Marine Gateway up close: First Impressions
Text and images by Mike Klassen
Marine Gateway is the very model of the highly-touted TOD (transit-oriented development) and one which the City of Vancouver and development community have a stake in its success.
In preparation for a recent Heritage Vancouver talk about shaping our neighbourhoods, I decided to make a quick morning stop at Marine Gateway. To be fair, the place was extremely quiet as some businesses such as the Cineplex had not opened yet.
I arrived via the underground parking lot elevator which exits on to Marine Drive. A quick left turn out of the elevator took me past a large air duct toward the central square shopping area. Right there I was walloped by the smell of rotting garbage being blown up from the basement. I surmised that perhaps a garbage bin had been parked too close to the intake in the garage – something I hope that is easily rectifiable as it makes for an unpleasant sensory impression.
The “square” as I will call it features a long plaza that opens north to the busy Marine Drive intersection and looks toward newer towers — many of which are rental.
The surface of the square features many nice touches, such as cast metal grates with words stencilled into them. The covered walkway on the east side of the square is made of wooden planks, which remind me a bit of walking in Steveston’s old cannery district with its restaurants and ice cream joints. It’s a nice touch and it will be interesting to see how this surface is maintained over the long term.
The use of transparent glass awnings provide both weather protection for much of the space, but also allow a clear view up toward the surrounding buildings. People in offices to the east and residences to the west both would have a clear view of the square below too, making the area more inviting and safe.
There are many unoccupied retail spaces in the development, but one presumes that it will be a matter of time before they are filled. Just like with Olympic Village, it took a few brave business proprietors to be the first ones in, with the rest of the spaces eventually being leased.
There are a few “anchor tenants” already in place. The T&T Supermarket is geared toward Vancouver’s Chinese community (a prominent part of south Vancouver’s population). The Cineplex theatre will make MG a destination for movie-goers who love the big-screen surround-sound experience. There’s a English pub-style eatery (with an intriguing outdoor patio that hangs over the bus loop). There are two banks, a dentist’s office, a government liquor store, and a Winner’s clothing store. The latter is very much geared to low-to-middle income shoppers, many of whom live in nearby homes and apartments.
From a distance Marine Gateway has a cool aquamarine hue from the glass and metal finish of the building exteriors. Up close in the square there is an attempt to make it seem more warm, with some wood finishes and orange-coloured glass along the west balcony.
The plaza features raised garden beds with water percolating in them. Each bed has a cast metal plaque with the name of a tributary of the Fraser River, and a sort of homage to BC’s salmon run is embedded beside each. Not sure how much shoppers will engage on these details, but they are distinctive at least.
Marine Gateway certainly garnered its share of controversy for the urban design, the location on the edge of our industrial land base, and its displacement of existing low rental housing. It is definitely a “work in progress” but one that makes a respectable first impression. Though I did not try that hard I was surprised that I did not intuitively know how to get to the Canada Line station from the square. Perhaps I just missed the signage.
In the long run I think the city and the developers must give some consideration to how to bridge the intersection at Marine and Cambie, which is always massively busy and not at all pedestrian or bike friendly. It will make the difference in the success of the development as a whole.
In fairness, Marine Gateway includes rental, market residential, office, retail, etc. There’s a Steve Nash Fitness Gym, Starbucks, Tim Hortons, 3 banks, Subway, a Thai restaurant, Shoppers Drug Mart, etc. The Cineplex also includes a separate adjoining VIP theatre, with a bar and lounge. The office building looks out over a green terrace roof above the east retail volume.
There’s also a city of Vancouver bike lockup. The buildings are LEED gold and the entire operation runs off of a massive district-energy system.
Were there people there? There are developments I thought were poorly done until I was forced to revise my opinion by evidence that others liked them; others that looked good to me have failed to achieve popularity. I see a handful of people in your photos, but I get the sense the place is fairly deserted. Understandably so if most of the shops are unoccupied (and it matters when you visited), but maybe one can get an impression nevertheless (e.g. were there people at the pub).
Even in busy places, some spaces or features simply fail; people go there because they have business, but no-one wants to spend time. It seems to me that even a person or two enjoying a bench in an otherwise deserted new development gives some indication that it’s a place where others might like to be.
There is a similar development in my neighbourhood (Solo). Lougheed would seem to be a miserable street to front, and the retailers look as though they might be no more interesting than those in the echoing silence of Madison Centre across the street. When I have visited it has indeed been quiet. But lunchtime crowds at Whole Foods, the occasional benched pedestrian or cyclist on the separated bike track (all of one block long) suggest it may just be a matter of time.
you mention in the opening sentence that the development was “highly touted” and leaders “having a stake in its success” and then go on to give your assessment. this review doesn’t seem very fair. evidence of recent rainfall, threatening clouds, a visit at that brief moment when a development has finished but anchors not open yet, etc.
why post this now, when today’s reality is worlds different? your talk was june 15, after everything had opened. a more interesting approach would be to have gone back in the week or two before and documented the transformation. maybe traveling by SkyTrain this time to really experience the T in TOD.
disappointing
Couple of mistakes in there..
– the newer towers to the north across Marine Drive are “MC2” which are market condos.
– Marine Gateway was built entirely on the former ICBC inspection station site – so there was no displacement of “low rental housing” (you are thinking of the W1 project across Marine Drive).
I wouldn’t necessarily say Winners is for the “low to middle” income market. Some of their stuff can be pretty pricey. It’s not low income in the same way that Wal-Mart is lower end. Winners is more middle income and “aspirational” shoppers. i.e. you can sometimes find $250 men’s Ferragamo shoes in there.
“Marine Gateway is the very model of the highly-touted TOD…” Urch. Brakes. Stop right there. Without getting into the specifics of this development, it is just one site integrated beside the station. TOD is so much more than a 15 second walk from the station – its a walkable radius of up to 15 minutes. One good thing has been concentration of density at the station (versus other Canada Line stations that receive virtually the same density as locations along Cambie that are a good distance walk to a station), but the follow-up with surrounding sites is key.
Some of those photos read as an exact carbon copy of the development south of Lougheed between Willingdon and Rosser (e.g. the shopping corridor, exterior escalators, and general look/feel detailing).
The City planed expansion. Concord is redeveloping Marine Gardens to the north east. The expansion south will also be big.
Did the Marine Gateway project “displace(d) existing low rental housing”? I am not aware of that. I believe it displaced an old ICBC Claim Centre and some parking. It provided new market rental housing.
To be clear, I meant across the street — in the next phase of MG. Thanks for pointing that out.
I saw Marine and Cambie as a huge barrier long before the Canada Line was built. I argued with the designers that all the stations should have been designed with multiple entrances, but was shot down. The Marine station should have been built over the intersection with entrances on both the north and south sides so passengers heading to/from the station wouldn’t have had to cross a very wide intersection with a complex multi-phase signal system.
Vancouver City Council was unfortunately complicit in this crime against transit users. They continue to insist that pedestrians cross streets on the surface. I’m sure it’s about calming traffic, but sometimes putting the interest of pedestrians first means building them a physically separated pathway. Allowing a rapid transit station to span a roadway as was done in the 1980s (Main, Broadway, Joyce) just makes sense, especially when massive redevelopment is envisioned that will bring thousands of additional pedestrians to the location.
That’s one thing I don’t like about some of the Skytrain stations. There’s only one entrance. I heard that it was some sort of security reason.
Wouldn’t it be great for example to be able to enter the Broadway-City Hall station from north of Broadway?
I heard from someone that the cycling and walking path on the Canada Line bridge originally was designed to continue north and touch down north of Marine Drive but that part was cut to save money. That would have been great. Especially if it had a Skytrain entrance in it.
There is a “knock-out” panel on the west side of the mezzanine at Broadway-City Hall Station for a pedestrian tunnel to the M-Line extension and/or to the north side of Broadway. There is also provision for a small entrance area in the Crossroads building that is currently used as retail until the tunnel is built.
But a narrow pedestrian tunnel is also considered a safety risk (that’s why the pedestrian tunnel from Stadium Station under Beatty St. was closed and filled with sand).
Holy cow is that what that weird thing is in the front yard of the AMEC building? I had been wondering for years.
Narrow tunnels will definitely not meet the criteria for a high-capacity hub station at Broadway / Cambie. The city owns the entire block on the south side of Broadway and may be keeping it in the land bank for a future city hall complex. It makes sense to demolish the existing buildings early in the subway construction schedule and recycle the timbers, steel and studs, and use the site as the staging yard and excavation access for a new station. By excavating and removing materials sideways, the station box pit can be temporarily bridged over during construction.
The box can be designed to modern standards, including a 150m centre platform with a very wide mezzanine set crosswise overhead to allow access from both sides of Broadway, or even all four corners of the station. I suggest the box or larger pedestrian tunnels could also extend to the west side of Cambie to allow access to the station from all corners of the intersection, therein getting all subway-oriented pedestrian circulation off the street.
This is the way it should be done, and should by no means be cheapened like the Canada Line. Ease of access from the surface to the platform is essential, as is providing generous circulation space. And that means building the subway under Broadway, not a block away under 10th Ave.
The concept of a ped/bike path on Canada Line Bridge was originally conceived as continuing to the north side of Marine Drive. Cost would have been $10 million but senior TransLink staff recommended against it. VACC (now HUB) campaigned in support of the ped/bike deck for the bridge and convinced the TransLink board to support this. Unfortunately, the contract had already been signed with the private partner, so the same $10 million could only pay for what we see today. CoV would probably be happy to build the extension to Marine Drive if someone gave them the $10 million to do this.
With regard to station entrances, there is an emergency exit for the Oakridge/41st station at the SE corner of 41st and Cambie which could be converted to a real station entrance. There may also be the possibility of access from NE corner of the intersection.
Yes very unusual. All European or New York subway stations have multiple entrances, 2 at least and mainly 4, on either side, to both sides to the street each.
The only reason I can think of is cost.
Canada Line already has trains & stations that are too short.
Much like the missing subway in the plans for the North Shore it shows the “vision” of our enlightened politicians & planners. They need to get out more and see the world.
Interesting, David. When the two Marine Gardens towers and the other one on the NW corner are up there will be many more people to get across the road. The traffic will also increase, even if only for service vehicles. Did you get the impression that traffic volume is not important and the city just want to slow it all down?
This is ugly architecture at its finest. From the street view it has trashed the idea of urban design and urban landscape For a starter the transit line should have gone under Marine Drive. Visually that station is brutal, lacks any context with the neighbourhood. It cannot even be landscaped. It epitomizes the worst of transit stations hoovering above the street like an oversized freeway exit ramp with no consideration for the street view. And then the building expands upon this distopia recalling the massive British social housing urban disasters of the 60’s. JMHO.
The Cambie and Marine intersection is a nightmare. Whoever designed the whole station complex should be taken out behind the woodshed. The ridiculously narrow sidewalks beside a choked Cambie South of Marine, the incredibly awkward turn busses have to make onto westbound Marine, along with the huge trucks from the transfer station. Translink and the City were basically using pedestrians as cannon fodder by trying to prove a point that the evil car shouldn’t be accommodated.
You are almost certainly correct, Bob. I took the train to meet a driver on a commercial job just recently. There’s nowhere to meet. The traffic was crawling with about five vehicles getting through the northbound Cambie signal at a time. Other pedestrians and drivers were unable to get in and out so they were all over the alley too.
This is just the start. The Northwest main condo tower is 31 floors, the Marine Gardens complex is 27 and 21 floors too. Then there’s the massive redevelopment of the second phase to the south. Docksteader is leaving and the whole site is going to be developed along the same line.
There must be a plan to remove the buildings along the west side of Cambie, south of Marine, then expand the road to accommodate the traffic.
The pedestrians scrambling across the street from these four new buildings alone will make this an interesting intersection.
How many of these units are occupied ? How many units are vacant and will be hit by the Mayor’s new vacancy tax ?
What if someone is off visiting Portland to check out their great bike programme and a city occupancy-checker knocks on the door, will they get a non-occupancy bill?
Perhaps we’ll all have motion sensors installed in our homes and city staff will monitor movements, then send a bill to the owner if nothing inside moves.
What if I buy a rental suite and my tenant takes a vacation in Europe for the whole summer. Will I get non-occupancy bill?
If I hop on a flight to Toronto will my airline be obliged to inform the city that I’m heading out of town?
Will my friends have to sell their summer cottage because they might take too many weekends away?
Indeed.
The occupancy tax is a stupid idea which is very hard to enforce. A heater & a few lights on a timer coupled with a robot vacuum cleaner will create movement, noise, lights and power consumption.
Is a moving robot enough proof of “occupancy” ? Or a monthly visit by a ” occupant for hire ” for $65 ?
Better would a far higher land transfer tax – say 15-25% – on non-resident owned single family houses, triple the property taxes and strict enforcement of taxes when sold with a gain. Maybe half these taxes for condos.
At least the Mayor is forcing the utterly disinterested provincial and government to think and act.
And federal government …
Perhaps the editor of this post can add the word “federal” then remove this editorial typo comment.