He who dares not offend cannot be honest.
Thomas Paine
1737 - 1809
.
Tuesday 27 December 2011
Tuesday 20 December 2011
Bradley Who?
.
After the current pre-trial? phase in Fort Meade Bradley will be back in Fort Leavenworth. Mail (preferably by air!) sent to him now at the address below will reach him!
Bradley Manning
89289
830 Sabalu Rd
Fort Leavenworth, KS 66027
USA
.
After the current pre-trial? phase in Fort Meade Bradley will be back in Fort Leavenworth. Mail (preferably by air!) sent to him now at the address below will reach him!
Bradley Manning
89289
830 Sabalu Rd
Fort Leavenworth, KS 66027
USA
.
Wednesday 14 December 2011
Nelson (Star): Mayor Fletcher
Following is a Letter to the Editor, Nelson Star, sent Dec. 3, 2011
Re: Former mayor's grave marked at last
Nelson Star, Fri. Dec. 2, 2011
When the tomb-stone for Mayor Fletcher was contemplated by Don Tonsaker - according to the Nelson Express, about one year ago - researchers Ron Welwood, local historian, and Pat Rogers, Community Heritage Commission (CHC) and Touchstones Archive, supposedly couldn't find much information on the mayor.
Crucial information they seemingly hadn't found - even though readily accessible - was information which actually defines Mayor Fletcher's legacy. Unless they had unearthed it, and the Express just failed to mention it. Or something.
Bear with me: Local discrimination against the Chinese population of Nelson in those early years was of punching-bag status - with John "Truth" Houston right in there as loudly outspoken racist and the Nelson Weekly Miner advocating to arrange to kill off, if any legal way can be divined to accomplish that act, every mother's son of the almond-eyed pigtail wearers living at present in any country inhabited by white men. He is a filthy, immoral piece of human machinery, not a man in the sense in which the word is used by civilized peoples.
This despite the fact that these filthy, immoral piece(s) of human machinery at the time - while forced to live in the Lower Hill ghetto - were feeding Nelson with cheap, fresh produce, grown under extremely harsh Anglo-determined conditions; had been playing a major role in building area-railroads; did all dirty work for Upper Hill ladies; kept most everybody's clothes clean and mended.
Instrumental in putting Nelson on the map!
Here goes: At that time Chinese farmers asked Mayor Fletcher to lease Cottonwood-Basin land to them - they wanted to establish market-gardens there. Mayor Fletcher could not do this because the land had been given to Nelson by the CPR as park-land. But he did give them permission to work the land as squatters! This was a truly remarkable gesture of generosity at the time - with Chinese habitually used and abused. Taken from - but never given to!
And then the licensing-fee fracas. Alderman Irving attempted to see a licensing-fee of $25 per year imposed on Chinese market-gardeners. This was a ploy devised by Anglo vegetable-farmers, trying to rid themselves of Chinese competition - even though the Chinese were the first to work Nelson's outskirts as market-gardeners. In fact: some of these Anglo farmers were growing crops on land which had been leased to and cleared and cultivated by Chinese. Meaning: the Chinese had paid money to landowners to be allowed to clear and cultivate their land! To then be told unceremoniously to leave - when the land appreciated in value because of it! Anyway, $25 was an impossible amount for the Chinese to come up with; Alderman Hamilton thought that $10 were sufficient. The issue had everybody jump up-and-down loudly for a while - until Mayor Fletcher put a decisive end to it, saying: the Chinese had been cultivating this land for the owners, and without them it would have remained wilderness! Council was deadlocked, and the issue was dropped!
In both cases Mayor Fletcher showed himself as a man of reason and objectivity - a leader - his own man, way ahead of his time.
Asking to have these two crucial facts published as a letter - I wrote to the Express, as soon as it published the article about the intended tomb-stone and supposed dearth of Fletcher-related facts.
The letter was never published.
I sent a copy of it to Don Tonsaker through Kim Charlesworth, then CHC member from Council.
This e-mail was never acknowledged.
And there is no mention here in the Star about these facts either: information more revealing of the man than anything else published about him in Nelson since his time in office.
Heritage selectively acknowledged - Nelson's heritage!
Claos Schunke
Nelson
End of letter to the Star.
I don't fault the writer of the article for not including this information; I want to bring to his (and anyone's) attention though that - no matter how convenient a conduit the Touchstone Archive may be - there are other excellent conduits with possibly more and/or different historical sources in the area: such as the Selkirk/Castlegar Reference Library.
Which, of course, has nothing to do with the Nelson Star not being interested - now, after it ran its story - in this additional Nelson-specific information of substance about Mayor Fletcher and his time - delivered to its door!
How convenient is that!
As of this date: my letter above to the Nelson Star - more than 3 issues ago - has not been published.
.
Re: Former mayor's grave marked at last
Nelson Star, Fri. Dec. 2, 2011
When the tomb-stone for Mayor Fletcher was contemplated by Don Tonsaker - according to the Nelson Express, about one year ago - researchers Ron Welwood, local historian, and Pat Rogers, Community Heritage Commission (CHC) and Touchstones Archive, supposedly couldn't find much information on the mayor.
Crucial information they seemingly hadn't found - even though readily accessible - was information which actually defines Mayor Fletcher's legacy. Unless they had unearthed it, and the Express just failed to mention it. Or something.
Bear with me: Local discrimination against the Chinese population of Nelson in those early years was of punching-bag status - with John "Truth" Houston right in there as loudly outspoken racist and the Nelson Weekly Miner advocating to arrange to kill off, if any legal way can be divined to accomplish that act, every mother's son of the almond-eyed pigtail wearers living at present in any country inhabited by white men. He is a filthy, immoral piece of human machinery, not a man in the sense in which the word is used by civilized peoples.
This despite the fact that these filthy, immoral piece(s) of human machinery at the time - while forced to live in the Lower Hill ghetto - were feeding Nelson with cheap, fresh produce, grown under extremely harsh Anglo-determined conditions; had been playing a major role in building area-railroads; did all dirty work for Upper Hill ladies; kept most everybody's clothes clean and mended.
Instrumental in putting Nelson on the map!
Here goes: At that time Chinese farmers asked Mayor Fletcher to lease Cottonwood-Basin land to them - they wanted to establish market-gardens there. Mayor Fletcher could not do this because the land had been given to Nelson by the CPR as park-land. But he did give them permission to work the land as squatters! This was a truly remarkable gesture of generosity at the time - with Chinese habitually used and abused. Taken from - but never given to!
And then the licensing-fee fracas. Alderman Irving attempted to see a licensing-fee of $25 per year imposed on Chinese market-gardeners. This was a ploy devised by Anglo vegetable-farmers, trying to rid themselves of Chinese competition - even though the Chinese were the first to work Nelson's outskirts as market-gardeners. In fact: some of these Anglo farmers were growing crops on land which had been leased to and cleared and cultivated by Chinese. Meaning: the Chinese had paid money to landowners to be allowed to clear and cultivate their land! To then be told unceremoniously to leave - when the land appreciated in value because of it! Anyway, $25 was an impossible amount for the Chinese to come up with; Alderman Hamilton thought that $10 were sufficient. The issue had everybody jump up-and-down loudly for a while - until Mayor Fletcher put a decisive end to it, saying: the Chinese had been cultivating this land for the owners, and without them it would have remained wilderness! Council was deadlocked, and the issue was dropped!
In both cases Mayor Fletcher showed himself as a man of reason and objectivity - a leader - his own man, way ahead of his time.
Asking to have these two crucial facts published as a letter - I wrote to the Express, as soon as it published the article about the intended tomb-stone and supposed dearth of Fletcher-related facts.
The letter was never published.
I sent a copy of it to Don Tonsaker through Kim Charlesworth, then CHC member from Council.
This e-mail was never acknowledged.
And there is no mention here in the Star about these facts either: information more revealing of the man than anything else published about him in Nelson since his time in office.
Heritage selectively acknowledged - Nelson's heritage!
Claos Schunke
Nelson
End of letter to the Star.
I don't fault the writer of the article for not including this information; I want to bring to his (and anyone's) attention though that - no matter how convenient a conduit the Touchstone Archive may be - there are other excellent conduits with possibly more and/or different historical sources in the area: such as the Selkirk/Castlegar Reference Library.
Which, of course, has nothing to do with the Nelson Star not being interested - now, after it ran its story - in this additional Nelson-specific information of substance about Mayor Fletcher and his time - delivered to its door!
How convenient is that!
As of this date: my letter above to the Nelson Star - more than 3 issues ago - has not been published.
.
Wednesday 7 December 2011
Heronically Nelson
Choosing one of the three unimaginatively similar suggested locations for the heron-post may be difficult for many: nobody I asked knows the Heritage Inn Point - there are several points along the waterfront, parallel to the soccer fields. What here (and here alone) is called the Waterfront Amphitheatre seems to be the stretch of grassy slope across from the Nelson Rowing Club.
The mock-ups provide no visual context: leading to an uninformed choice only.
An added consideration - not mentioned anywhere - is the bronze osprey in a nest on a wooden post, in the bay next to the mall's parking lot. This by local sculptor Denis Kleine, within the osprey's natural environment. The osprey is iconic in this immediate area - the heron is not! Regardless - putting the heron that close to a bird on a post we already have makes no sense!
In the mock-ups this post appears to be about 10 feet high, meaning that the remaining 15 feet or so are sunk into the ground. The Nelson Post does not mention how high its sculptor envisions the heron above-ground.
So - aside from possibly not being able to tell exactly where, people also can't tell exactly how high. How real is that!
We do know though that the ground isn't particularly solid in this area - what with sand, landfill and rocks - so it would not be a simple matter of digging a 15-foot hole and sinking the post into it. On the other hand - the higher the post's section above-ground is - the more well-engineered support it will need: considering its weight of about one ton and strong winds common here! No matter how far above or below ground - the post not tapering towards the top, plus the heron business up there, do not make for the desirable centre of gravity. Top-heavy!
Proposed locations at the Heritage Inn Point and Waterfront Amphitheatre present particular (obviously unaddressed) challenges: the first being right at the top of a steepish, narrow slope into the lake and the second at the edge of a slope, where it drops several feet into the lake or on the beach - depending on lake-levels.
Safe installation at the shown Point-location would mean extensive preparation of a very large/deep hole for a foundation-box, possibly reaching into the lake as containment-wall. Three of its sides may have to be fenced. There are lake-level and erosion issues! There is the wind-factor! The commemorative Heritage Inn plaque - seemingly giving the Point its name and being its centre - would need to be moved. A reminder: the post is about 25' high and weighs about one ton! Placing the post closer to the path would mean a completely changed appearance of the Heritage Inn Point. What's in a name?
Challenges of installing this post at the Amphitheatre slope-drop are greater yet: a very large/deep gash would need to be carved out for a foundation strong enough to support this post of - one more time! - 25' in height and one ton in weight. Ground-volatility, erosion-containment and water-issues are a certainty. Added here is that frequently strong winds would hit the post unimpeded: vibrations from the post into the foundation could eventually mean major disaster.
Of course, all this could be dealt with - but at what environmental, aesthetic and financial cost?
The three images shown in the Nelson Post - the heron just stuck into the ground - are simplistically and reprehensibly misleading: the CDC's attention possibly engaged elsewhere, while preparing for this presentation of no-choice choices for the public. With no engineers present. All this seems to be a rush-job, focused on getting a handle on the tax-receipt issue looming largish.
No matter where the post is eventually located - the City will be well-advised to figure-in a hefty all-purpose insurance policy ad infinitum.
Another angle: The City's agreement with the sculptor has him construct a decorative base he already designed - $6000 received? - which is only doable on flat ground, thus would call for considerable ground-modifications. If the post were to be erected in a way not at all suitable for this base: would the sculptor agree and still keep/get his $6000? The three mock-ups do not show his base or any kind of (necessary!) location-specific foundations.
When the Kelowna City Council came up with a minimum of $40.000 in installation costs, they seemed to know what they were talking about - they had done the math! With these locations here: Nelson can only guess! Even just a rough cost-estimate for various possible location-terrains has been deferred since the beginning, in July; and the CDC said in the Nelson Star, Nov. 16, 2011, that the most important/difficult thing now would be finding the location for the post. The rest - like money? - would be easy!
This approach has made me wonder all along how great a surprise the costs will be eventually.
Information made public about the heron has been sparse and often cheerfully vague. Particularly about money involved. No matter who hands it out for this venture - the source ultimately is the tax-payer! As the City - according to former Councillor Stacey - will definitely not pay for any of this, the public needs to be able to finally see more transparently in this matter. And regardless of how soothing the community-input idea for locations may be: this mock-up construct is superficial fun at best - but certainly not reality-based! How deeply is the community really (supposed to be) involved in this selection process - voting-response has been minimal thus far!
What if the popular location-choice presents significantly more installation problems - thus costs - than another location? But we wouldn't know, would we, if no engineering-based across-the-board estimates are done prior to the decision. What if costs of installing the post in any one of the three locations - one after the other - ultimately should prove prohibitive? Start over somewhere else: with the cart before the horse! Again! Non-existent money to burn!
Unless, of course, all this has been handled efficiently - step-by-well-reasoned-step - already, with the tax-receipt in place. And we just haven't been told!
Could it be that instead of catching a bird - we may just be laying an egg here.
.
The mock-ups provide no visual context: leading to an uninformed choice only.
An added consideration - not mentioned anywhere - is the bronze osprey in a nest on a wooden post, in the bay next to the mall's parking lot. This by local sculptor Denis Kleine, within the osprey's natural environment. The osprey is iconic in this immediate area - the heron is not! Regardless - putting the heron that close to a bird on a post we already have makes no sense!
In the mock-ups this post appears to be about 10 feet high, meaning that the remaining 15 feet or so are sunk into the ground. The Nelson Post does not mention how high its sculptor envisions the heron above-ground.
So - aside from possibly not being able to tell exactly where, people also can't tell exactly how high. How real is that!
We do know though that the ground isn't particularly solid in this area - what with sand, landfill and rocks - so it would not be a simple matter of digging a 15-foot hole and sinking the post into it. On the other hand - the higher the post's section above-ground is - the more well-engineered support it will need: considering its weight of about one ton and strong winds common here! No matter how far above or below ground - the post not tapering towards the top, plus the heron business up there, do not make for the desirable centre of gravity. Top-heavy!
Proposed locations at the Heritage Inn Point and Waterfront Amphitheatre present particular (obviously unaddressed) challenges: the first being right at the top of a steepish, narrow slope into the lake and the second at the edge of a slope, where it drops several feet into the lake or on the beach - depending on lake-levels.
Safe installation at the shown Point-location would mean extensive preparation of a very large/deep hole for a foundation-box, possibly reaching into the lake as containment-wall. Three of its sides may have to be fenced. There are lake-level and erosion issues! There is the wind-factor! The commemorative Heritage Inn plaque - seemingly giving the Point its name and being its centre - would need to be moved. A reminder: the post is about 25' high and weighs about one ton! Placing the post closer to the path would mean a completely changed appearance of the Heritage Inn Point. What's in a name?
Challenges of installing this post at the Amphitheatre slope-drop are greater yet: a very large/deep gash would need to be carved out for a foundation strong enough to support this post of - one more time! - 25' in height and one ton in weight. Ground-volatility, erosion-containment and water-issues are a certainty. Added here is that frequently strong winds would hit the post unimpeded: vibrations from the post into the foundation could eventually mean major disaster.
Of course, all this could be dealt with - but at what environmental, aesthetic and financial cost?
The three images shown in the Nelson Post - the heron just stuck into the ground - are simplistically and reprehensibly misleading: the CDC's attention possibly engaged elsewhere, while preparing for this presentation of no-choice choices for the public. With no engineers present. All this seems to be a rush-job, focused on getting a handle on the tax-receipt issue looming largish.
No matter where the post is eventually located - the City will be well-advised to figure-in a hefty all-purpose insurance policy ad infinitum.
Another angle: The City's agreement with the sculptor has him construct a decorative base he already designed - $6000 received? - which is only doable on flat ground, thus would call for considerable ground-modifications. If the post were to be erected in a way not at all suitable for this base: would the sculptor agree and still keep/get his $6000? The three mock-ups do not show his base or any kind of (necessary!) location-specific foundations.
When the Kelowna City Council came up with a minimum of $40.000 in installation costs, they seemed to know what they were talking about - they had done the math! With these locations here: Nelson can only guess! Even just a rough cost-estimate for various possible location-terrains has been deferred since the beginning, in July; and the CDC said in the Nelson Star, Nov. 16, 2011, that the most important/difficult thing now would be finding the location for the post. The rest - like money? - would be easy!
This approach has made me wonder all along how great a surprise the costs will be eventually.
Information made public about the heron has been sparse and often cheerfully vague. Particularly about money involved. No matter who hands it out for this venture - the source ultimately is the tax-payer! As the City - according to former Councillor Stacey - will definitely not pay for any of this, the public needs to be able to finally see more transparently in this matter. And regardless of how soothing the community-input idea for locations may be: this mock-up construct is superficial fun at best - but certainly not reality-based! How deeply is the community really (supposed to be) involved in this selection process - voting-response has been minimal thus far!
What if the popular location-choice presents significantly more installation problems - thus costs - than another location? But we wouldn't know, would we, if no engineering-based across-the-board estimates are done prior to the decision. What if costs of installing the post in any one of the three locations - one after the other - ultimately should prove prohibitive? Start over somewhere else: with the cart before the horse! Again! Non-existent money to burn!
Unless, of course, all this has been handled efficiently - step-by-well-reasoned-step - already, with the tax-receipt in place. And we just haven't been told!
Could it be that instead of catching a bird - we may just be laying an egg here.
.
Thursday 1 December 2011
Nelson in Living Colour
Painted Lady - San Francisco CA
1.
1.
Summary of Sustainable Downtown and Waterfront Master Plan
July 11, 2011
Baker Street is one of the most healthy and vibrant main streets in British Columbia, due in large part to an effective revitalization planning initiative 30 years ago.
The downtown will become even more vibrant with modern multi-use buildings that showcase heritage assets...
Plan recommendations
- Adopt design guidelines to provide direction for ways to relate new construction to heritage
buildings.
2.
City of Nelson Official Community Plan Bylaw No. 3114, 2008
Development Permit Area Building Design Guidelines Page 41
3.2.29 Colour
Colour is one of the most powerful design tools. The colour schemes of individual buildings and aggregate appearance of various paint schemes within the overall streetscape are very important to the image of the Nelson Commercial Core. Most major paint manufacturers have developed special palettes of "Historic Colours" - it is recommended that reference to these colour charts be made in order to select appropriate colours and shades.
Guidelines
Colour schemes for individual buildings within the Nelson Development Permit Area(s) should be devised to respect the qualities of the community's heritage and the natural environment, and to work harmoniously with adjacent building colour schemes and the context of the entire streetscape.
LoJo - Victoria BC
3.
Proposal to Revitalize Revitalization
This proposal will look realistically at and challenge sustainability of a healthy and vibrant Baker Street as an impossibility - within the context of Nelson's current mindscape.
It will specifically present a new approach to relate new construction to heritage buildings, with colours - if chosen imaginatively/creatively - indeed being a most powerful design tool for Nelson to make a statement, to expres itself uniquely.
The proposal's aim is toward economic growth - possibly sustainable only through a conscious revitalization of the revitalization planning initiative 30 years ago. A second renaissance, if you will.
3a.
Baker Street - Reality Check
For about half of the year Baker Street can be colourfully alive: sun; appropriately dressed crowds; leafy (for a while flowering) trees; hanging flower baskets; many cars - a summer mood.
For the other half of the year - like right now - it is possible to see Baker as it really is: no sun means not having to duck under canopies, awnings; uncrowded sidewalks means not having to focus on dodging; no leafy trees, flower baskets and fewer cars means being able to see the other side of the street easily and clearly.
And what one sees now - unadorned, unobstructed and in plain view - is a few blocks of colourless, dingy - even shabby - pseudo-gentility. Gentility - a wishful mindset only: certainly not provided by the street's heritage buildings as such.
Stripping buildings down to their historic gestalt - back then - gave Nelson a context with considerable depth - a raison d'etre. It energized Nelsonites, gave them confidence in themselves and the future: they became enterprising.
This heritage context was recorded, given rules, packaged: it became an industry. At first for practical economic benefit, then to just keep this initial rush of energy coming. Which promptly turned into an addiction. Part of this addiction's ever-tightening grip came from Nelson wanting to appear big and wonderful to the outside - while feeling it really didn't have much else to offer. Granted: there is the lake, and there are the mountains, but they are not unique to Nelson. Neither are heritage buildings, but because Nelson for some time was an economic and transportation hub, there are relatively more to be found clustered here than in other places in the area.
Baltimore MD
2a.
Official Community Plan - 3.2.29 Colour
Colour of heritage buildings: there isn't much on Baker (and at first wasn't in the rest of Nelson either) - just as there wasn't much when heritage buildings were put up anywhere else. Considering environmental conditions - the mud! - and well-controlled emotional conditions of the Victorian master in the early days - colour was definitely non-WASP and faded quickly with those non-WASPS who wanted to be folded into the motherly bosom.
Also - paints would have been a frivolous expense for most - even if they had been available and wanted anywhere within the Anglo-colonial psyche.
This presents a problem with Nelson's Official Community Plan: there is no such thing as a special palette of "Historic Colours" - they are a marketing-ploy coming from corporate paint-manufacturers' boardrooms. Translated into: regardless of local context - by using these pre-digested and predictable mudpuddle-colours - heritage anywhere looks like it all came from the same puddle. Nelson's heritage - where coloured - is part of this puddle, and even non-heritage buildings have been splashed by it. What exactly are appropriate colours and shades? If this corporate assembly-line colouring is very important to the image of the Nelson Commercial Core, what's with local creativity, originality? DOA!
2b.
Official Community Plan - Guideline
.....to respect the qualities of the community's heritage...and to work harmoniously with adjacent building colour schemes and the context of the entire streetscape.
The qualities of the community's non-Anglo/Victorian heritage have thus far not been respected. Acknowledgement and integration of Northern-, Central-, Southern-, Eastern-European and Asian heritage would mean an array of colours in the entire streetscape!
2c.
Official Community Plan - Colour Chart
There is a paint-chart in the bottom-right corner of the Plan's page 41 with an explanatory text. Seemingly an older chart, with an array of pleasantly predictable autumnal shades. This probably is meant as an example of heritage colours presented by a paint-manufacturer of long ago. It's accompanying text reads:
Colour schemes should respect the precedent of historic paint palettes and consider the colour schemes of adjacent buildings.
Magnification of this so-called palette actually shows that the chart is a basic colour chart only - Colours 101 explained - primary, secondary, tertiary colours. And a bar of the supposedly primary colours across the top - they should be a deep/clear blue, a deep/clear red and a bright/clear yellow - actually are a flat bluish/grey, a flat soft/orange and a sandy yellow. What follows is that supposedly secondary and tertiary colours aren't either! Provided one starts with colours commonly acknowledged as primary - one would get a rainbow.
But there's definitely no pot of gold at the end of this chart's result at the bottom. None of these colours fall into the most basic colour-construct the chart talks about; they are faded, washed-out beyond reasonable recognition - having nothing intended to do with heritage colours either! Possibly a poor print-job, exposed to the sun too long.
Page 41 generally presents a superficial and misleading approach!
1a.
Downtown/Waterfront Plan
A year ago Mayor Dooley talked about Baker's need of a paint-job. Aside from the one at the Co-Op recently - no painting or water-blasting seems to have been done there in years.
What started out as a tangible downtown revitalization planning initiative 30 years ago and became very effective has - over years - turned into an abstraction: constantly discussed and tweaked, but now without real momentum and outside the context of the whole - Nelson.
LoJo - Victoria BC
2b.
Official Community Plan - Guideline
4.
Official Community Plan - 3.2.29 Colour
Colour of heritage buildings: there isn't much on Baker (and at first wasn't in the rest of Nelson either) - just as there wasn't much when heritage buildings were put up anywhere else. Considering environmental conditions - the mud! - and well-controlled emotional conditions of the Victorian master in the early days - colour was definitely non-WASP and faded quickly with those non-WASPS who wanted to be folded into the motherly bosom.
Also - paints would have been a frivolous expense for most - even if they had been available and wanted anywhere within the Anglo-colonial psyche.
This presents a problem with Nelson's Official Community Plan: there is no such thing as a special palette of "Historic Colours" - they are a marketing-ploy coming from corporate paint-manufacturers' boardrooms. Translated into: regardless of local context - by using these pre-digested and predictable mudpuddle-colours - heritage anywhere looks like it all came from the same puddle. Nelson's heritage - where coloured - is part of this puddle, and even non-heritage buildings have been splashed by it. What exactly are appropriate colours and shades? If this corporate assembly-line colouring is very important to the image of the Nelson Commercial Core, what's with local creativity, originality? DOA!
2b.
Official Community Plan - Guideline
.....to respect the qualities of the community's heritage...and to work harmoniously with adjacent building colour schemes and the context of the entire streetscape.
The qualities of the community's non-Anglo/Victorian heritage have thus far not been respected. Acknowledgement and integration of Northern-, Central-, Southern-, Eastern-European and Asian heritage would mean an array of colours in the entire streetscape!
2c.
Official Community Plan - Colour Chart
There is a paint-chart in the bottom-right corner of the Plan's page 41 with an explanatory text. Seemingly an older chart, with an array of pleasantly predictable autumnal shades. This probably is meant as an example of heritage colours presented by a paint-manufacturer of long ago. It's accompanying text reads:
Colour schemes should respect the precedent of historic paint palettes and consider the colour schemes of adjacent buildings.
Magnification of this so-called palette actually shows that the chart is a basic colour chart only - Colours 101 explained - primary, secondary, tertiary colours. And a bar of the supposedly primary colours across the top - they should be a deep/clear blue, a deep/clear red and a bright/clear yellow - actually are a flat bluish/grey, a flat soft/orange and a sandy yellow. What follows is that supposedly secondary and tertiary colours aren't either! Provided one starts with colours commonly acknowledged as primary - one would get a rainbow.
But there's definitely no pot of gold at the end of this chart's result at the bottom. None of these colours fall into the most basic colour-construct the chart talks about; they are faded, washed-out beyond reasonable recognition - having nothing intended to do with heritage colours either! Possibly a poor print-job, exposed to the sun too long.
Page 41 generally presents a superficial and misleading approach!
1a.
Downtown/Waterfront Plan
A year ago Mayor Dooley talked about Baker's need of a paint-job. Aside from the one at the Co-Op recently - no painting or water-blasting seems to have been done there in years.
What started out as a tangible downtown revitalization planning initiative 30 years ago and became very effective has - over years - turned into an abstraction: constantly discussed and tweaked, but now without real momentum and outside the context of the whole - Nelson.
LoJo - Victoria BC
2b.
Official Community Plan - Guideline
So - the CHC will earnestly weigh a miniscule amount of narrow purple trim on a building on Vernon, set way back from the street and hardly noticed, provided one cared to look even - while Baker buildings are fading away or covered in grime - or both!
And while the CHC is lengthily discussing a set of inoffensive beige awnings on Vernon - the Masons on Baker have hung one awning - in very strong primary blue and yellow (their colours) - across two store-fronts and the building's entrance, with the Subway logo very prominently displayed on its front. One McHeritage to go, please! The awning has received much negative attention. How it relates to heritage buildings - harmoniously yet - is open to discussion.
3a.
Baker Street - Reality Check
More awnings. On the southside of Baker - between Ward and Stanley - we have the KWC Block, Lawrence's Hardware (Sonja's) and the Hudson's Bay Company (Nelson Trading Company Mall): all 3 have awnings - 15 in total. And over much time (never cleaned!) these awnings on all 3 have come to life with a streaming yellow-green growth. Straight out of Blade Runner. In addition, there are 10 more properties on Baker with awnings in conspicuous stages of benign neglect over years - from very dirty to growing moss. Most of them are heritage buildings:
660-690 Baker
King's Restaurant
247 Baker
333 Baker
441-445 Baker
507-509 Baker (and Ward) - Medical Arts
555 Baker
553 Baker
571-579 Baker
593 Baker
Again - during busy months tourists and locals don't look at buildings across the street, and even if they do - they look at shops over there but hardly up to the 2nd and 3rd floors. This applies to Baker anywhere. With few exceptions, very little of heritage is noticeable to out-of-towners, walking under canopies and awnings, looking at shop-windows. That and the lack of distinctive colour in these buildings hardly make them exist above and around stores on their ground-floors.
This may be just as well. The very long Nelson Trading Company - potentially an attractive building - looks particularly decrepit: doors forbiddingly closed, with darkness behind; dirty brickwork; a multitude of filthy awnings and tacky signage.
I do not know how deep the concern for the preservation of heritage in the Nelson Commercial Core actually goes on a practical level - but I do know that Nelson must strengthen its economic base to reach much-touted sustainability. The Downtown and Waterfront Plan talks about modern multi-use buildings downtown - seemingly mindful of heritage assets but modern nonetheless. For this to be possible the city will have to lighten-up (literally!), let go of its heritage-enclave attitude and facilitate interplay between Nelson-as-was, Nelson-as-is and Nelson-as-can-be.
After 30 years - the heritage-theme as wherewithal has run its course and is tired. This tiredness (and not much else) shows, while holding back development with its restrictive self/all-important rules.
Painted Lady - San Francisco CA
4.
Heritage of Colour
Heritage and its joyous expression in traditional folk-customs and celebrations usually is colourful in all countries - except for that of Victorian Anglos of the realm - and with that appreciated and cheered by most. Not so in Nelson when it was young, where non-Anglo otherness was unacceptable - except as a fetch-it labour-force. And with Anglo-colonial heritage thus having become the unquestioned norm here, Nelson - despite some creative vibes finding their way in - still is bewildered by colour as a state of mind and keeps it and heritage boxed and stored separately as much as possible.
San Francisco introduced colour as a life-force with the Summer of Love; Berkeley had the Free-Speech Movement around the same time. And England presented the Beatles and Carnaby Street with bold patterns. In California clothes and attitudes were stripped-off - a desire for freedom of ideas and imagination unbound was paramount. England went along with the stripping of attitudes but - being British - wasn't quite ready to strip-off clothes. So it minimized them by making them tight and short. Thus the mini-skirt was born.
In San Francisco people were painting themselves and each other boldly - life as art - and then expanded to painting their environment.
Houses!
This was the beginning of the Painted Ladies - Victorian gingerbread houses painted in all colours imaginable and beyond. Not as rejection of establishment values but as never-before celebration and appreciation of these buildings' design - often deliriously ornate. A riot of colours accentuating structural and ornamental intricacies, adding what those Victorian grandiosities had been lacking all along: beauty, wit and - life! Very quickly these pieces of lived-in art became a magnet for the Leave-It-To-Beaver crowd in the Midwest - where a man was a man, and a woman's place was in the kitchen! Tours! T-shirts! Postcards! Books! A tourism industry! Still today!
Nelson?
Victoria - the most BC-colonial of colonials - started to pay attention to its architectural heritage as a life-form - so to speak - in the 70s. Since then it has at least begun to overcome its maternal prissiness: it now has candy-coloured Market Square and LoJo - Lower Johnson Street - with the winter-issue of Westworld saying about it in a full-page write-up that a new rush was triggered: independent stores and eateries studding a jelly-bean stretch of heritage buildings, now Victoria's hippest hangout.
Nelson?
Over time heritage buildings everywhere/anywhere - often in seemingly unlikely places - have got a make-over: dress-up, make-up, the works!
Nelson?
Cathedral - Glasgow, Scotland
5.
Nelson Alive!
And why not Nelson? The city has talked about cultural tourism for some time - except the cultural part has not been identified and manifested. Talking to tourists about facilities we have - like the Capitol Theatre, Touchstones, the Royal and the Spirit Bar - is not enough, because their oeuvre is not consistent and not consistently available. Nelson needs to provide a basic feel-good setting - a heart! For many tourists there's nowhere to go in the evening: a missed economic opportunity for the city. And with heritage rarely on the tourists' mind even during the day - at night it doesn't figure at all.
So the tourism booklet for Nelson advertises a lot of commercial venues with unsupported over-the-top promises and finds only meager bits of general local interest with which to fill its pages.
I can see Baker - and spreading out from there to all of Nelson - embracing colour. Not as a CDC-contest for untried local talent but initially professionally planned. Turn all of Baker into a colourful piece of art everybody lives and participates in. Substantiating the Far Out/For Real slogan of the Nelson Kootenay Lake Destination Marketing Organization with this process! A breathtakingly stylish environment: providing a totally-fun indoor/outdoor shopping/eating experience during the day (with vehicular traffic on Baker minimized) and in the evening (completely closed to vehicular traffic) a cool strolling-dining-shopping-entertainment experience: all this well-lit; shops welcoming with open doors (literally!); tourists and locals dressed-up and gathering downtown - the place to be and be seen; sidewalk-dining with laid-back acoustic sounds - also strolling!
Items: I can see the Hudson's Bay building painted creatively - with appealing signage at the entrance; new awnings; flower boxes under windows; street-level doors invitingly open in summer; attractively lit/decorated inside - in total providing a strong, cohesive two-storey shopping environment. I can see the RBC's public-toilet architecture across the street modified with colour. And I can see the Capitol Theatre -currently with an appearance of no character whatsoever - make a bold statement in its packaging about its contents!
Turning Nelson as such into a place to experience - cultural (including heritage!) and recreational activities part of but not all of it! A time of exuberance - instead of earnest, unproductive single-focus stodge only. In summer and winter alike! Now!
Turning Nelson as such into a place to experience - cultural (including heritage!) and recreational activities part of but not all of it! A time of exuberance - instead of earnest, unproductive single-focus stodge only. In summer and winter alike! Now!
Dublin, Ireland
The Marketing Organization is perfectly placed to become a prime mover in this: part Chamber of Commerce and part local merchants. A truly vibrant downtown would benefit them thus Nelson - and potential economic benefit certainly was the reason behind its inception. Focused investment in the future. Pro-actively creating a solid economic base - instead of dreaming of an economic upswing, based on a dream 30 years ago!
Introducing colour into local heritage - long overdue because of its various components to begin with - would also allow for easy integration with Nelson's non-heritage and contemporary parts. Done everywhere else. Nelson's insistence on keeping heritage caged does not promote - it stifles. In an odd twist - it bumps into limitations it set for itself! Colouring Nelson's core extensively and dramatically (and then spreading outward!) should also appeal to the art crowd: creative expression on a grand scale such as here proposed may provide a more fertile foundation and environmemt for individually creative expression.
Painted Lady - San Francisco CA
Most important for a renaissance in/of Nelson is its willingness to embrace change.
Most important for a renaissance in/of Nelson is its willingness to embrace change.
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