Les Leyne
Times Colonist
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
Maybe the cute little monkeys weren't such a bad idea after all.
Or maybe we should go full circle, blow the overblown map up, and turn the Crystal Garden into a salt-water swimming pool, like it was in the bygone age when the building was a real attraction.
Overwrought monkey-lovers reacted with horror two years ago when the perennially money-losing tropical jungle was shut down to make way for the slick new B.C. Experience.
They held a vigil of hope and protested the lack of time for "closure" when they shut the doors for the final time a few hours early.
And some of the diehard monkey supporters were first out of the gate when it came to predicting failure of the new attraction that took its place.
As someone who cast a skeptical eye on their vigil, their need for closure and their demands that taxpayers keep shelling out to subsidize an incongruous conservatory that hadn't made a nickel in years, let me be the first to acknowledge that their dire warnings might be accurate.
Barring some kind of miraculous rescue plan in the next week or so, it looks like the B.C. Experience will turn out to be a forgettable bust. The name might eventually wind up as a metaphorical synonym for B.C. experiences that paying customers would prefer to forget -- like the fast ferries, the Vancouver Grizzlies and the Bill Vander Zalm and Glen Clark governments.
The disclosure yesterday that the B.C. Experience is filing for creditor protection a scant 11 weeks after opening for business reactivates the debate that ran for a year or more over the publicly owned facility. Anyone else got any bright ideas? It also puts up for debate another question: Why does this town have so much trouble accomplishing things? The capital is about two generations behind the times in getting sewage treatment. It took two tries and years and years of arguing to get a new arena built and (almost) finished.
It took years of debate to agree on a plan for the Songhees redevelopment, which turned into a barren, sterile maze. It takes two years to approve a new hotel in Oak Bay. It's been 12 years since Victoria actually set its sights on a civic goal and accomplished it without a meltdown somewhere along the way.
That was the Commonwealth Games, and even that wasn't without its difficulties.
You can't fault the backers of the B.C. Experience for at least trying something. They rolled the dice and sank millions of dollars -- of their own money -- into what was going to be the centrepiece of a rejuvenated tourism market. But a lot of the congratulations extended their way during the grand opening a few weeks ago were people being polite.
There was a palpable sense of disappointment among large parts of the throng over what turned out to be a big public space with a momentarily diverting map and a cluster of terminals on which people could play on a variation of Google Earth.
It was just 11 weeks ago that Premier Gordon Campbell took to the lectern on a balcony at one end high above the giant map. (If the map is according to scale, in real life he would have been floating about 30,000 feet over Osoyoos.) Looking down on British Columbia, waving his hands around and intoning how beautiful and good everything was that lay below, he reminded me and some of the other religiously minded media hacks who were there of God himself. Given that Olympic overruns are the order of the day, he uttered what might turn out to be an ominous remark. "It allows you to think for a moment about what British Columbia could be," he said from on high.
Based on the project's uncertain status, though, I'm thinking about what Victoria could be.
And it could be a lot better than this -- a place that has got by on its geography and climate for so long it runs into enormous difficulties when it has to do something on its own.
There was a good debate for a few weeks at the height of the tourism season about whether social problems like street people are to blame for a perceived tourism slowdown.
The B.C. Experience should widen that argument beyond panhandlers.
Victoria needs a vision and some people to execute it. Fast, before Langford overtakes it.
Just So You Know: The next new idea for the Crystal Garden, now that it's been seismically-upgraded and reglazed courtesy of the taxpayers, will probably be a casino.
That might or might not fly, but should be worth another year's worth of arguments.
But what about the map? Best idea of the day: Set it up in the legislature.
It's not like the B.C. Liberals are using the building.