Posted on the Sentimental Vancouver Facebook page, this thirteen minute video takes you on a bike ride through Vancouver 48 years ago in 1974.
Photographer Hans Sipma shot this video originally with a Braun Nizo Super 8 camera mounted on a bicycle. “The camera had an intervalometer so it automatically shot a frame of film every so many seconds. I redid the ride in 2011 and photographed stills at key points in the film to show then and now.”
The video has been dubbed to include cut scenes of some locations current to 2011, and also has radio chat as the audio current to the time. The 13 minute video bikes through parts of Vancouver as well as the North Shore. There is a running count of Volkswagen “beetles” found in the video.
It also shows views of the Englesea Lodge which mysteriously burnt to the ground in 1980. It was located on city property, and was designed by the same architect that designed The Sylvia Hotel. The Parks Board at the time considered the Englesea Lodge an eyesore that blocked the view, even though the rent in the building covered the costs. You can read more about this story in this great post from author Eve Lazarus here.
There is also in the video the rather terrifying scene of the cyclist going over the Second Narrows bridge. As one person who biked the Second Narrows Bridge last year pointed out, “that’s two hours of my life I will never get back.”
Enjoy the Ride.
Volkswagen’s two-door, rear-engine economy car was indeed called the capital-B Beetle, so it’s strange that the post casts the name in scare quotes.
Volkswagen Beetles 71
SUV’s 0
Love it!