[Spring2008]

Good points:

Parker: Chinatown's survival requires new development


The Music Man sang “there’s trouble in River City,” and in this city there’s trouble by the Bow River in the area we call Chinatown.

Hon Development wants to build a mixed-use complex on 3rd Avenue S.W. behind the three 28-storey Sun Life office towers and some fear the effect it would have on the historic area.

I have been somewhat involved with Chinatown since the 1960s, when it was a thriving cultural community.

In recent years I have become worried about its future, but not because of new development that I believe can be its saviour.

My concerns include the spread of Chinatown up Centre Street and further away from downtown. Parking problems have driven regular shoppers north to Lamda Oriental Foods and 100 Tops Supermarket north of the river, or even as far as the huge T&T Supermarket in Harvest Hills.

In Chinatown, I’ve noticed shuttered storefronts and the closing of restaurants. The Dragon City mall cannot today be classed as a purely Chinese retail complex.

And then there are its residents. Many are elderly and living in small apartments. Who will follow them? Certainly not their children who have become used to modern, spacious homes around the city.

Vacant lots have remained undeveloped for decades and their sale would be difficult given the challenges of selling new construction to the community.

Part of the problem is due to fear of change and how it will be handled.

City Hall has a checkered past in addressing Chinatown, including its forced relocation, encroachment of non-Chinese buildings like the Harry and Hays and Livingston Place, the 1970s battle to kill the idea of a freeway along the Bow River and a perceived lack of law enforcement and social services in the area.

Building in downtown Calgary is expensive and economically it is impossible to build low-rise structures. The burned-out buildings just before the Centre Street bridge still await redevelopment.

I have looked over plans for the proposed Hon development — run by a Chinese family whose record includes the building of the Guardian towers in Victoria Park — and I see space for new Asian-related shops that would bring more people into the district, along with services, restaurants and underground parking that would benefit existing retailers.

Towers of modern condominiums might entice some suburb-living Chinese couples back to Chinatown when they become empty nesters, helping to maintain the community’s ethnic pulse.

Ask a person in Vancouver where Chinatown is and they will probably answer Richmond. I’d like to see ours remain where it is, but needs new development to help preserve its character.

http://calgaryherald.com/business/re...ew-development