History
The first Georgia Street Viaduct was built between 1913 and 1915. The narrow structure included streetcar tracks that were never used. It was a poorly built structure which, over the years, threatened pedestrians below with falling pieces of concrete. At one point, every second lamppost was removed to remove weight. It was replaced in 1972 by the current viaduct, which is structurally separated and contains three lanes for each direction of traffic.
The current Georgia Viaduct was envisioned in the early 1970s as forming part of an extensive freeway system for Vancouver. However, communities were opposed to the idea of demolishing structures to build the freeway system and the plan was scrapped. The freeways would have required demolishing buildings in neighborhoods including Strathcona, the Downtown Eastside and Chinatown. A predominantly African community called Hogan's Alley was bulldozed in building the viaduct.
Read more about this topic: Georgia Viaduct
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“A people without history
Is not redeemed from time, for history is a pattern
Of timeless moments.”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)
“There is nothing truer than myth: history, in its attempt to “realize” myth, distorts it, stops halfway; when history claims to have “succeeded” this is nothing but humbug and mystification. Everything we dream is “realizable.” Reality does not have to be: it is simply what it is.”
—Eugène Ionesco (b. 1912)
“Systematic philosophical and practical anti-intellectualism such as we are witnessing appears to be something truly novel in the history of human culture.”
—Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)