Can Vancouver Make “Vancouverism” Work for Them?
The interesting thing about potential solutions to urban sprawl is that they tend to revolve around a massive mobilization. Over the next few days I am going to attempt to take a different approach to the issue than most. I believe that it does not take a complete change in the way everyone lives to mitigate the effects of this sprawl on our farmland. I believe that a select few can make a huge difference.
The concept of “Vancouverism” is an interesting idea that was implemented by a select few. For starters, what is Vancouverism? Well this is how the New York Times describes it:
“Vancouverism is characterized by tall, but widely separated, slender towers interspersed with low-rise buildings, public spaces, small parks and pedestrian-friendly streetscapes and facades to minimize the impact of a high density population.”
The concept of “Vancouverism”, before the term was coined of course, was implemented by world famous Vancouver artitect Arthur Erickson. Project 56 was his plan to turn Vancouver into a modern metropolis.
Project 56
Since this time, Vancouver has grown into one of the more pleasantly designed downtown cores in North America and is envied by many.
In line with the message preached in “Vancouverism”, Vancouver has recently adopted the Eco-Density Charter (
http://www.vancouver-ecodensity.ca). This charter says that ”high quality and strategically located density can make Vancouver more sustainable, livable and affordable”, and argues that this type of development is good for the environment because it prevents urban sprawl. A recent online article entitled “Will ‘Vancouverism’ replace urban sprawl?”
(http://thetyee.ca/Blogs/TheHook/Transportation/2009/03/10/UrbanSprawl/) examines the effectiveness of this charter. The general consensus is that this could be an effective plan, but must be implemented city wide. Quoted in the article is the director of the urban studies program at SFU, Anthony Perl, who says that “although Vancouver is developing population density in certain parts of the city, there are huge parts of the city that still need to be utilized.”
I must ask whether or not this solution has the potential to be effective. First of all, I have to question whether an opportunity really does exist. Unless higher desity and bigger buildings also means a lower selling price, I believe that their is relatively little demand for people wanting to live in more densely populated neighbourhoods. Once again, for people and capital it depends on a few select individuals. Government officials would need to zone for higher densities and developers would need to find the financing to build bigger buildings.
This type of government initiated policy is one way to combat urban sprawl. The problem with these types of policies is that they are generally extremely long-term. Large tracts of farmland are still being built on as the city makes incremental changes that may or may not have large effects on density.
