Dear Editor:
I write regarding your Oct. 12 story, Lower Capilano 'Village' Planned.
The story misses a number of significant aspects of the proposed village centre and confuses the ownership, unit numbers and geography of the development in a manner that would tend to unbalance the opinion and understanding of a casual reader.
The article fails to mention that significant community amenities will be provided to the neighbourhood through the development of Larco's Capwest site, not to mention the further benefits not yet determined from the Grouse Inn and other properties slated for much needed refurbishment.
A 22,000-square-foot community centre, a revitalized and landscaped Fullerton Avenue with safe legal sidewalks (there are none at present), desperately needed seniors rental apartments, a public plaza with seating and meetings spots will revive a neighbourhood made inclusive and accessible via improved trails and a pedestrian-oriented street.
All of these amenity components - for which neither the District of North Vancouver or its taxpayers have an appetite to pay for directly through increased taxes - are becoming available through the redevelopment of a site that has sat vacant for many years and offered no benefit to the community or enhanced the district tax base.
The revitalization of the motel properties would begin to offer tourists the level of accommodation they desire. Presently the owners of the Capilano motel properties watch busload after busload of tourists pass their doors on the way to the Capilano Suspension Bridge and then return to hotels in the downtown core.
The Capwest site, while comprising 4.35 acres, occupies a much smaller footprint than described by your reporter. Also, many of the 1,000 living units cited by the reporter would replace a large percentage of the dated motels that continue to sit at vacancy rates below 60 per cent.
While objections will remain from those who believe that the automobile should be accommodated above all, I wish they could have been available at the planning event to hear the young mother relate to me the decision made by herself and her husband to purchase and settle a few streets east of the proposed village centre.
For this young family, the prospect of the village centre with its promise of energy, social connection and community centre cemented their decision to purchase here, as a place with a future that meets their future and growing family needs.
Douglas Curran North Vancouver
