Vancouver aims to "end homelessness by 2015". Officials have been working over the years to reduce the city’s homelessness, and in July passed an ambitious plan that targets eliminating street homelessness by 2015 and creating nearly 40,000 new units of social, rental, and condo housing by 2021.
The plan is aimed at building multiple types of housing to address shortages, but the first three years focus mainly on supportive and social housing. It calls for 3,650 units of such housing, 1,700 of which are already funded and in either the planning or construction phase. According to city councilor Kerry Jang, the need for this type of supportive housing has skyrocketed in recent years.
posted by modernnomad
on Oct 24, 2011 -
96 comments
This is how it will happen. Let’s pick a day: June 22, 2012. It’s a gorgeous Friday afternoon in the Pacific Northwest, 75 degrees and sunny. It’s been raining for weeks, and in Seattle the freeways are jammed with people fleeing the city to enjoy the rare sunshine. Same story in Portland. Out on the coast, the beach towns are thrumming with tourists.
How a monster earthquake and resulting tsunami would affect the coast and cities of the Pacific NW.
posted by jontyjago
on Aug 26, 2011 -
152 comments
What would a pro sports playoff drive be without a fan-written tribute song? For those anticipating Game 7 of the Stanley Cup playoffs tonight, here for your enjoyment is
Canucks Waleyan Ne, a Bhangra song written by members of Vancouver's large South Asian community. English lyrics available
here (pdf), pasted below the fold for your convenience.
[more inside]
posted by PercussivePaul
on Jun 15, 2011 -
81 comments
"A
short film chronicling the legendary Johnny Canuck, his years of triumph and turmoil, and how they mirror the history of the Vancouver Canucks franchise and their Stanley Cup run in 2010-2011." [SLYT]
[more inside]
posted by Felicity Rilke
on Jun 9, 2011 -
28 comments
The Complaints Choir phenomenon, started by the Finnish artists Tellervo Kalleinen and Oliver Kochta-Kalleinen, has
spread all over the world since
last we paid it any attention, from
Birmingham to
Helsinki,
Hamburg,
St. Petersburg,
Poikkilaakso,
Bodø,
Penn State,
Canada,
Juneau,
Gabriola Island,
Sointula,
Jerusalem,
Melbourne,
Budapest,
Malmö,
Chicago,
Florence,
Copenhagen,
Vancouver (
2),
Philadelphia,
Sundbyberg,
Milano,
Åland,
Hong Kong,
Tokyo,
Rotterdam,
Basel,
Umeå,
Ljubljana,
Gdansk,
Arizona State University,
Washington, DC,
Horace Mann School,
Durham-Chapel Hill,
Auckland,
Toronto theatre students,
Kortrijk,
Cairo (
2),
St. Pölten,
Maribor,
Port Coquitlam,
Ústí nad Labem,
Columbus &
Kauhajoki (
2,
3,
4,
5,
6,
7,
8). For more information, including a
9 step guide to forming your own complaints choir, go to the
Complaints Choir website. Finally, here's the
Singapore Complaints Choir, whose performance was banned by the Singapore government.
posted by Kattullus
on Nov 19, 2010 -
40 comments
Want to get to that town in the next state on the cheap? Sure, there's Greyhound, but it's hardly a bargain at $32 for a journey from Seattle to Portland. When you really need to save the cash, use
Epic Transit Journeys wiki to plot your route entirely on local transit carriers, allowing you to
get to Stumptown for only $11.50 and a paltry five transfers. For a truly epic journey, cross international borders for the
trip to Vancouver, BC, which includes a lovely 2.9 mi stroll across the border.
Oran Viriyincy's travelogue of this trip includes lots of photos of buses and trains, and the border official's shocked reaction.
posted by grouse
on Nov 9, 2010 -
42 comments
Bloodied but Unbowed "... chronicles, for the first time anywhere, the late 1970's/early 1980's Vancouver punk rock scene. The documentary tells a tale of rebellion and music — a fiercely independent scene created from nothing."
The full documentary can be seen
here.
posted by squeak
on Oct 12, 2010 -
31 comments
Insite, operated by Vancouver Coastal Health, operates North America’s first legal supervised injection site. Slate writer offers
harrowing illustrations of the people who go there and the neighborhood they live in.
posted by elder18
on Feb 2, 2010 -
38 comments
NextBus uses GPS to tell you the predicted time of the next bus. Google maps show buses in real time, and you can get updates on your phone/PDA. The coverage is limited to certain agencies within the US, so these other sites might be useful:
Hopstop covers subways and buses in NYC, Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, DC, and more. (
mobile version)
Google Transit has many US metro areas in addition to Canada, Europe, and Japan.
(previously) Many more locations inside.
[more inside]
posted by desjardins
on Oct 21, 2008 -
36 comments
This morning in Vancouver, volunteers handed out hundreds of disposable cameras, available free to any low-income resident of the city's Downtown Eastside (
DTES) neighbourhood. Pictures in the returned cameras will be entered in this year's "
Hope in Shadows" competition, with winners getting prizes and one of 12 spots in next year's calendar. (It will be sold by specially-trained low-income folks, who keep half their profits.) Run by
Pivot, a local legal activism group, "Hope in Shadows" is a
succesful and "
innovative empowerment through art" project and a chance for the residents of the DTES to define their community -- one most often defined by its
poverty,
addictions,
violence and
disease.
Previous winners: 2004, 2005 [1] [2], 2006
posted by docgonzo
on Jun 9, 2007 -
13 comments
