Tag: Port of Vancouver

Situated between Canada Place and the Centerm Terminal at Centennial Pier sits Crab Park at Portside. This piece of beachfront with an interesting history provides locals with rare public waterfront access along the south shore of Burrard Inlet.

On Sunday afternoon Crab Park was visited by an array of locals looking to soak up the last of the summer sun. A young couple let their black Labrador off his leash. He raced across the dog park to a group of children happily playing. On the other side of the field an impromptu soccer game amongst a group of twenty-somethings kicked off. An elderly gentleman explored the shoreline. He settled on a location and set his line. Crab Park is a dubious fishing ground and after an hour the old man had nothing to show for his efforts.

Crab park offers a little bit of everything to anyone lucky enough to find it. It is fitting that luck would bring people here since the early inhabitants of Burrard Inlet knew the location originally as Luckylucky, the Native phrase for Grove of Beautiful Trees. In the early 1980s, a group called Create a Real Available Beach, or CRAB, led by Downtown Eastside activist Don Larson, lobbied for the creation of the idyllic waterfront park, which was finally opened in 1986. It wasn’t until 2004 that the name was officially changed to CRAB Park at Portside.

Not many people come to the park, those that do cross the bridge at the north end of Main Street. On Sunday afternoon as the sun set a mild age couple strolled across the bridge and stopped to read the plaque dedicated to the “On to Ottawa Trek.” On June 3, 1935, in the middle of the Great Depression, the location was the starting point of a worker movement that would eventually contribute to the downfall of Prime Minister R.B. Bennett’s Conservative Government.

The park retains a strong connection to the community. A large boulder rests along the edge of the path beside the beach. It is a memorial to the women murdered in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. It was dedicated on July 29, 1997. Fresh flowers and handwritten notes are still left around the base of the memorial. The inscription makes special mention of the “native aboriginal women,” who were the primary demographic of the murdered women. The memorial is a sobering landmark and a reminder that not far from the park is Canada’s most socially troubled postal code.

Crab Park users are worried their secret oasis will not last much longer. The rapid gentrification of Gastown, and the potential development of the adjacent land to the west of the park has led to plans for a pedestrian greenway, including an overpass above the CPR rail yards to connect the north end of Carrall Street with the sea wall and Crab Park. The once peaceful park will not be so quiet once the rest of Vancouver finds out about it.

It was a sad day in North Vancouver when the Versatile Pacific Shipyards shut down. The shipyard opened by the Wallace family in 1906 built 379 vessels before being closed in 1992. During its peak the shipyard was the largest in BC and a vital part of the local community. Workers applied their trade building tugs and barges for the lumber industry, supply ships for both World Wars, ferries for BC’s coastal waters, and icebreakers for Canada’s Arctic. Renamed first in 1921 the Wallace Shipyard became the Burrard Dry Dock Company; then in 1985 became the Versatile Pacific Shipyards. The old shipyard has now been transformed into the Shipyard Historic Precinct. It sits half developed, a prime piece of waterfront real estate awaiting urban gentrification. The development of the area was stalled when the provincial government pulled funding from a proposed National Maritime Centre. Now local residents are unsure what their community will look like in the next five years.

Currently the Shipyard Historic Precinct contains the Pinnacle Hotel, Atrium Condos (with three more condo buildings planned), Shipbuilder Square, and 71,000 sq. ft. of waiting space. At the north end, propped up on a huge cement stand, sits the 80 ft. tall stern of the HMS Flamborough Head. Covered in white tarps it waits to be integrated into the new development. The stern section was to be used as the entrance to the National Maritime Centre before plans for the Centre were cancelled.

Surrounding Shipbuilder Square sit many of the old shipyard buildings, which are beautifully refurbished but remain empty. An old crane looms above. Moved and freshly painted in its original yellow, it stands in contrast to its rusting contemporaries still in use next-door at the Vancouver Drydock. The businesses that will move into the space remain a mystery and local residents like, Arlene Simpson, are getting frustrated that plans to complete the area’s development have stalled.

Simpson, who lives across the street from the stern of the HMS Flamborough Head, moved to lower Lonsdale with her husband five years ago. She has witnessed first hand the development of the old shipyard and now enjoys taking walks along the seawall and pier to snap pictures of the changing area and the passing cruise ships in the inner harbour. She was excited about the development of the Shipyard Historic Precinct including the National Maritime Centre. The provincial government’s decision to cancel promised financial contributions frustrates Arlene, as does the municipal government’s inability to approve a suitable alternative. “We were told that we would have this great place in the community and that all these buildings would be used for a market like Granville Island,” she said.

Local residents are growing impatient with the lack of progress. Many of them sit around the beautiful refurbished seawall and stare into the empty buildings. A new digital clock beside one of the buildings remains the only indication that any progress is being made.