Sun writer Frances Bula has a blog – City States – where she can put pieces that don’t make it into the paper. (Which raises the question, why not? In cities that have papers which focus more on local issues and urban development, they would.)
However, in the case of her piece on Downtown South, The Sun gave it good play.
Vancouver’s new mini-Manhattan is here
I have a feature in tomorrow’s paper on a downtown neighbourhood that no one ever talks much about, even though everyone who comes to the central city drives through it. It’s just 34 blocks in total, but it will soon be home to 24,000 people.
Downtown South is fascinating because it’s a living laboratory that shows how Vancouver’s “Living First” model for a residential downtown works outside of the carefully sculpted megaprojects in Coal Harbour and False Creek North.
It’s home to more regular Vancouver folks and more young people than the new projects, but it’s also suffering from the pressure of success. Developers have gone crazy in the area, putting up towers faster than the city can nail down a little bit of space for parks or daycares.
“But despite the projections of growth, the province reduced the size of Elsie Roy before it was built, Denike said.
“We had originally proposed for that school to be…in excess of 400 students for Elsie Roy. The government cut that back to about 280,” he said.
“They wanted to see the students there before we could get the spaces…The result of that is [what] we’re seeing today.”
The board currently has a site ready for a new school in nearby False Creek, but that is also waiting for provincial approval and funding, Denike said.”
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2008/01/11/bc-provincenotbuildingschools.html
Apparently the Dorothy Lam Daycare gives priority to Concord Pacific residents, so that means that downtown south are effectively left out.