Event: City Conversations

Event: City Conversations

The newest lunchtime discussion series to hit Vancouver is City Conversations. A partnership between SFU Urban Studies, SFU Vancouver, Bing Thom Architects, and the SFU City Program, this new series of Thursday noontime meet-ups will be held at Simon Fraser University’s Vancouver campus.

This first meet-up topic? Vancouver’s art and culture scene.

Vancouver is a vibrant city, but its cultural quantity and quality are not often compared to New York or Toronto, or even San Francisco – a city of similar size. What will it take to raise Vancouver’s (and the Lower Mainland’s) cultural star? Philanthropy? Government investment? Affordable artists spaces? Big arts institutions? Cross-cultural sharing with other West Coast cities?

Join Norman Armour (PuSh Festival), Charlie Smith (The Georgia Straight) and Vanessa Leigh (ION Magazine) on April 19, for a discussion exploring these issues and more with our inaugural City Conversations: State of the Arts.

Join us next Thursday, April 19, 12:30 in Harbour Centre Room 1425. Bring your lunch!

Check out the website for a bit more, and follow @cityconv on twitter!

Do you talk to strangers on the bus?

As part of an assignment for a current class, I spent several hours this past week sitting on the bus observing passengers and their interactions with other riders. Nothing too much out of the ordinary: people seem to care about getting from point A to point B, whether that involves talking with their seat mate or not.

Of those observed, I found about 20% of passengers are using electronic devices (cell phones or some sort of audio device with headphones). Not surprisingly, these passengers rarely if ever spoke to the people around them.

Those passengers who did strike a conversation with strangers on the bus did so usually because they were almost on top of each other during peak hour crowded bus situations, did so after asking to share the adjacent seat, or when some unusual event happened on the bus (like a guy losing his pants when the driver gunned it – it happened, I kid you not), sparking unanimous laughter or concern.

What brings you to meeting someone new on transit? How often do you run into people on transit that you already know? Do you think public transit provides a “communal” atmosphere where relationships can begin or grow?

A gondola for Seattle?

With so much talk of a gondola to connect SFU Burnaby with the SkyTrain system, Seattle is now considering one as well. The promise of an aerial gondola would connect the waterfront, Seattle Center, South Lake Union and Capitol Hill. Below are images from a post from City Talk.

Now, you may be thinking, “don’t they have that monorail already that was used for some exposition and now just sits as an awkward tourist attraction?” Yes. Yes, they do. I can’t help but think this would inevitably turn into Monorail 2.0, but there is something kind of neat about this proposal. The “cherry on top” they are calling it, are two towers that the gondola cars would pass through.

Here’s the write up:

One last exciting element here is the cherry on top of the hill. Imagine an iconic tower in the Capitol Hill light rail station area redevelopment.  I’m showing a gondola terminal located about 160 feet up a 400-foot-tall tower that would include a public viewing terrace, restaurant and bar with views in every direction.

The lower portion of the tower could be used as a destination hotel with conference and meeting facilities in the base, possibly combined with a joint-use community center for the local community. Businesses, services and organizations could symbiotically collaborate to occupy the second and/or third floors while the ground floor would be dedicated to street activation in the form of retail and restaurants.

Yes, this is controversial and certainly not allowed by current zoning. However, a tower at this location could be rationalized by the gondola, which is an exceptional public asset (and vice versa). The tower is essential to allow the gondola system to be strung well over the existing buildings on the west slope of Capitol Hill. The tower would also contain the receiving terminal, which needs to be mounted approximately 160 feet or higher above the street. It’s also a means to an end as the added development could better provide the desired neighborhood amenities and public benefits package as identified in the neighborhood’s urban design framework plan (UDF).

The current UDF plan suggests up-zoning this site by one or two stories, which may add 20-25% more capacity to the site. That will bring some value to the project, but it won’t buy much in terms of the long list of public amenities desired by the community. I’m suggesting a doubling or tripling of development capacity that is concentrated in the tower where it can take advantage of the great views.

Assuming a tower is possible, I’d propose it be a stand-alone beacon celebrating the station and the unique attributes of the neighborhood. It could be the next generation’s Space Needle, designed by a rigorous international competition and with no other towers allowed in the district. As the only tower, more sun, light, air and views would be maintained on the station area site. It could be slender and graceful, and set back slightly from the street. I’m showing a form in these illustrations for scale and to show how a gondola would be incorporated. Clearly more design work is needed, and that could be an opportunity for community engagement.

As many have observed, more people living and working in the station area is a public benefit, even if some of them occupy high-end condominiums at the top of the tower. Their carbon footprint will be significantly less living here than if they lived on 10 acres in Woodinville and commuted into town each day. They would potentially help pay for some 250 units of affordable housing, a district energy system, the Nagle Place Market and a community center.

Thoughts? This seems like something worth following, especially with Seattle’s recent plan to demolish and tunnel the Alaskan Way viaducts and their rather progressive push for change in and around the downtown core lately.

Preservation vs. The Future

I will start this off by saying that I am a flaming preservationist. I worked for a year in a small downtown in Oregon leading a Main Street program with a focus on business development but from a preservationist approach. It’s easy to do that there, in a small town setting that thrives on its history. In a place like Vancouver, or any other large city with inflated housing and development markets, the preservation approach is much more difficult to use as a reason for keeping buildings, and it is clear that usually new, higher use buildings get the go ahead from developers and city council, replacing the few existing historical gems we have left.

   

[Thanks to Illustrated Vancouver for the images!]

Yes, cities like Vancouver must plan for the future. Yes, there is a housing crisis, and the demand and dire need for more housing is absolutely a priority for municipal policy. Yes, Vancouver is pretty much built out, and higher densities are needed as more and more people choose Vancouver as their home. But where do we draw the line?

As a relatively new Vancouverite, I struggle finding very many historical buildings in the city, and often I wonder what was located on particular sites before the high-rise “green” condo buildings and same old modern style structures that define the Vancouver skyline today. Vancouver continues to be known worldwide as one of the greenest cities. A new report from the National Trust for Historic Preservation in the States has concluded that, “when comparing buildings of equivalent size and function, building reuse almost always offers environmental savings over demolition and new construction.”

Being green is great and not being discounted, but when the issue of greater residential and commercial demand exceeds the capacity of existing heritage buildings, the dilemma arises. Demolish the old building for something higher capacity? (See the new plans for 720 Robson St) Keep the building, but build around it, maybe with a new tower soaring above? (See the Patina/YMCA in Vancouver) Or keep the historic building, maybe with a few renovations, but no major capacity changes?

skyscrapercity.com

These are the issues cities are facing today and in the future. Keep these historic gems that are part of our cultural pasts and tell stories of a Vancouver that once was, or make way for new density that attempts to solve problems of high demand and bring more tax dollars to the city and profits to developers.

What’s your take on this? Is there a right or wrong answer?

About Me: Landon

2012 marks my second semester of the Urban Studies program at SFU, which means that the time has come to dive a bit deeper into thinking about a thesis topic and narrowing my studies down into what I am truly passionate about in cities. Having been born and raised in Florida, living in the the sprawling cities of Fort Lauderdale, Jacksonville, and Atlanta, I have come to see the lack of varying levels of communal activities and everyday life that are something on which other places around the world thrive.

Like Andrew, I was a LEGO kid as well and built cities (with the electric train and all!) on my bedroom floor. I loved trains, buses, subways, monorails, you name it. It wasn’t until I lived in Atlanta where I truly was able to experience an urban rail system, and even that is no where near comparable to New York, London, or Tokyo. Since coming to Vancouver, I think I have found where I’d like to settle for a bit longer than my previous stays. This city is the perfect testing ground for finding that point where community and public transit cross paths. It’s what I’d like to explore with my remaining time here at SFU, and right now, it is the best location.

I am excited to contribute to this blog periodically, and I hope it inspires thought and conversation among students and faculty in our program and beyond.