After campaigners for a new museum fell short of their $5-million fundraising goal, City of North Vancouver council has sent plans for a new North Vancouver Museum in the Pipe Shop on the Shipyards the way of the Flamborough Head.
The mind boggles when it comes to the questions this raises.
Where is the museum to go now? And on what timeline? What does this mean for the city’s agreement with the District of North Vancouver, which is a funding partner? What does it mean for the federal grant offered?
What does the museum’s leadership say to the people who donated on the understanding the new museum was to take its place on the central waterfront?
What will come of the historic Pipe Shop in the Shipyards?
If we’re willing to drop this critical piece of the Roger Brooks vision that council has been using as its blueprint, what other major components can we pick apart? The museum was a big strength in the something-for-everyone aspirations for Lot 5.
The plans for the museum and the fundraising needed for it were indeed ambitious. Perhaps too much so. There were questions as to whether the museum would succeed or flounder if it moved into the Pipe Shop, but giving the museum a prime location on what is destined to be the jewel of the North Shore’s public spaces was its best chance at success.
We’d like to see some Plan Bs sooner rather than later because an awful lot of time and energy has been spent on the proposed museum only to have it collapse at this late hour.
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