Minneapolis writer Sam Newberg calls himself “Joe Urban.” For good reason: he loves looking at cities and making observations (kinda like a lot of the people who read Price Tags). He has his own site here.
Sam dropped by Vancouver for a day or two (not long enough) on his way to Seattle, but that was at least enough time to take him on a walking tour through the West End and Coal Harbour. He made it to Yaletown and Granville Island the next day – and reports on it all here.
An excerpt:
The most striking thing is the attention paid to the quality of the urban environment. Some things are quite simple. Parking is either on-street or underground, not in surface parking lots. Streets are lined with trees. No blank walls – in fact, buildings are required to have numerous entrances from the sidewalk and even high-rises have rowhomes facing sidewalks. Commercial corridors are lines with shops, have few gaps and fewer parking lots, are relatively uniform in height, no more than two stories, and stores are required to have awnings so Vancouverites don’t need an umbrella. How civil!
Lots of pics here.
Joe Urban should take a walk through our “quaint and historic” downtown east side…