Last week, the North Shore News ran this:
TO many West Vancouver seniors, the recent closure of the Ambleside Safeway marks the loss not only of a badly needed place to buy groceries, but of a community institution.
The venerable supermarket on Marine Drive and 16th Street (map here), one of several large grocery stores facing redevelopment on the North Shore, shut its doors for good last weekend to make way for a refurbished facility from property owner H.Y. Louie Ltd. …
Some are even casting a wary eye at the Save-on-Foods on Marine Drive in North Vancouver, which sits on a strip of land quickly filling with condos – although no plans have been announced for changes to that property.
But residents shouldn’t worry about getting caught in what urban planners call a “food desert” – a neighbourhood with no close access to adequate grocery shopping, according to Gordon Price, director of Simon Fraser University’s city program. While temporary closures may happen, the grocery industry is simply changing.
Big-box-style supermarkets surrounded by parking lots, which came into vogue in the 1950’s and 60’s, are simply on the way out as cities densify and try to encourage residents to drive less, Price said.
A few days later, this email from Walter Cicha:
Dear Mr. Price,
… In a North Shore News article covering the Safeway story, you tell the readers not to worry about “food deserts” popping up on the North Shore, because this is all only part of a trend to eliminate large food stores that are surrounded by parking lots, to discourage shoppers from driving. I guess you are implying that many smaller food shops with little or no parking will replace them… Are we the North Shore residents supposed to be happy about this?
My wife takes care of the food shopping for our West Vancouver family and walks to the IGA Marketplace on Marine and 25th to do so (with two pre-schoolers in tow). She is nearly alone in doing so. She rarely if ever sees other shoppers walking down the street with IGA shopping bags, nor are there any bike racks full of parked bicycles surrounding the store. Perhaps the odd shopper takes the bus to do their grocery shopping, I don’t know…
However, the fact is that the vast majority of food shoppers at the IGA drive there, and prefer to do so. Even in densely packed Europe, where we visit regularly, there are large “box-style” food stores with with large parking lots surrounding them. Americans invented this style in the 1950s and Canadians and then Europeans adopted it, and at least in North America it has worked just fine for over half a century. I am in no way condoning urban sprawl, but to take away highly functional and appreciated food stores and their lots so that some developers can make a financial killing splitting them up into smaller parcels is borderline criminal. Yet this is exactly what is happening on the North Shore, and throughout other parts of our loveIy metropolitan region. I only wish that more residents were vocal in their opposition to this quality of life reducing trend.
It is shameful what is happening in Greater Vancouver as regards property development (the food store trend is just one example), and the best of our residents are consequently gradually being driven away… I shudder to think about the Vancouver of the future.
I wrote back … but before I post my remarks, how would you respond?
Look around at other supermarket redevelopments that have already happened. Parking doesn’t have to go away, it can just go underground. The big box stores on Cambie and 7th Ave are a good example. If the residents of West Vancouver want to make sure parking will remain, they should just pressure the local council to require underground parking in any new development.
As the North Shore of Vancouver Grows, Big Box stores like Safeway will see a slow death. There is simply not enough space in North Vancouver to accommodate stores that use up more than half of their land for parking. Experiences in the United States have shown that this model generates fewer tax dollars for the city for the land it sits on, this creates a car centered culture of urban sprawl, and the city’s that are dotted with big box stores will deteriorate within time. This is not the direction that North Vancouver should aim toward.
Though currently many customers of the IGA use their motor vehicles to travel to there, I must praise your efforts to travel there by foot. Within time, as Ambleside grows and densifies, the majority of customers will switch to other modes like you have. The big Box style store simply does not fit the 21st century City.
In the West End, though many may have traveled to the Safeway by auto a few decades ago, a dramatic shift has taken place. The West End of Vancouver is now a pleasant place to live in without a motor vehicle. Many of the shoppers at the Safeway walk and bike rather than drive.
So my answer is to give it time, and the shift to a more walkable neighborhood will take place.
I think you’re wrong that big-box supermarkets are disappearing. The mixed-use big-box supermarket form is appearing in regional town centres, places like Central Lonsdale, South Cambie, and Downtown Vancouver. The big-box-in-a-massive-parking-lot form is still appearing outside the regional town centres, places like Marine Drive in North Vancouver, Southwest Marine Drive in Vancouver, and Queensborough in New Westminster.
New big boxes are being built on land zoned for light industry or highway-oriented retail. The new PriceMart on Marine Drive, for example, was built only after rezoning to mixed use was rejected. A new Canadian Tire is being built on Southwest Marine Drive. Because land that is zoned for highway-oriented retail is worth much less than land zoned for residential or mixed uses, the construction of new big-box supermarkets in massive parking lots remains relatively affordable.
These massive big-box supermarkets will continue to be built as long as there are highway-oriented retail zones.
I think Gordon’s point is that many municipalities no longer see the value of highway-oriented retail zones. As Kyle (above you in the thread) points out, these zones just don’t bring in enough tax revenue per unit of land.
More on food deserts at http://www.fooddeserts.org
I assume the above IGA’s parking is free.
Although underground parking is expensive for the developer, IMO it would be feasible to incorporate it into developments if you charge for it. Walter’s family can still drive there and park easily if they want to, but would now have to pay for the convienience. It would also make them further contemplate getting to the store by non-car methods when it is less of a burden, let’s say when his kids are older.
although I am not sure if that is the answer he is looking for…
When I think about food desserts and grocery stores surrounded by acres of parking lots, I am reminded of the acerbic James Howard Kunstler’s term: “The Geography of Nowhere”. This kind of development is not only economically wasteful and less sustainable — it’s boring and not worth remembering. Towns end up building garish “cartoon geography” like giant hockey sticks on the side of their highways in order to make their towns remotely distinctive. Architecturally, a highway-oriented retail zone is about as forgettable as it gets.
An old friend* sent this to the NS News, recalling the hardship his elderly mother faced when the last grocery store in “downtown Kerrisdale”, a small IGA, closed. An unintended consequence of Safeway having to divest some of its locations (Broadway/Maple, 41st Dunbar) when it took over Woodward’s Food Floors.
http://www.nsnews.com/news/Hardship+store+seniors+after+Safeway+closure/6846725/story.html
* How old? I met Derek when our blog host was active with C.R.O.W.E. Confidential to former Solicitor General Bob Kaplan., restaurants continue to thrive in the West End.
Broadway and Maple is demolished, 70th and Granville has been modified and faces demolition, 4th and Alma long gone,Kingsway and Knight long gone, 4th and Vine, 10th and Sasamat remodeled 20 years ago. The Marina syte Safeway, once ubiquitous, now endangered, Last sighted in Burquitlam, unlikely to last much longer http://goo.gl/maps/HGu4
I’m pretty sure once the Evergreen reaches out there that Safeway is a gonner too.
The Safeway at 70th & Granville will return in the new mixed use development. They’ll be using some bent wood beams as decoration in tribute to the older iconic roof form.
At 4th & Alma, there’s a No Frills at Jericho Village (there’s also a few newly opened “No Frills” (franchises supplied by Loblaws) around town (small to moderate in size) and they’re the best for low-priced groceries (they also have free parking).
Kingsway & Knight – a PriceSmart Foods opened in the new mixed use project.
Who knows what North Vnacouver was thinking when it approved the strip mall style Price Smart Foods (and adjacent Thrifty Foods and Bed, Bath & Beyond) on Marine Drive.
The new Canadian Tire redevelopment at Kingsway and Gladstone (closing out sale on now!) will apparently have space for a food store (as well as 3 midrise condo towers).
Safeways are dying largely because they are at the expensive end of grocery stores without the high level service seen at trendier stores like Whole Foods or Urban Fare. Ditto for Save-on-Foods.
Any other large grocery store on a main shopping strip with a surface parking lot will likely be redeveloped as well (as noted – 4th & Vine, 10th & Sasamat and Burquitlam, plus Broadway & Commercial). There’s even rumours of Stong’s on Dunbar being redeveloped.
I think big box Safeways are still happening. But for West Vancouver Ambleside Safeway and North Vancouver Lonsadale Safeway those are on a lease. The lease ran up and HY Louie did not want to extend our lease. The same thing will happen with North Vancouver Safeway Lonsdale. Burquitlam is only getting remodled and same with 70 Granville. And you are wrong about 4th and Vine Safeway , 10 th and Sasamat, plus Broadway6 and Commerical. Those three Safeways are not closing down they already are remodeled in certain ways. But, for West Vancouver Amblesdide Safeway and Lonsadale Safeway in North Vancouver we leased our property 25 years ago. I know because I work for Safeway that closed down.