Is it time to rethink Robson Square?
After the public space was turned into a pot market by people openly selling marijuana and edibles, Charles Gauthier says it is a conversation worth having.
“If we can’t get a handle on it and do something more positive in the space, we should have the dialogue about opening it up to buses and trolleys again,” the president and CEO of the Downtown Vancouver BIA told the Courier. “If we leave it to its own devices, it’s got the potential to be a free-for-all and that’s not what we want.”
Gauthier says that in December, the number of marijuana vendors in the public space began to intensify, as did the complaints. “We saw the numbers grow and grow and grow,” he says. “We expressed concerns [to the city] that it was out of control. It wasn’t a friendly pot protest or friendly farmers’ market. It was a drug market. There were skirmishes and people being accosted…
“The space was no longer enjoyable and accessible to everyone.”
Of particular concern were the pot edibles, such as brownies and gummy bears, being sold in a place where children frequent. Even stores that are licensed to sell medical marijuana aren’t allowed to sell edibles.
Gauthier’s concerns are not just about pot vendors. “It needs to be a place where we’re not solicited to buy things,” he says. “Guerrilla marketers selling the latest and best in cold coffees is not what we want. [The late architect] Arthur Erickson would be shocked and [landscape designer] Cornelia Oberlander would be shocked…
“From our perspective it doesn’t align with what we envision the place to be.”
When the City of Vancouver announced plans in 2016 to permanently create the pedestrian-only plaza on the west side of the Vancouver Art Gallery, city manager Sadhu Johnston told the Courier that, “We want to do it because we think it’s the right thing to do. There’s not that many public gathering places downtown — plazas like that. So we want to create a really nice public spot that people can gather.”
At the time, the BIA expressed concerns about shutting off the 800-block between Howe and Hornby streets.
In retrospect, Gauthier says, “This is not what you want with ‘build it and they will come.’ It should be ‘build it and we will manage the space.’”
