Yes We Can!

UPDATE on the proposed tree removal:

I spoke with a city worker on the site who told me people were there this morning, and the trees are not going to be removed, they are redesigning something right now to care for the roots.

Emails were circulated by business owners and residents! City responded! yes we can!

I’ll post more when I have more details.

Good News on Carrall Street

The Pennsylvania Hotel finally has opened its doors – providing housing for 44 people needing homes in the DTES.

I took videos of the opening, posted them to Youtube and over to the Carrall Street Journal, so check them out.

By the way, I decided kept the Carrall Street Journal going after all. (Of course, now I have double postings – will have to sort that out soon.)

Hyper-Local on Carrall Street

This post is a duplicate of a page in my Carrall Street Journal.

I started a blog named The Carrall Street Journal in March 2006, and it has been an on and off activity for me. My original ideas for it are listed below. They were a little bit out of scope, and I began to see it simply as a vehicle for my own personal expression of life here in Gastown/DTES. As it was a very personal hyper-local blog, a place-based personal log of my observations, I’ve just now integrated all the posts from the old Carrall Street Journal here into my personal blog.

March 2006, this is what I thought the Carrall Street Journal would be:

• The Carrall Street Journal documents people, events, development and transitions along Carrall Street.

• The Journal offers reflections on the physical and social developments as the greenway plans take hold and become a reality, and is open to any comments and community suggestions.

• Descriptions and profiles feature people, businesses, events and associations located on and near the street.

• The journal is volunteer-based and is an independent voice, with no particular affiliation.

• It doesn’t take any advertising, and isn’t commercial.

• Any member of the community can contribute to the discussion, as long as you have an email address to send from and to be contacted at.

Performance on Carrall Street this Tuesday

This post is a duplicate of a post in my Carrall Street Journal.

Art on Carrall – literally about Carrall Street. This is the kind of thing I’ve been thinking about for years, and now it looks like Althea Thauberger is making art about this street and its complexities.

Can’t wait to walk out my door and see what she has put together.

ARTSPEAK | CARRALL STREET | ALTHEA THAUBERGER | SEP 30
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CARRALL STREET | ALTHEA THAUBERGER

Tuesday, September 30, 2008
8-11pm in the 200 block of Carrall Street, Vancouver

Carrall Street Public Forum
Thursday, October 2, 2008
7pm at 33 West Cordova Street

Althea Thauberger’s one-night performance, Carrall Street, will present the
street (brightly lit like a film set at nighttime) as a stage, or zone of
illumination where the roles of performer and spectator blur. The
interweaving of organized performers, passers-by and audience members will
allow for unforeseen interactions to take place that reveal something of
the street’s history, its current issues, as well as its future. Carrall
Street is planned in collaboration with local directors, performers and
community members.

Carrall Street is one of the oldest streets in Vancouver. It can be argued
that the entire history (and pre-history) of the city can be mapped along
its six blocks. Caught between urban gentrification and decay, the street
marks transitions from the most touristic parts of the city to what is
often described as the poorest neighbourhood in Canada. In ways that are
both unique and similar to other inner cities, it has been affected by
development, public policy neglect and polarized politics.

A publication accompanying the project will be available in 2009.

Althea Thauberger is an artist based in Vancouver. Her work involves
research and collaboration that result in performances, films, photographs,
audio recordings and books.

The performance and forum are free and open to the public.

This project has been supported by Arts Partners in Creative Development,
The Canada Council for the Arts, the City of Vancouver and the Portland
Hotel Society.

Carrall Street Journal Returns: Hi Yo Silver, Away!!!!

After a too long hiatus, I’ve gone back to the Carrall Street Journal. Client work and a general disillusionment with the entire public process conspired and I left that blog to lie fallow. It was still getting hits, and now, after my recent meeting at the Gastown Heritage Area Planning Committee (the unpronounceable GHAPC), I was moved to go back into the old blog. Frustration at the length of time it takes for anything to be accomplished on the civic level combined with a simple urge to blog about the street again, and I got my groove back.

I’ve got new ideas for the Journal and have scaled down my expectations, so will be posting there a little more often than once in 6 months!

Over the years the events that seemed so significant have faded into the past, and ideas I had for the street and contact through it still haven’t come to fruition.

Talk about big ideas!

Originally I had wanted to walk the street as Joyce walked Dublin, and using the names and references seen on the street, through the history, from the stores and shops along the way, to create a poetic integrated image/bank. Oh I envisioned projections on the 4 corners of each intersection, digital audio tours that were poetic and resonant with the past, present and future. I imagined Carrall Street as the microcosm of a whole new world, including East, West, Chinese, Aboriginal roots, Colonial overlords, high-tech infrastructure, homelessness, high-end glamour, art galleries, corner stores, contrasts between more expensive restaurants like Chill Winston with Wing’s Cafe, tucked in between the Gospel mission and the alley by Pigeon Park. A symphony of a city, as the early filmmakers created them. I didn’t pursue funding for this, and it remained simply an incubated idea, which others will surely find and follow.

UPDATE NOV. 2008: I’ve just decided to integrate the Carrall Street Journal posts here in my personal blog, and all the posts can now be found here.

Urine Smell Overpowers Me

All right, I’m Back

Every year or so I come back to this blog about Carrall Street and report on the same old things. It wasn’t inspiring me, so I put my energies elsewhere. Still living here, still involved but it was so much the same old same old, I had no reason to tell the story again and again.

I’ve been somewhat reinvigorated in the past week or so and instead of making excuses, I’ll just continue on with this blog, adding my view of the place into the mix.

Smell of Urine Overpowering

Big news is the very strong smell of urine, worst ever in all the years I’ve been here.

One day this August the smell was so strong and pervasive it came right into my home through the window. This is the first time this has happened.  I’d noticed it all along Carrall Street when walking through Gastown, particularly at intersections. I was alarmed, thought there was some kind of chemical spill, and called the Health Department. Then when it was also in my home, I was really concerned. Imagine my dismay when the woman from the City Health Dept. who came out to check it told me it was strong urine. “It will rain soon” she said.

Well rain won’t do it, folks. It smells like a stable in the laneways, like an 18th century London street, like some kind of zoo. This is unhealthy and extremely unpleasant. We need more cleaning from City Engineering down here. When the needle exchange was on Hastings, they used to pressure wash the lane between Hastings and Cordova, and that did make a big difference. Remember, there are people in those laneways, lots of them. Some are sleeping there. This is not the way a normal city cares for its people or for the city itself.

And today, yes, it was as strong as ever. You can only burn so much incense!

City Strike Grinds On

This post is a duplicate of a post in my Carrall Street Journal.

Carrall Street has been kept relatively clean by volunteers, the United We Can folks, and as a result the whole place doesn’t look too bad, or seem too terribly unhealthy, despite the city strike.

However, the Carrall Street Greenway has been very affected by the strike, and no work has been done on the whole thing for much of the summer. Tall grass and weeds are growing in the square areas that had been left for tree planting on the one area that had been constructed so far. The whole schedule for this improvement has been suspended, and this could have serious repercussions in the timeline. Hopefully there will be a resolution to the strike soon.

Meanwhile, September brings new exhibitions in the galleries, ACCESS, ArtSpeak, InterUrban and Centre A.

The New York Times Style Magazine this Sunday featured the designer at Richard Kidd, and positive mention of Carrall Street’s Irish Heather and Hunt and Gather.

Now equinox is past, we will see earlier nights, and that also means colder nights for the homeless. People are seriously nested in under the awning on Cordova Street just west of the old Pig and Whistle, and also in any nook to be found in doorways of the old Ranier Hotel. That place has been increasingly covered in graffiti through the summer, with more coming along through the month of August and early September. Almost every brick in the doorway to the former chicken place has a tag of some kind.

That’s the September wrap-up for this street of high contrast!

Burnt Out Restaurant? Sure Fooled Me!

This post is a duplicate of a post in my Carrall Street Journal.

Driving on the new Greenway part of Carrall Street I was shocked to see a group of people milling around this old burnt out restaurant. How could it have flash burned so fast, and why hadn’t I even noticed it before? Well, the truth is this is a set for a movie, Lionsgate Films, The Eye. That’s why I hadn’t seen it before. It was purpose built in the Jack Chow Insurance parking area, and was removed as quickly as it appeared.

Creative Reworking of the Old Telus Box

This post is a duplicate of a post in my Carrall Street Journal.

This Telus box near the bus stop on Carrall and Cordova has been a real eyesore and a problem in the area, as in the past it was a place where dealers and users would congregate. All kinds of things went on between that box and the building behind it. The people at the new Irezumi Tattoo shop had the idea to make this box less of a graffiti-covered eyesore, and arranged with Telus permission to cover the box with a graphic of their own design. It’s totally in keeping with the feel of the street so how could it invite graffiti? Fantastic! Kudos to Irezumi Tattoo!

August Weekends: Events on Carrall

This post is a duplicate of a post in my Carrall Street Journal.

August weekends featured festivals and events on Carrall Street.

In early August the canopies covered the intersection of Carrall and Hastings for the Insite event at Pigeon Park, with bands headlined by the venerable DOA.

Then the next weekend was the Chinatown festival, and people were walking along carrying their clay pots on cardboard squares, or lining up to go to the gambling booths and kiosks. Spilling over from the regular Night Market set up, people walked through Sun Yat Sen Park and out the alley by the Garden entrance, into Carrall.

Then this past weekend in Gastown saw the Motorcycle Show and Shine. Weather cooperated as again the street was filled with parked motorcycles all on display.

And coming up we will see the annual Gastown Concours D’elegance, Saturday September 1st.

Motorcycles lined up on display along Carrall