever-gracious Larry Beasley, helped in ways small and large, sometimes without knowing it. In particular, John Madden provided useful development statistics. Dan Campbell was generous in his assistance with City maps and graphics. While this book does not always agree with some of my City colleagues usually more rosy assessments of changes on their watch, I have nothing but admiration for their professionalism and dedication to the task. They certainly can take some credit for the urban planning successes the city has seen. They should also know that any criticisms between these covers are made in a spirit of constructive critique.