Vancouver opens ‘park of the future’ and builds resilience
The park area aims to deliver a community connection in a dense urban setting with a third of the area planted with 6,000-plus shrubs, perennials, climbers and trees, significant to indigenous culture, food, and medicine.
The City of Vancouver has opened what it describes as “a park of the future”, which aims to deliver access to nature, leisure, health and provide a community connection in a dense urban setting.
The 0.8 acre site in the downtown area of Yaletown has been created by Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation and will serve more than 10,000 residents and 17,000 employees who live and work within a five-minute walk.
Citizen engagement
It has been more than10 years since a new park was created in downtown Vancouver. Within that time, the city’s downtown has boomed with new residents and workers. Extensive public engagement shaped the design of the park, which is located at the intersection of Smithe and Richards Streets.
Answering residents’ and workers’ needs for more areas to gather, play, enjoy public art, and connect, the space offers dynamic play areas, climbing frames, hammocks, seating nooks, art installations, towering skyframes, and multi-dimensional walkways that go far beyond the traditional concept of a park.
The City said the project is also a significant step on the path of decolonising the city through parks and greenspace and connecting thousands of park visitors to the unceded territory they are standing on. In collaboration with Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations, park board staff will help to tell the story of the unceded land and those who have stewarded it throughout history, through art installations, and cultural programming.
“This is a place where people can live, work, socialise, and play in their neighbourhood. It’s about building community and creating complete neighbourhoods”
Projected as “the hardest working park in the city”, it has also been designed with sustainability in mind, the park aims to strengthen Vancouver’s climate resilience as a city. One third of the park is planted with some 6,000 shrubs, perennials, climbers, and mature trees, many of which are significant to and used in indigenous culture, food, and medicine.
Rain and water from the plaza’s water feature is collected, filtered, and channelled for irrigation and flushing toilets, or cleaned by aquatic plants before entering the city’s storm sewers. The on-site café is designed with a 30 per cent reduction in energy use and features a green roof.
He added: “This is a place where people can live, work, socialise, and play in their neighbourhood. It’s about building community, creating complete neighbourhoods, and we cannot wait for people to enjoy a whole new take on what a downtown park can be.”
The park board has partnered with independent Vancouver coffee roaster, Kafka’s, to run the on-site café, known for building neighbourhood hubs.
Clad with Douglas fir carpentry and shimmering artist-crafted mobiles that cast rainbow colours across the urban backdrop, the café aims to seamlessly blend into the park through a dramatic folding window-wall that opens up to the plaza in warmer weather.
“This park will be a gathering place in the city like no other. It’s a symbol of connection to one another, to the land, and an opportunity to build further collaboration with the host nations for education and artwork”
An official naming ceremony will announce the name gifted by the host nations for this park in June 2022.
“This park will be a gathering place in the city like no other. It’s a symbol of connection to one another, to the land, and an opportunity to build further collaboration with the host nations for education, programming, and artwork,” said Stuart Mackinnon, chair of Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation.
He added: “I’m beyond excited for the communities that make up this city to unite in the burst of colour and joy this park brings to the downtown core.”
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