Pacific Metropolis

On to Vancouver in 2010

Two points to be made here:

1) Now that the Turin Games are over, do you feel like packing up and moving to Turin? Did you want to move to Sydney after their highly successful Games?

Probably not. But maybe you have thought about travelling to Turin, Sydney or Athens after their Games.

Clearly, the main benefit of the Olympics will not be felt in the Vancouver housing market, but in our tourism and convention business instead. When you think about it, the smart money is investing in hotels, since it's quite likely that BC will experience a tourism boom, if the weather cooperates and we pull off a successful games.

As it stands right now, most people outside of Vancouver know that ours is a beautiful city, but they don't necessarily feel compelled to come visit - they need at least two or three more good reasons to make Vancouver a vacation destination. How else can we convince them it's worth coming here?

The Games should therefore be seen as an investment in the BC Tourism industry. The cost of the Olympics needs to be weighed against the long term benefits over 10 to 15 years, not the 2-week party. Despite the lamentations of the naysayers, the $500 million+ investment will eventually pay for itself.

2) Since the opening and closing ceremonies represent the primary marketing opportunities for Vancouver, we're going to have to do a lot better than we did at the Turin Games, if we're going to close the sale and convince people to come here.

We need to get away from the god-awful cliches of ice fishing, igloos, hockey, mounties, and Canadian celebrities if we want to capture peoples' attention.

Simply put, we've got the ocean, mountains, forests and the urban modernity of Vancouver to sell, but we have to get the package right.

Wikicouver

Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia, has a lengthy entry about Vancouver that's worth checking out.

(Image by: Leonard G., licensed under Creative Commons)

Some things that you may not have known about Vancouver:

• The first non-native settlement in the city limits of Vancouver was at McLeery's Farm, in the area of the Oak Street bridge, in about 1862.
• The settlement of Gastown was originally named Granville when it was surveyed by the colonial government.
• William Van Horne of the Canadian Pacific Railway renamed Granville Vancouver, partly because people in Montreal and Toronto would recognise the name better, due to their familiarity with the location of Vancouver Island.
• Some people who are unfamiliar with the region may be surprised to learn that Vancouver does not lie on Vancouver Island.
• The density of the city itself is the third highest of any metropolitan centre in North America, after New York City and San Francisco.
• Included among Vancouver's eight sister cities are Los Angeles, Edinburgh, Melbourne, Guangzhou, Kaohsiung, Busan, Odessa and Yokohama.

Curly Burly

Pardon our neglect in failing to include the new curling arena among those Olympic sports that require an ice surface. It's probably due to a subconscious bias that makes it difficult for us to accept curling as an Olympic sport. (In what other Olympic event can septuagenarians potentially medal?)

Anyway, there's a new 5,700 seat curling venue being built as part of a broader plan to redevelop Vancouver's Hillcrest Park - perhaps better known as the place where Nat Bailey Stadium is located. Construction of the Olympic facility is set to begin in May 2007.

The Hillcrest Curling Venue (pictured below) will be built with temporary seating for the Vancouver Olympics, after which the arena will be renovated to include an ice hockey rink and eight sheets of curling ice. Other facilities in the park complex will include a new library, aquatic centre, and community centre.

Jolly beer-guzzling curlers will be permitted to descend upon the new facilities shortly after their Olympian friends spill out of the arena in 2010. If only polka dancing could be made into a sport at the summer Olympics- these people could potentially medal in both Games.

Ice Capades

For Olympic sports that require an ice surface, the Vancouver Olympics will primarily be making use of four arenas - two of which will be newly-built, and two of which are familiar old venues.

Currently under construction, the Richmond Oval (pictured below) will be the main venue for speed skating. The new facility will include a 400 metre track and seating for about 7,600 spectators, according to this press release.

Figure skating, and its less graceful cousin, short track speed skating, will be held at the Pacific Coliseum. The replacement of 16,000 old seats at the Coliseum began in 2005, while other major capital upgrades such as improvements to concession and washroom facilities will occur over the next two years.

Hockey games will be held at GM Place (which will need to be modified in order to accomodate an international size ice rink) and the rebuilt UBC Winter Sports Complex (pictured below), which will also serve as a practice venue. Construction on the new T-Bird centre will begin this April, and be completed in two years' time.

For an overview of Olympic venues that will be built in Vancouver, visit the City of Vancouver's website here.

Gearing up for Vancouver 2010

With the Turin Winter Olympic Games now underway, the handoff to the Vancouver Games will be in just a few days. Following Olympic tradition, we'll be getting a few minutes to pitch our upcoming games during the closing ceremonies, with the help of the lovely miss Avril Lavigne: "Canada! - nyaa!" (per SNL's take on her).

Over the coming months, we'll be covering the development side of the story, as the construction of sports venues gets underway and the final design plans for the Athletes' villages are announced.

In the meantime, the official website for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Games has been redesigned, and is worth checking out.

We've got a couple old Olympics-related posts from our archives as well. The first makes note of the mini-controversy generated by our Olympic logo, while the second considers the adequacy of BC Place Stadium as the venue for the opening and closing ceremonies.

Speaking of the opening ceremonies, after watching the bang-up job that the Turin Games did on theirs, one can't help but have concerns that ours might not quite have the same cosmopolitan look and feel as the Italians were able to pull off.

While we do know that Vancouver has some very talented artists and designers, the proposed 'ring of fire' around BC Place Stadium doesn't instill confidence in the games' current planners. If they have their way, the standard, trite cliches of Canadiana will once again be trotted out for the world to see - beavers, mounties, hockey iconography and Celine Dion. In short, there's a danger that we'll come off looking like a bunch of provincial rubes.

Our best hope is that the people we've sent to Turin will come back with some ambitious ideas.

In the meantime, and on a more positive note, below is a link to a promotional video for the Vancouver Games. There's definitely flashes of talent in its production, giving us some optimism for the future.

Video: Inspired by Dreams (Vancouver Olympic Committee)

No Joking

For some time now, we've had our suspicions that Raffles on Robson is named after a clown. Not a very good clown, mind you. One of those lousy ones who shows up drunk at children's birthday parties and blows up animal balloons.

Pardon the digression. The main point here is to give a little info on the new Raffles on Robson building whose address is really 821 Cambie street. (But across Robson street from the soon-to-be revamped CBC complex).

According to the Development Permit Committee report (link to pdf), Raffles will be 23 storeys (238 feet) high, contain 145 spanking new condo units, and be built on a foundation of laughter and joy. It'll also be a mixed use building, with retail, office and restaurant space.

How about saying some nice things. Well, Raffles is close to the library, shopping on Robson, and its kind of near Yaletown.

Apparently bozo the clown has bought the penthouse.

Change the Channel

Although it's probably old news by now, it's worth mentioning that the CBC building bounded by West Georgia, Robson and Cambie streets is getting a condo makeover, thanks to Concord Pacific's TV Towers development.

CBC's Vancouver headquarters will get a renovation (to be completed by 2009), while two separate condo towers will be built on the property. The new buildings will come in at 21 storeys (208 feet) and 31 storeys (286 feet), and add another 450 condo units to the Vancouver market when construction is done by late 2008.

Judging by the developer's website, the project's marketing seems to be targeted at young people who have been raised in front of their television sets, many of whom suffer today from ADHD.

And when the marketers mean starter homes, they really mean starter - it's hard to imagine that anyone would retain their sanity after living for very long in one of the 439 square foot suites. Maybe they'll put the Fraggles in there.

According to the development board permit application (link to pdf), the CBC building renovation will create an "integrated newsroom" which will be visible from Georgia street. This will also provide the CBC newscasts with Vancouver backdrops, as seen from their studios.

On the Robson street side of the site, there will be public space, retail shops, and a "CBC presence" to allow for broadcasting opportunities.

One Last Look at Gateway

As public consultations for the Gateway Project proceed over the coming months, one of the better-organised opposition groups is the Liveable Region Coalition.

They've just published their thoughts on an alternative strategy to the Gateway Project, called the Alternatives Report (link to pdf), which primarily focuses on the expansion of Highway 1.

The report essentially advocates further investment in transit, emphasizing new bus routes and added capacity for Skytrain. Among some of its key suggestions:

• Increase Translink's bus fleet between regional town centres such as Surrey-Coquitlam, with 10 minute or better frequency of service.
• Accelerate the purchase of 44 new Skytrain cars to alleviate crowding on the Expo Line.
• Expand transit lanes on key highways, including priority access lanes to let buses on the highways faster.

It's interesting to note that 30% of Port Mann Bridge traffic enters at 152nd street in Surrey and 32% exits at the Cape Horn Interchange, heading into the Tri-Cities area. Perhaps this would make a light rail connection from Surrey to Coquitlam's new Evergreen Line a viable alternative in the future.

The Liveable Region Coalition recommends improved bus service between Surrey and the Tri-Cities area instead, as there currently isn't any service across the Port Mann Bridge.

One major criticism of this proposal, however, is the fact that many people simply won't ride the bus. Even with improved frequency of service and direct links (reduced transfers), many of us simply prefer to stay in our cars.

So...what's the best alternative - improve bus service, widen the highway, or extend Skytrain? We'll likely wind up with a combination of all three, with the former occurring in the short term, and the latter being built over the long term.

More on the Gateway Project

The authors of the Gateway Project have been smart to tie multiple transportation initiatives into a single broad package. By combining the good with the bad (or, at least controversial), there's a wider scope for negotiation between different municipalities and a better chance of pushing the entire package through.

Of course, it simply makes sense to consider the lower mainland's transportation system as a whole, since changes in one area will invariably affect other municipalities as well.

Among some of the positive aspects of the project: the south Fraser river perimeter road is indeed necessary for accommodating the increased truck traffic related to Deltaport, the CN intermodal yards and the US border. This will lead to increased container traffic moving through Vancouver ports, which translates into more jobs and growth.

The north Fraser perimeter road should also help with the congestion around the New Westminster area, and provide better connections to Pitt Meadows and Maple Ridge.

Furthermore, the new Pitt River Bridge foundation (bridge pictured below) will be built in such a way that it could accommodate light rail (Skytrain) in the future. The same will be the case for the Port Mann twin.

It's interesting to note however, that the creation of a Skytrain route along the Highway 1 corridor had been considered, but it was scrapped because there aren't enough regional town centres along that particular route. It's not clear whether commuter rail, similar to the Westcoast Express was considered as well.

The province also considered the idea of not twinning the Port Mann Bridge, but simply putting a toll on all traffic, as a means of reducing demand. According to the Gateway Project report (link to pdf), to create such a disincentive would require tolls to be as high as $5 to $8 per trip. Futhermore, most rerouted traffic would simply wind up diverting to the already-choked Patullo Bridge, which would remain free.