Back in February 2005, Sun columnist Trevor Boddy wondered aloud whether Vancouver might soon be architecturally finished:
"...the complete development of all highrise sites on the downtown peninsula is already within sight. More than most of us realize, downtown Vancouver got architecturally 'finished' over the past several years, by and large.
"Decades, maybe centuries from now, historians will tour Downtown South, Coal Harbour, Concord Pacific, even our core downtown and be amazed to find cornerstone after cornerstone bearing dates reading '2003', '2004', and '2005'."
Although his prediction might have been a little premature, Boddy does raise an interesting point about the most recent building boom in Vancouver - the current period, say from 2003-2010, will quite possibly be seen as a Golden Age of sorts, when much of Vancouver's ultimate form was substantially built out.
As for the question of whether downtown Vancouver is architecturally finished, we'd be willing to bet that there are some further touches still to come, not least of which will include the new Vancouver Art Gallery, the proposed Dalai Lama Centre, and possibly a few other suprises.
Bob Rennie, among others, would probably argue that the future of development lies east - towards his Woodwards project, and beyond. There's also the potential to develop some of the Gastown Waterfront lands with mid- to low-rise buildings, if issues related to the railyards can be sorted out.
Others would add that there are still plenty of empty parking lots in the Downtown South neighbourhood that could be built up, while Concord Pacific has yet to unveil plans for its North False Creek development.
And finally, we can always tear down old buildings, as one reader recently suggested we do with the Sears building.
It's far from 'finished'. There's plenty of crappy 3 story buildings all over the place.... the guy is deluded.
Posted by: Mark | Monday, January 08, 2007 at 12:06 PM