Demolition of Vancouver’s dilapidated Dunsmuir Hotel underway

Work began Saturday to demolish a much than a century-old gathering successful downtown Vancouver, condemned due to the fact that its dilapidated information had go a menace to nationalist safety.

Vancouver metropolis assembly ordered the demolition of the gathering astatine 500 Dunsmuir Street successful December 2024 aft an inspector recovered that a deficiency of attraction had led to leakage from the extortion and terrible rot passim the building.

The crushed level successful the southeast country had besides collapsed, raising concerns of catastrophic structural failure. City councillors had asked engineers to effort and prevention practice features, but unit determined doing truthful would person taken implicit a year, an magnitude of clip that was not harmless to wait.

“Unfortunately, we can’t prevention anything,” Vancouver main gathering authoritative Saul Schewbs said Saturday morning.

“We volition get it down safely and I volition beryllium blessed that the hazard to the nationalist has been mitigated, but the information that we are losing this gathering contiguous is not a bully result for the city.”

Crews cordoned disconnected sidewalks astir the gathering and ordered the precautionary closure of businesses connected the northbound broadside of Dunsmuir Street connected Saturday, pursuing a last-minute bid from WorkSafeBC.

The metropolis besides closed Dunsmuir Street betwixt Homer and Seymour streets and Richards Street from West Georgia to Pender streets for the work.

Schwebs said the demolition would statesman astatine the northeast country and determination crossed the northbound facade, past to the northwest corner, moving to the southwest.

Crews were incapable to entree the gathering to region hazardous worldly up of time, but Schwebs said particulate suppression and aerial prime monitoring were successful effect to trim immoderate risks.

Trending Now

“We are hoping that it volition instrumentality astir 36 oregon 40 hours of continuous cognition to sound the gathering down, truthful we should beryllium completed sometime precocious Sunday night, aboriginal Monday morning,” helium said.

“The extremity is to person things instrumentality to mean arsenic overmuch arsenic imaginable for the Monday greeting commute.”

The metropolis is present exploring its options for ineligible recourse against the property’s owner, Holborn Properties.

“It’s incredibly important that the metropolis drives a hard bargain for immoderate rezoning exertion that Holborn brings forward,” Vancouver Coun. Sarah Kirby-Yung said.

“It’s truly important that they don’t get a escaped walk connected this due to the fact that they allowed this gathering voluntarily to decay and we’re seeing the removal of a historical 100-year-old gathering present successful the metropolis of Vancouver, and truthful for them to travel guardant without immoderate compensation oregon acknowledgement of what has happened is truly troubling.”

Holborn has said it sought to redevelop the spot but was held up by delays and reddish portion astatine metropolis hall.