10 10 Thursday, Thursday,December December19, 19,2013 2013
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» COVER STORY
To preserve and protect A plucky non-profit society’s mission to defend North Shore heritage BY JuSTin BEddall
North Shore Preservation Society president Peter Miller stands in front of the Flamborough Head. Rob Newell photo
Peter Miller’s electric Nissan is parked on the port side of the hulking stern of the HMS Flamborough Head on this drizzly December afternoon. With classical music playing softly on the stereo, Miller stares out of a fogged-up window with a slightly sullen expression as helmet-clad workers move up and down the scaffolding attached to the rusty maritime artifact located just steps from the Pinnacle Hotel on the Lower Lonsdale waterfront. Miller knows that the last remaining Burrard Dry Dock-built “Victory” ship, a supply vessel that survived enemy-infested waters in the Atlantic during the Second World War, is about to make its final voyage — this time to the scrapyard, piece by piece. The 40-foot, three-storey stern section and engine is being dismantled not far from where it was launched on Oct. 7, 1944. At the time, North Vancouver was a bustling shipbuilding hub supplying more than 150 of the 10,000-ton merchant ships to the Royal Navy for the war effort. The bespectacled Miller is today dressed in a grey sports coat, blue plaid shirt and brown corduroys that, along with his British accent, make him easy to mistake for, say, a history professor — but he’s not. A retired architect, Miller is the president of the North Shore Preservation Society and when it comes to protecting the past, he’s scrappy, outspoken and ever vigilant. “…the North Shore Heritage Preservation Society is — once again — dismayed at the North Vancouver City Council’s failure to respect the proud history of its community,” wrote Miller last week, in a letter to the editor sent to The Outlook, about the pending dismantling of the Flamborough stern. Looking out the car window, Miller says he’s surprised and saddened by CNV council’s decision to dispose of the Flamborough “because this was going to be the artifact to demonstrate the scale of the product the North Vancouver shipyards
was turning out for the war effort.” Even worse, he’s concerned that “this opens the door to the possible dismantling of the yellow crane,” he says, pausing to look over his left shoulder at the iconic shipbuilding crane situated a few hundred feet away at Shipbuilders’ Square, “for similar reasons, i.e. liability and future maintenance expense to the city.” ***** The stern section of Flamborough Head was originally obtained by the City of North Van in 2001 for $1 from the Artificial Reef Society before the rest of the ship was sunk near Nanaimo Harbour to create a recreational dive site. Originally, the plan was to incorporate the stern as part of a then-planned maritime museum for the North Vancouver Museum and Archives. But when an ambitious National Maritime Centre was later slated for the redeveloping Lower Lonsdale waterfront, the stern was to be a centrepiece there. However, in 2007 the plan was scuttled when provincial funding was lost. “It was tabbed to be part of the national maritime centre so when the funding fell through for the national maritime centre from the provincial government I think that was the beginning of the end,” says CNV Mayor Darrell Mussatto. Since then, plans for the stern have been adrift and now the temporary cradle that’s held it upright for more than a decade needs to be replaced — something
the city says will cost big bucks. This July CNV council voted to use the Pipe Shop located in the historic waterfront precinct as North Vancouver Museum’s new space but it won’t have a strictly maritime theme. Barb Pearce, CNV’s director of special projects, who is directing the waterfront project, explained in an email that “There is no space or opportunity for the stern or engine to be used in conjunction with this new museum.” “Faced with the need to either replace the cradle with no plan in place for the stern, or to dispose of the stern, Council directed staff to proceed with the disposal,” she added. That happened after an in-camera meeting in September, with council voting unanimously in favour of spending up to $250,000 to dispose of the stern. (The Artificial Reef Society was first contacted to see if they had any interest in the stern or engine but they declined; a U.S. organization is interested in the engine.) The disposal cost is so steep because the stern contains amounts of asbestos, lead-based paint and pigeon poop — also considered a hazardous material — that’s accumulated through the years. To date, the city has paid around $381,000 to have the stern of the Flamborough removed from the rest of the ship, transported to North Van, moved to its current location and shrink-wrapped. As for the other heritage items located
The HMS Flamborough Head in 1945. North Vancouver Museum and Archives photo
in the central waterfront area, Pearce said there are no plans to dispose of the yellow crane or the historic Pacific Great Eastern Railway Station, which is being temporarily relocated while work is being done on the subsurface at the foot of Lonsdale. Miller, while complimentary of the city’s integration of maritime history into the redevelopment of the waterfront, bristles about the fact that the stern’s fate was decided behind closed doors. But Mayor Mussatto explains the decision was made in-camera “because there’s some liability issues with regard to the stern of the ship at its current location and liability and lawyer’s advice is kept in-camera.” “We invested a lot of time, money and energy into [the Flamborough Head] so it was not an easy decision and I can probably say for council it wasn’t an easy decision for them as well.” Still, he realizes the decision has rankled some members of the preservation society. “I feel for them. I think it’s understandable, it is a piece of heritage but we have to weigh all the information we have and we have to make a decision. And we made a tough decision.” Still, the mayor notes that there’s still a significant heritage component to the area, including Parcels 3 and 4, the Coppersmith’s and Pipe shops, refurbished shipbuilding crane and other vehicles