From my friend Jonathan, who posted this Google Maps screenshot along with the assessment “No comment.”

It would please me to blame this sudden proliferation of sports bars on the damn Vancouver 2010 Olympics. However, though I’m sure the Olympics didn’t help, the causes predate 2010. For starters we have the pricing out of non-corporate culture through the condo-ization of the city and related real estate speculation and astronomical commercial rents. Skyrocketing property values and rents have made it extremely difficult for restaurants to make a profit. Then there’s the intensification of hockeymania through corporate PR and broadcasting. There’s the aggressive expansion of generic restaurant chains taking over older venues which have trouble paying inflated rents and competing with said hockeymania. There’s the whole culture of aspirational consumer aesthetics and the insecure anti-cultural swagger of what was historically a resource extraction town. Maybe too there’s just laziness and lack of imagination in the restaurant industry. Not doing well? Put up a TV screen.

It’s very difficult for any venue or event to compete with the juggernaut of hockey marketing and hype. Restaurant bars seeking for scant revenues in a town with a median income lower than Windsor—we are Canada’s Detroit—will most often resort to profiting off that hockey fan market. Chronic lack of provincial/local contribution to the cultural realm doesn’t help counter any of this, in a town still noticeably suspicious of ideas and remarkably incurious about its own history. PR is key for arts non-profit culture just as it is for hockey etc., and it costs money. Money that arts organizations and restaurants don’t have because too much of their budget goes to rent.

Anyway, as a friend pointed out last week, if you’re looking to hang with guys who look like metrosexuals but who talk like hockey fans at megaphone volume about ”kicking ass,” even when the game’s not on, it looks like you have about 55 choices.

Another friend joked about the map above, “The map is not yet entirely obscured by red. There’s still opportunity for growth in this sector.”

I’m not even going to go into the design of these places; but look.

Finally, I think you will enjoy this. (This Party Just Took A Turn For The Douche, by Garfunkel and Oates)

What I’d love to see on Google maps for Vancouver is a visual guide of every restaurant that contains no TV screen. And if you could add in a filter to exclude any place with fluorescent lighting, you’d really be getting something useful.

Photo below from UBC Thunderbird story about Sin Bin Sports Bar, restyled as sports bar after  nearby Olympic Village became ghost town post 2010. Look at that place. 

This is a disaster. Vision Vancouver, are you really going to allow more speculative condo development to take out one of the last good mixed cultural venues in the city? For those who don’t know about Vancouver’s historic Waldorf Hotel, see its site or an article here . The hotel represents a key piece of built heritage, but it is also an important site of Vancouver cultural history. Famed acts have played in its famous tiki bar and other rooms. Its eviction is a final act in Vancouver’s long saga of throwing culture under the bus, then rolling out the red carpet for condos built for an investment market.

This city’s ship rudderless. Why not just make a condo developer mayor? Truly, the result would be the same. Mark Carney, Bank of Canada head, has long warned that there is a surplus of condos in both Vancouver and Toronto and that real estate development needs to be slowed. Condos worsen rather than relieve unaffordability, and their rampant development is killing culture, more quickly than slowly. Culture needs affordable older buildings, history, and protection from rampant speculation. And this when the selling market in Vancouver has slowed to a standstill. Pointless destruction. RIP Waldorf.

There are two petitions you can sign:

1. Gregor Robertson: Deny rezoning of the Waldorf Hotel site to condo development
2. City of Vancouver: Save the Waldorf Hotel

Press Articles
Day 1, Jan 9
Georgia Straight, Globe and Mail (utterly disagree with last sentence, barring a couple of developer philanthropists who get it only half right) and Scout Magazine. And a smart analysis on this blog and a summary on Frances Bula’s blog.

Day 2, Jan 10
NME Grimes criticises hometown over plans to close local recording studio ‘Vancouver is so fucked’ she says in angry Twitter post
Metro News: Waldorf Hotel’s new owner responds amidst public outcry
CBC Waldorf Hotel could be saved, says developer
Mainlander The story behind The Waldorf’s displacement from the Hastings Corridor

Later days

Jan 15  Opinion: Solterra Group should cut deal with Waldorf operators and let them continue their program
Jan 14  Lament for the Waldorf: A looming development leaves the historic Vancouver hotel’s fate in jeopardy

For urbanism nerds, read the last two paragraphs here on “stroads” (street/roads) and the correct way to develop them.

WALDORF’S PRESS RELEASE
January 9, 2013, Vancouver, British Columbia

East Vancouver’s cultural institution the Waldorf Hotel has been sold to real estate development company forcing imminent closure.

The Waldorf Hotel re-opened its doors on October 31, 2010 with a vision: create a welcoming cultural hub in the heart of East Vancouver. Prior to this, the complex, which was built in 1947, had seen better days, and was just one of many dilapidated Eastside dive bars. But in the summer of 2010, a 15-year lease was signed by a group of partners led by Thomas Anselmi, Ernesto Gomez, Scott Cohen, and Daniel Fazio. They proceeded at great financial and sweat equity costs, with no assistance from the landlord, to restore the building to its former glory.

A restaurant, hotel rooms, a world renowned tiki bar, two nightclub spaces, a recording studio, and an art gallery were housed under the re-imagined Waldorf’s roof. It was embraced by the community and dubbed “a Cultural Oasis in the middle of nowhere” by the Globe and Mail.

The Waldorf was well on its way to growing into an economically viable and profitable business. But, given the scope of the project and its “middle of nowhere” location, it should come as no surprise that the first year was a financially difficult one. The landlord, Marko Puharich, was sympathetic and understanding and some rent was forgiven to give the project breathing room. But in August 2012, the landlord’s attitude changed overnight and it was baffling. Phone calls stopped being answered. Emails and texts were unreturned. A smug litigator, rather than the jovial landlord, became the point of contact. The property was on the market and the landlord was using the Waldorf’s growing pains to break the lease.

In early January 2013, Anselmi and Gomez were informed that the complex had been sold to the Solterra Group of Companies, a condominium developer. “Solterra were unwilling to sit down and discuss negotiating long-term lease possibilities. We were offered a week-to-week lease until September 2013, when the property must be delivered vacant. We obviously can’t move forward under these conditions as our business requires commitments to artists, organizations and entertainers months in advance,” Anselmi explains. He then adds: “This has cost 60 people their jobs. This has destroyed our business.

“The irony that the Waldorf was taken over by a condo developer in the very area we helped reinvigorate is obvious to anyone. The Waldorf filled a void. People responded because they needed it. We tried to stand for something authentic and real in a city with thousands of empty condominiums and a community starved for cultural spaces,” says Anselmi.

During its tenure, institutions like the Cheaper Show, the East Side Culture Crawl, the New Forms Festival, the Polaris Music Prize, the Presentation House Gallery, the PuSh International Performing Arts Festival, the TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival, the Vancouver Art Gallery, and the Vancouver International Film Festival all held events at the Waldorf. And the city’s top culture producers like Black Mountain, Douglas Coupland, Rodney Graham, Grimes, Japandroids, Michael Turner, and Paul Wong all headlined events here as well. “On top of international entertainment programming every weekend, the team was constantly working towards the next big event, such as Food Cart Festival and our legendary hotel-wide Halloween and New Year’s Eve Parties,” Fazio recalls. “We were always trying to out-do ourselves.”

Everyone at the Waldorf takes great pride in the fact that the complex was operated as a community-oriented cultural institution. The Waldorf had an open door policy. Countless emerging artists, non-profits, and community groups were facilitated. The Chef-in-Residence program devised by Gomez and Cesar De La Parra hosted international culinary stars, Bob Blumer, Rodolfo Sanchez, and Pedro Martin. The Waldorf hosted an international artist-in-residence program for musicians and visual artists in collaboration with the Goethe-Institut and the French Consulate.

“We would like to extend our sincere gratitude to all the people who supported the Waldorf since we reopened our doors. We’re extremely proud of all the artists and events that we’ve hosted over last two and a half years. We’re extremely proud of our incredible staff who helped to execute world class events,” says Gomez.

The Waldorf will be vacated on Sunday, January 20, 2013. The Waldorf was nothing without its creative team and they are currently looking for a new space where they can continue to develop the high quality and eclectic arts and entertainment programming that the complex has become known for and that Vancouverites want and deserve.

-30-

Well it’s the last day of 2012, the end of another alarming year in a string of alarming years. These are not times to be proud of in Vancouver, in British Columbia or especially in Canada.

Still, the First Nations-led movement known as Idle No More is a sign of hope that Prime Minister Stephen Harper is in serious trouble. And the other positive note is that we still have our sense of humour. Even if that sense of humour will no longer appear in the paper, now that all our cartoonists have been fired.

These animations are by recently fired newspaper cartoonist Dan Murphy. Actually to be accurate, Dan wasn’t exactly fired; his position was just axed, as were those of cartoonists in the other newspapers in Postmedia, the corporate news chain that dominates B.C. papers. This was precipitated by Dan’s first satirical video about the proposed Enbridge pipeline, an animated cartoon that was pulled from the paper’s website after complaints from Enbridge. (Let’s hope the Streisand Effect now plagues The Province newspaper for that act.) The whole story is here and the video is below:

I know there’s been a lot of politics in this design blog over the past few years, but at the risk of repeating myself, it’s never possible to separate design from economics and politics, even if the umbilical cord connecting them is sometimes invisible. All you have to do is look at the godawful generic corporate skyline of Vancouver to see this connection right away. As I must do daily. For a designer, it is irksome to witness the way rampant jockeying for power and money so utterly ruins the design and the tone of our immediate environment.

Here’s to a better 2013 in which we fight the outrageous conditions of this new gilded age and win.

PS Dan Murphy’s on Twitter.

I am in full support of Idle No More and Chief Theresa Spence’s now perilous hunger strike in a tipi across from Canada’s Parliament buildings in Ottawa. Chief of the beleaguered town on Attawapiskat in Ontario, where inadequate housing has led to a level of misery that attracted even UN censure, Spence is engaged in a desperate gambit to force PM Harper to speak with her.

Idle No More, a nation-wide First Nations protest against Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s erosion of native sovereignty, consultation and environmental regulation is fast gaining strength and allies in Canada and abroad. In addition to Chief Spence’s protest over Attawapiskat and government interference  there, the Prime Minister’s omnibus budget bill C-45, which contained a bludgeon obliterating all manner of environmental regulation and local controls, has not surprisingly been met with First Nations protest. And it is only the latest in a string of bills eroding rights; Bill C-54 was just as disastrous to environmental protection and First Nations rights and sovereignty.  It destroyed the Fisheries Act and Environmental Assessment among other law, close to 70 in all, with no debate or discussion. These things combined have precipitated a movement that Stephen Harper will have great difficulty putting down, and whose magnitude he probably hasn’t even clocked yet.

I have never witnessed anything like this in Canada in my lifetime. The level of First Nations unanimity in BC even before Idle No More, precipitated by and in opposition to oil tanker traffic and/or pipelines in BC, and in particular to the high-handed actions of the federal government and its corporate allies in Enbridge, were stunning enough. But Idle No More represents a sea change in Canada. It is very unlikely that it can be stopped, it will undoubtedly do serious damage to the Stephen Harper/Conservative Party of Canada government, and it’s almost certain to alter the political landscape not to mention the way in which this country views itself.

Must reads (this list will be periodically updated):

Follow Chief Theresa Spence on Twitter.

Pamela Palmater:  Why we are Idle No More

First Nations UBC professor Glen Coulthard: Idle No More in Historical Context

Dulce et Decorum: The Indian Act in Plain English

Superb breakdown by Chelsea Vowel in âpihtawikosisân & National Post:  The real math behind Attawapiskat’s $90 million

Rabble (Am Johal):  Justice at stake: Chief Theresa Spence passes Day 15 of hunger strike

Al Jazeera:  First Nations #IdleNoMore on day of action

Guardian: Canada’s First Nations protest heralds a new alliance – The grassroots IdleNoMore movement of aboriginal people offers a more sustainable future for all Canadians

Marc Garneau, former Canadian scientist and astronaut, Member of Parliament:  An open letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper: Let our words not be empty

Idle No More blog

Toronto Star: Pressure mounting for Prime Minister Stephen Harper to meet Attawapiskat chief on hunger strike

Lastly, see this.

Other perhaps some other pagan holiday options? Perhaps we could consider Saturnalia. Or, if it must be organized religion, then the Flying Spaghetti Monster whose mockery-loving followers are known as Pastafarians. “Around the time of Christmas, Hanukkah, and Kwanzaa, Pastafarians celebrate a vaguely defined holiday named “Holiday.”

That last line is perennially funny to me. It’s a new winter tradition.

Whatever you do, happy winter holiday, everyone. And consider the reindeer. They may not be with us that much longer, and Santa’s North Pole appears to be melting.

PS in this long warlike year of intolerance on the part of organized religions, Stephen Fry at 07:17

Buy Nothing Day was launched by Vancouver’s Adbusters Magazine.

“The journey towards a sane sustainable future begins with a single step. It could all start with a personal challenge, such as this: make a vow to yourself to participate in Buy Nothing Day this year. This November 23rd, go cold turkey on consumption for 24 hours … see what happens … you just might have an unexpected, emancipatory epiphany! … Join millions of us in over 60 countries on November 23/24 and see what it feels like. Then, after Buy Nothing Day, take the next step … for generations, Christmas has been hijacked by commercial forces … this year, let’s take it back.”

My extended family did a Christmas like this a few times. My nephews were 6 and 7 years old the first time. You had to make all presents with things you found, and nothing could be bought. No bought wrapping paper either–everything had to be recycled. These are the best Christmases we ever had. Inventive, hilarious and fun.

I’m not sure that personal choice alone is going to effectively challenge consumer capitalism, but it’s worth a try. North America’s profligate spending and wastefulness is truly repellent.

Also, from a design standpoint, departing from consumerism produces the happy result of automatically creating better design. Every time. At the risk of stating the obvious, our anti-consumerist design/gift guidelines could be:

• Less is more. This is almost always true.
• Buy less and when you do buy, buy items of significantly high quality, items you’ll never tire of and that will improve with age. The expenditure is worth it, and in the end you’ll find this has actually cost you the same or less than the sum of many cheap expenditures.
• Nothing substitutes for the handmade
• Artisanal, high-quality, local production from carefully chosen materials can be far better-looking than factory-produced brand name goods or furniture (but some artisans have to stop adding busy, funky, weird detailing to everything. (3 different woods/materials in one table; curlicues.) Awkward aesthetics are wasteful too–we tire of them, so they work against longevity).
• If you must buy new, try to buy mostly things made/grown in your own town/region/country.
• Use found objects. Items with some history bring some humanity with them. So many spaces are utterly dead because they lack the marks of  their natural origins, or of the human hand, history and use. Bring a fallen tree branch into the house. Google “biophilia” to found out how seeing natural objects is beneficial to health and serenity.
• Don’t buy anything made of chipboard! Better to find solid wood items at thrift shops. At IKEA, some items are far better quality than others. Avoid anything made of cheap laminates.
• Older couches and chairs often have solid hardwood under-structures. Collect these! Instead of buying a new couch, get an old one re-sprung and re-upholstered. This also supports local labour, and you end up with a far better product with longevity; perhaps even an heirloom. Or just throw a nice blanket over the thing.
• Collage a card for a friend/relative rather than buying a present. In the long run these mean far more to people than objects do. I know I don’t want anything bought new. It’s never right.
• Old second-hand books are a fantastic present. We should support local bookstores in general.
• Enjoy your improved surroundings. They will make you happy.