As renovations continue on the venerable art-deco themed 1932-era Burrard Street Bridge, here is an architectural detail of the new sidewalk lighting. To me, these are lovely and stylish echoes of other details on the original bridge structure. And so are the pillars they rest on.
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Sadly, as stylish as these lights are, judging by the picture, they seem to be totally against the outdoor lighting bylaws recently adopted by council, relating to achieving “dark skies” by eliminating stray light.
This is a most appropriate response to a Class A heritage structure. Architectural concrete is very difficult to do at the best of times. The luminaires are gorgeous. Many kudos to the city, the designers and the contractors.
Sometimes exceptions need to be made to misinformed blanket policies (re: dark skies). You can never mitigate light reflected from the ground and the resulting ‘skyglow.’ Shades are ineffective for bounced light. The only way to dramatically reduce lighting up the sky over a city is to shut off the lights. But then safety standards will be broken. There are far more important environmental policies that need attention.
I saw those columns the other day and I love them. Art Deco is such a nice design style.
To think that such a treasured architectural movement arose from the Great Depression. In many ways, architecture and other visible expressions of design are a public asset regardless of ownership.
The Burrard Bridge is part of our public street system, but the vast majority of our streets are pathetically bland by comparison. The Marine Building came from the same era and is so treasured that it received protection through the highest heritage classification. Buildings and streets consume almost all of the urban fabric, yet one of these elements is invisible to the point of neglect in every respect save as conduits for private cars.
We talk about the missing middle in housing and moderate density development with a human scale. Well, there is also the missing layers of urban design on our street system. Vancouver’s achievements will reach their apex unless we can address streetscapes. Throwing some pavement on left over largely private open space and calling them “plazas” doesn’t cut it, nor does tossing red maples into sidewalks until we can relate completely to humans walking and being alive and socializing on the street. If parks are our backyards, then surely streets are our front yards.
Until then, it’s all about Autotopia.
From what I recall from one of the originals that used to be on display in the Director of Planning’s office, these are at least quite close to the originals.
Looks great!
Sort of puts the yellow painted main towers to shame.
Hopefully some improved detailing will be made there too.