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A study in Modern(ist) urbanism: planning Vancouver, 1945–1965

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 April 2011

RHODRI WINDSOR LISCOMBE
RHODRI WINDSOR LISCOMBE*
Affiliation:
Department of Art History, Visual Art and Theory, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, CanadaV6T 1Z2
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Abstract:

The implementation of Modern Movement town planning is still regarded as both rapid and relatively unproblematic in the aftermath of World War II. A more complex narrative emerges from an examination of the urban redevelopment policy and practice at Vancouver, British Columbia, during the immediate World War II decades. The analysis focuses on the civic and professional discourse of redevelopment. It illuminates the diverse interests and processes by which Modernist planning theory and practice were introduced, modified and resisted. New concepts and values are shown to have been subject to internal no less than external forces of revision.

Type
Research Article
Information
Urban History , Volume 38 , Issue 1 , May 2011 , pp. 124 - 149
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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References

1 The social and architectural history is examined by Liscombe, R. Windsor, The New Spirit: Modern Architecture in Vancouver, 1938–1963 (Montreal, 1997)Google Scholar, bringing out Giedion's, Sigfried assertion that ‘Architects today are perfectly aware that the future of architecture is inseparably bound up with town planning’ in his seminal book, Space, Time and Architecture, 3rd enlarged edn (Cambridge, MA, 1954), 23Google Scholar. The history of town planning in Vancouver is outlined in the ‘Guide to the Planning Department’, the City of Vancouver City Archives (hereafter CVA); and related in Oberlander, J., ‘History of planning in Greater Vancouver’, in Davis, C. (ed.), The Greater Vancouver Book: An Urban Encyclopedia (Vancouver, 2003)Google Scholar; see also Morley, A., From Milltown to Metropolis (Vancouver, 1961)Google Scholar; Barman, J., The West Beyond the West (Toronto, 1996)Google Scholar. The author is most grateful to the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council for Canada for funding this research and to the editor and anonymous readers for their contribution to the refinement of both argument and text.

2 The communicative, if not precisely linguistic, aspect of architecture was articulated by the most internationally renowned Canadian architect of the era, Arthur Erickson – Vancouver-born and based – in his article, ‘The weight of heaven’, writing, ‘The architect infuses meaning into forms which then become symbols, like words, units of meaning which, put together, make sense out of previous confusion’, Canadian Architect, 9 (Mar. 1964), 48, article 48–63. The relation between Modernist architectural discourse and media, especially journalistic and during the interview years, is examined by Colomina, B., Privacy and Publicity. Modern Architecture and Mass Media (Cambridge, MA, 1994Google Scholar).

3 The architectural dimension of this phenomenon is discussed by Colquhoun, A., Essays in Architectural Criticism: Modern Architecture and Historical Change (Cambridge, MA, 1981)Google Scholar.

4 The scope for the Modern Movement, including internal contestation as by Team Ten, is summarized in Frampton, K., Modern Architecture: A Critical History, 4th edn (London, 2007)Google Scholar; Colquhoun, A., Modern Architecture (Oxford, 2002)Google Scholar; and with particular respect to internal division, Mumford, E., The CIAM Discourse on Urbanism, 1928–1960 (Cambridge, MA, 2000)Google Scholar; its discursive aspects are defined by Goldhagen, S.W., ‘Something to talk about; Modernism, discourse, style’, Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, 64 (Jun. 2005), 144–67CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and in Vidler, A., Histories of the Immediate Present. Inventing Architectural Modernism (Cambridge, MA, 2008)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 In order of citation, these representative writings are: Habermas, J., trans. Tsoskouunglou, H., ‘Modern and postmodern architecture’, 9H, 4 (1982), 227–35Google Scholar; Heynen, H., Architecture and Modernity: A Critique (Cambridge, MA, 1999)Google Scholar; Watkin, D., Morality and Architecture Revisited (Chicago, 2001)Google Scholar; Scott, J.C., Seeing Like a State (New Haven, 1998)Google Scholar; Jacobs, J., Death and Life of Great American Cities (New York, 1961)Google Scholar; Jencks, C., Language of Post-modern Architecture, 6th edn (London, 1991)Google Scholar; Venturi, R., Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture (New York, 1966)Google Scholar; Wilson, C. St J., The Other Tradition of Modern Architecture: The Uncompleted Project (London, 1998)Google Scholar; Alexander, C., A Pattern Language (New York, 1977)Google Scholar; Isenberg, A., Downtown America. A History of the Place and the People Who Made It (Chicago, 2005)Google Scholar; Goldhagen, S.W. and Legault, R., Anxious Modernisms. Experimentation in Postwar Architectural Culture (Cambridge, MA, 2000)Google Scholar; Harvey, D., The Condition of Postmodernity (Oxford, 1989)Google Scholar; Ghirardo, D., Architecture after Modernism (New York, 1996)Google Scholar; and Longstreth, R., City Center to Regional Mall: Architecture, Automobile and Retailing in Los Angeles 1920–1950 (Cambridge, MA, 1999)Google Scholar. The full range of literature is further indicated by such more theoretical studies as Lefebvre, H., Droit a la Ville (Paris, 1968)Google Scholar, as against situated analyses exemplified by Soja, E., Postmetropolis; Critical Studies of Cities and Regions (Maldon, MA, 2000)Google Scholar.

6 Bartholomew, H., A Plan for the City of Vancouver, British Columbia, Including a General Plan of the Region, 1928 (Vancouver: Vancouver Town Planning Commission, 1929)Google Scholar. The work of this firm is reviewed by Lessoff, A., ‘Harland Bartholomew and Corpus Christi: the faltering pursuit of comprehensive planning in South Texas’, Planning Perspectives, 18 (2003), 197–232CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

7 Civic Centre (Vancouver (dated St Louis Missouri), Jun. 1945), 7.

8 Ibid., 7.

9 Ibid., 7.

10 Downtown Business District (Oct. 1945), 10.

11 Administration of the Plan (Aug. 1948), 7.

12 The Appearance of the City (Oct. 1947), respectively 11 and 18.

13 Administration of the Plan, 18.

14 Ibid., 19.

15 Published from their office at 626 West Pender Street, Vancouver; not paginated.

16 This background is examined by Oberlander, H.P. and Newbrun, E., Houser: The Life and Work of Catherine Bauer (Vancouver, 1999)Google Scholar.

17 For these systems see respectively Perry, C.A., Housing for the Machine Age (New York, 1939)Google Scholar; Gold, J., The Experience of Modernism: Modern Architects and the Future City, 1928–1953 (London, 1997)Google Scholar; and Mumford, CIAM Discourse.

18 Planning Vancouver, not paginated.

19 Liscombe, New Spirit, 58–61 and 101–3.

20 The Little Mountain scheme is related in Liscombe, New Spirit, 61; and the Marsh Report (Vancouver, 1950) is examined in Liscombe, R. Windsor, ‘Leonard Marsh and Vancouver Modern’, Architecture and Ideas, 1 (1996), 40–51Google Scholar.

21 The impact of this magazine, and the commodification as well as gendering of Modernism, are analysed by Liscombe, R. Windsor, ‘The fe-male spaces of Modernism: a western Canadian perspective’, Prospects, 26 (2002), 667–700CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

22 CVA, pd 335, not paginated; see also Liscombe, R. Windsor, ‘John Bland and the modernizing of Vancouver design’, La Revue d'Aerchitecture, 97 (1996), 11–17Google Scholar.

23 Sutton-Brown served as city planner 1952–57; for his background see Morris, E.S., British Town Planning and Urban Design: Principles and Policies (London, 1997)Google Scholar, and Gold, Experience of Modernism.

24 CVA, pd 83. The full title was Vancouver Redevelopment Study. Prepared by the City of Vancouver Planning Department for the Housing Research Committee; it was associated with the City of Vancouver Development Plan published that year, 1957, by the Vancouver Technical Planning Board.

25 Redevelopment Study, iii.

26 Ibid., 4.

27 Analysed in Cohen, L., A Consumers Republic. The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar America (New York, 2003)Google Scholar, and linkages between the Modern Movement and suburban development are discussed by Fishman, R., Bourgeois Utopias: The Rise and Fall of Suburbia (New York, 1987)Google Scholar.

28 Gruen's planning ideas and work is contextualized by Longstreth, City Center to Regional Mall.

29 Urban Sprawl (Vancouver, 1957), 2; significantly the term has reappeared as exemplified by Mitchell, J.G., ‘Urban sprawl’, National Geographic, 200 (2001), 48–73Google Scholar.

30 For the attitudes of a renowned contemporary architectural photographer, see Schulman, J., Photographing Architecture and Interiors (New York, 1962)Google Scholar; Rosa, J., A Constricted View. The Architectural Photography of Julius Shulman (New York, 1994)Google Scholar; and for photography and Modernist design, Colomina, Privacy and Publicity.

31 Liscombe, New Spirit, 57; the proposal was based on Wells Coates’ typescript, ‘Proposals for the formation of a new organization concerned with the study of problems in inter-related fields of the visual arts with special reference to the Canadian scene’ (Vancouver, 1957), copy Canadian Centre for Architecture.

32 Liscombe, New Spirit, 173–5, for the BC Electric Building. The chief architect of CMHC, Ian MacLennan, also criticized the complacency of architects and planners in a speech reprinted in the Journal of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada, 3 (May 1961), 66–7.

33 The re-emergence of developer-driven and market-based urban growth is placed in an ideological and historical perspective by Guy, S., Development and Developers: Perspectives on Property, ed. Henneberry, J. (Oxford, 2002)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; see also Dredger, L., The Urban Factor: Sociology of Canadian Cities (Toronto, 1991)Google Scholar.

34 CVA, pd 237, 3, dated 7 Dec. 1961.

35 Respectively CVA, pd 132 and 137-F-2.

36 CVA, pd 117, dated 7 Jun. 1962.

37 Redevelopment in Downtown Vancouver, II, 17.

38 Ibid., 21.

39 Examined by Hazel, S., Conflict and Compromise: A Case Study of the Decision-Making Process in the Downtown Eastside (Vancouver, 1982)Google Scholar, and Case, R.A., Participatory Dissent; A Case Study of the Political Participation in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside (Vancouver, 1995)Google Scholar.

40 CVA, pd 238.

41 Redevelopment in Downtown Vancouver, III (7 Sep. 1962), 14.

42 Georgia Viaduct Replacement: Preliminary Engineering Report July 1963 (Vancouver, 1963), and Georgia Street. Second Century (Vancouver, 1986); its construction caused the demolition of a small conclave of African-American businesses and residences.

43 Redevelopment, III, non-paginated preface.

44 Mitchell, D.J., W.A.C. Bennett and the Rise of British Columbia (Vancouver, 1983)Google Scholar; and for the ideology of this regional political party, Douglas, C.H., Social Credit (Vancouver, 1979)Google Scholar.

45 The public debates are summarized by MacKenzie, K., Freeway Planning and Protests in Vancouver, 1954–1972 (Burnaby, 1985)Google Scholar. Among other local proposals was ‘The Vancouver Board of Trade Brief on Freeways’, published in September 1960. The local debate is recounted in Pendakur, Setty V., Cities, Citizens and Freeways (Vancouver, 1978)Google Scholar; for the North American context, Lewis, T., Divided Highways: Building the Interstate Highways, Transforming American Life (New York, 1997)Google Scholar, and Clair, D.J. St, The Motorization of American Cities (New York, 1986)Google Scholar. Interestingly, the British architect Maxwell Fry had included a photograph of a freeway east of the Los Angeles civic centre in Art in the Machine Age (London, 1960), illus. 22 opposite 91, with the caption, ‘The freeways are magnificently free where all else is confined’.

46 The emergence of the heritage movement is examined briefly in Kalman, H., A Concise History of Canadian Architecture (Don Mills, Ont., 2000)Google Scholar.

47 Redevelopment, III, 11.

48 CVA, Vancouver City Council Minutes, MCR-1–86, vol. 83, 115, 182, 283, 326 and 327; Rathie was away 28 Apr. –19 May and 27 May –16 Jun. 1963.

49 CVA, 88-C-2, Board of Administration Reports for Mar. 1963. Van Norman's scheme is illustrated in Liscombe, New Spirit, 157, illus. 125, while that by Jessiman was published in The Contract Record (May 1964).

50 Punter, J., Vancouver Achievement: Urban Planning and Design (Vancouver, 2003)Google Scholar. Project 200 and the freeway debate form the theme of the permanent exhibition of post-World War II Vancouver at the Vancouver Museum.

51 Vancouver Sun, 11 Dec. 1967.

52 Reported in Vancouver Sun, 4 Oct. 1968.

53 An Outline Plan for the Inner Area of Vancouver (Jun. 1964), 6.

54 Ibid., 19.

55 Ibid., 46.

56 CVA, 529-D-3, 15 Jul., Community Arts Council records, 1966–67.

57 Their report was entitled ‘Vancouver: a proposal for Block 61 and the downtown core’ and was published as ‘Proposal for Block 61 and the downtown core, Vancouver’, in Architecture Canada, 43 (Aug. 1966), 42–3. Erickson's urban design is briefly examined by Olsberg, N. in his essay ‘The common ground’, in Arthur Erickson. Critical Works (Vancouver, 2006)Google Scholar, especially 129–34.

58 CVA, 88-C-2,Board of Administration Reports,1963.

59 Cemp in conjunction with the Toronto Dominion Bank and Eatons produced a publicity booklet (copy Vancouver Public Library) with the caption, ‘A magnificent heart for a great world city’, unpaginated source for quotations in the next two successive paragraphs. Among the extensive press coverage is Robert Sarti, ‘Pacific Centre – start of a world city’, Vancouver Sun, 20 Oct. 1970.

60 CVA, pd 419.

Supplementary material: File

Liscombe Multimedia Companion

This package contains the source files for one of the Urban History multimedia companions created to accompany the Urban History article entitled A study in Modern[ist] urbanism: planning Vancouver 1945–1965, by Rhodri Windsor-Liscombe, and originally hosted as an online resource by Cambridge University Press. These files contain multimedia content in a now deprecated format, Adobe Flash. Please note that links to third party resources will be retained here in the original form provided by the compilers of the multimedia companions. The Press does not warrant that links from archival entries will continue to function correctly and does not undertake to redirect or suppress links when third party sites cease to be available

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