May 6, 2021

Downtown Waterfront Visionaries – Mary Pynenburg

From the Downtown Waterfront Working Group:

Simon Fraser University, Vancouver campus, recently hosted two significant and destined-to-be-influential dialogues on the future of the Vancouver Downtown Waterfront, titled “The Downtown Waterfront: Visionaries and Implementers”.

 In the second session, held April 29, 2021, Mary Pynenburg* presented a comprehensive “how to” on implementing major urban revitalization projects.  

“What a difference a few decades can make – False Creek in 1981 v 2021 “

 

Why these two images?

Our downtown waterfront site is in many respects the last (and hopefully not missing) piece of an important urban puzzle.

My thoughts on urban design implementation for a site like this:

Political will at a variety of levels – city, region, province federal, including key landowners like Port, Railways, Translink, Cadillac Fairview.

Vision – not just words (we are not poets); pictures are easier and ‘worth a thousand words.’

You may recall the phrase from Seven Habits of Highly Effective People: “Begin with the end in mind” . Based on my experience with large urban redevelopment projects like Port Royal, Woodlands and Terry Hughes Lands in New Westminster, I suggest creating a landscape plan focusing on green space and public realm. Later, we set up a development permit area with design guidelines, with covenant registered on title. In my mind, we need a strong public realm like a continuous bike /walkway, viewpoints and gathering places. What’s essential? Public access and public safety and connectivity .

Simply stated, my overarching principle for the urban design of this site is that it should be equal or better than western harbourfront at Coal Harbour. Many design solutions /options can be explored within this broad parameter (I suggest seeking out award-winning examples/ best practices. For example, see the Waterfront Center.)

Define what’s essential and what is ‘if possible’ or optional – in other words ‘must have” or ‘nice to have.’  For example, grade down to water’s edge, as Norm Hotson suggested in the last session, is a worthy goal but is it ‘must have’ or simply “nice to have”?

What is the frame for the spectrum of issues, what are you wanting to avoid aside from the worst of urban ugliness (fire, floods, earthquakes, toxic rail shipments)?

Other considerations/filters: Indigenous reconciliation, climate change, history/heritage , tourism, social equity.

Devise a framework of governing urban design principles:

  • Rebuild community by replacing sprawl with compact, human scale urban fabric
  • Recognize and combat the negative impact of our built environment on physical, social and mental health
  • Adopt planning and urban design decisions that will make our cities and suburbs more livable for children, elders and the poor 
  • Emphasize ethical land use patterns to reduce extreme economic disparities
  • Strengthen compact urban neighborhoods to maintain diversity of ethnic and cultural identity
  • Build multifunctional town squares that, like the ancient agora or medieval marketplace, can regenerate civic engagement and democratic participation.” Reference Liveable Cities.

Build Public Support – driven by pictures and plain /powerful words (i.e. good communication) not numbers . Don’t lead by engineering or accounting. If you want a city designed by engineers or accountants you may find yourself living in an Industrial park – it does its job in the cheapest and durable way but often dismally unattractive and the public realm is often missing. It’s okay to meet in private but report out to the public at regular intervals. No NDA’s !

Resources – make a start with seed funding (eg need a bit of water to prime the pump).  Start raising public awareness with a vision or visioning process or a charette or an international design competition.

Governance/Team-building – create a working task group. It may evolve into something more (eg New Westminster Waterfront Development Corporation or a development agreement(s) like those that achieved Vancouver’s western downtown waterfront).

Go forth & Multiply – identify partners and their interests / motivations.  Look for win/win situations and early wins. Be creative.  If you can’t make a development fit/work here, transfer rights or trade land. If a private owner can’t make money, maybe they can donate the land and take a tax write-off.

Don’t reinvent the wheel: Assemble existing studies/ reports – avoid ‘analysis paralysis.’  (All background studies should be available to public; otherwise the public will believe that nothing worthwhile has been achieved in last five or more years. Again, no NDA’s!)

Create Work plan/implementation strategy/timeline – identify steps and work incrementally.  Doing nothing and waiting for the perfect time, perfect partner is not a good strategy . Perfection can be the enemy of the good. Eighty percent of something is better than 100% of nothing.

Meet team regularly – work with key partners and work around obstacles.

Kaizen = Japanese for Continuous Improvement (Adjust as needed).  The pandemic has taught us many lessons, including humility about making plans. Project management key factors are Time /Cost/Design Quality . Expect the unexpected.  Workable mechanisms for readily resolving dispute(s) and expanding/ contracting as needed.

Key stumbling block. Who pays? – you, you or you.  (Government = you as a taxpayer, user fees.  Private sector = you as a consumer, user fees.  You as a volunteer . Or you as some combination). Private investment will follow . Why? ‘Time is money’ and the private sector cannot waste time or money on repeated failure. Why is the train station not in public hands or owned by a crown corporation? Important infrastructure like a transit hub should have public investment. (The stats from last session are staggering: 100,000 people a day; many millions of passengers a year, many modes of transport.)  I think these assets should be public. But even in private hands, do not forget all multimodal trips begin and end with people.  There is always a public realm.

What is Success? – you may know the quote “success is falling down seven times but getting up eight.”  But that may be better suited to perseverance and eventual success of medieval church builders. It all seems so complicated – so many players, so much money, so many issues. Even the question “what is good urban design?” seems too complicated. “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder” and there are many beholders in this case: owners residents and don’t forget visitors.

How in the end will we even know what is successful urban design?  The short answer is “a people place” and Vancouver has many. Granville island, False Creek seawall and Coal Harbor are all good examples.

If that all sounds too daunting and you are still wondering, ‘Can we do this?’ – Yes, we can . Vancouver has done it before as my original photos showed.  Why not this time?

But let’s not wait another five years to start – or worse, 30 years to finish.

Take a positive first step, even it’s a small one:

  • Follow our Downtown Waterfront Working Group Facebook page.
  • Share an article about this site on social media.  Amplify the message.
  • Speak out and contact your neighbourhood association, your city council, your MLA or your MP and tell them this site is important to you and your community.

____________________

*Mary Pynenburg is a consultant, former Director of planning, Kelowna and New Westminster, and a member of the Downtown Waterfront Working Group.

 

 

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