Stanley Park

For other uses, see Stanley Park (disambiguation).

Location of Stanley Park within Vancouver.

File:Stanley Park Aerial.jpg

An aerial view of Stanley Park. Brockton Point is on the right and the body of water at the edge of the city is Lost Lagoon. The Lions' Gate Bridge is at the top connecting to West Vancouver.

Stanley Park is a 4 km² (1 000 acres) urban park bordering downtown Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The park features many huge Douglas-fir, Western Redcedar, and Western Hemlock trees. These trees can be up to 100 metres (300 ft) tall and over a hundred years old. It is estimated that 8 million people visit the park yearly. The Project for Public Spaces ranked Stanley Park as the sixteenth best park in the world and sixth best in North America [1].

History

Stanley Park as seen from West Vancouver. The Lions' Gate Bridge can be seen to the left.

In 1886, Vancouver’s City Council agreed to petitioning the Government of Canada to lease the large, 1,000 acre (4 km²) military reserve on the peninsula to the west. This area had been logged many times since the first pioneers settled in the area and required some work before it was presentable. At Brockton Point, the city’s first graveyard was closed for the development of the park. Soon after establishment of this official "greenspace", the Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation, was created.

On September 27, 1888 the park was officially opened, where it was named after Lord Stanley, Governor General of Canada at the time. The next year on October 29, Lord Stanley himself, the first Governor General to visit British Columbia, officially dedicated the park. An observer at the event wrote:

A statue of Lord Stanley at the quoted moment.

Lord Stanley threw his arms to the heavens, as though embracing within them the whole of one thousand acres of primeval forest, and dedicated it 'to the use and enjoyment of peoples of all colours, creeds, and customs, for all time'.

In 1908, 20 years after the first petition for the lease, the federal ministry of defence renewed the lease of Stanley Park to Vancouver for 99 years, renewable (till 2007).

In 1994, when plans were developed to upgrade Stanley Park's Zoo, Vancouver voters decided in a referendum to phase out the zoo. The zoo began much earlier with a bear kept on a chain, but grew into a collection of over 50 animals, including snakes, wolves, emus, buffalo, kangaroos, monkeys and Humboldt penguins. The Stanley Park Zoo closed completely in December 1997 after the last remaining animal, a polar bear named Tuk, died at age 36. He had remained after the other animals had left because of his old age. The polar bear pit, often criticised by Animal rights activists, was converted into a demonstration salmon spawning hatchery.

The Vancouver Park Board now maintains over 192 parks at over 12.78 km² of land, but Stanley Park remains, by far, the largest.

Attractions

Seawall

Seawall at Stanley Park. The Lions' Gate Bridge can be seen in the background.

Construction of the 8.8 km (5.5 mile) trail around the park began in 1918, but not declared finished until September 26, 1971. James "Jimmy" Cunningham, a master mason, dedicated 32 years of his life to the construction of the seawall from 1931 until his retirement in 1963. Even after he retired, Cunningham kept coming down (once in his pyjamas) to keep an eye on the wall's progress, until his death at 85 on September 29, 1963.

Unable to obtain a licence to reproduce Copenhagen's The Little Mermaid statue, the authorities of Vancouver selected a modern version with diving mask, wetsuit, and swimfins.

Since then many more additions to the walkway have been built. The current unofficial Seawall starts at Canada Place, runs around Stanley Park, along English Bay beach, around False Creek, and down to Kitsilano Beach in the south. This is a favourite destination for walking, running, cycling, and inline skating. There are two paths, one for inline skaters and cyclists and the other for pedestrians. The section around the park is one-way for cyclists and inline skaters, running counter-clockwise.

Miniature railway

The train is an exact replica of Locomotive Engine #374, which pulled the first transcontinental passenger train into Vancouver in 1886. The ride lasts 15 minutes, traveling though what used to be parts of the Stanley Park Zoo. For a few days around Christmas and Halloween, the area around entire length of track is dressed up in lights, and other decorations.

Deadman's Island

Deadman's Island is a small island to the south of the Stanley Park in Coal Harbour. The naval station/museum, HMCS Discovery, is stationed there. Also, training for RCSCC Captain Vancouver is on this island during Wednesday evenings and sometimes Mondays.

Deadman's Island

In 1792 Captain George Vancouver, in his description of Burrard Inlet, mentioned a small island off the shore of what is now Stanley Park. Many years later one of Vancouver's first white settlers, John Morton, visited the island in 1862. Morton discovered hundreds of redcedar boxes lashed to the upper boughs of trees and one had evidently fallen and broken to reveal a jumble of bones and a tassel of black hair. The island was the tree burial grounds of the Squamish First Nation. Undeterred, Morton took a fancy to the island and attempted to acquire it. He changed his mind when Chief Capilano pointed out that the island was "dead ground" and was a scene of a bloody battle between rival tribes in which some two hundred warriors were killed. It's said that "fire-flower" grew up at once where they fell, frightening the foe into retreat.

During the 1860s to early 1880s, early settlers along Burrard Inlet used the island, along with Brockton Point, as a burial ground and cemetery. Burials ceased when the Mountain View Cemetery opened in 1887, just after Vancouver had become a city. In 1930 the island was offered to the city by the federal government to be used as a park, but a park never materialized.

Two Spirits sculpture

Slightly hidden, this sculpture is found just west of the crossroads of trails that enter into Stanley Park from the swimming pool located at Second Beach. The sculpture was created in the mid-1990's and depicts the silhouetted head of an aboriginal person against its own image. The sculpture was chiseled into a stump that remains from one the large trees in the area.

Other attractions

• Lions' Gate Bridge
• Vancouver Aquarium Marine Science Centre
• The 9 O'Clock Gun
• Siwash rock
• Plaque commemorating the wreck of the Beaver, the northwest's first steamship
• English Bay Beach, Second Beach, Third Beach
• Beaver Lake
• Prospect Point
• Brockton Point, Brockton Point lighthouse
• Pitch and putt golf course
• The Rose Garden
• The Children's Farmyard
• Malkin Bowl
• Hollow Tree

External links

• Map of Stanley Park
• Vancouver Parks web site

References

• History of Metropolitan Vancouver
• Deadmans's Island history from HMCS Discovery website.
• Vancouver Residents Say No to Stanley Park Zoo, Edmonton Journal 4/28/1996
• Bears, sea lions for aquarium? Vancouver Courier, January 11th 2001