Proposal calls for towers ringing new and old psychiatric facilities

Darah Hansen
Sun

The B.C. government is planning a multibillion-dollar development with dozens of residential towers on the historic Riverview lands in Coquitlam, according to internal government documents obtained by The Vancouver Sun.

The resulting community — to be called the Coquitlam Commons — would include everything from facilities for the mentally ill to high-end market housing.

The concept calls for more than a dozen residential towers of 20 storeys or higher on the eastern part of the 98-hectare site, which has been home to the Riverview psychiatric hospital for more than a century.

At least 25 more “mid-range” towers are included in the proposals, more than half of which would rise to 15 storeys or higher.

The plans include at least 10 additional condominium and apartment buildings.

Riverview psychiatric facilities, both existing and new ones, would be scattered in the centre of the property.

The plan could generate billions of dollars in real estate deals, with millions potentially flowing to the province.

The documents offer the first detailed glimpse of what the province is considering for the site.

In the 1990s, the province started shuttering parts of Riverview, formerly B.C.’s major institution for the mentally ill. Newer specialized mental health centres are being developed in health authorities across B.C.

The Sun reported last summer that a large development was being planned for the property, prompting the government to admit in July it was looking to trade land to private developers in return for a share of the profits to bolster social housing supplies.

At that time, the proposal called for as many as 7,000 residences to be built. Since then, the plan appears to have increased in scale, and Coquitlam councillors suggested 10,000 or more residential units could be in the works.

Housing Minister Rich Coleman downplayed the draft documents on Wednesday, insisting any development of the site is “a long ways down the road.”

But he confirmed his office is planning to put a proposed site design out to tender to explore the “opportunities and options.”

He said the public could get a chance to weigh in on the issue “over the new few months.”

Right now, he said, “there is nothing designed for Riverview.”

The fact the government continues to plan for residential development at Riverview came as news to Coquitlam Mayor Maxine Wilson, whose council has vocally opposed any market development of the land.

The city is poised to give consideration to a resolution in support of maintaining Riverview as a haven for the mentally ill, as well as preserving its historic architecture and protecting one of the last major green spaces in the Vancouver region.

Wilson said Wednesday she expects to be supported by surrounding Metro municipalities.

“We all see it as the one place in the Lower Mainland that can house those with mental illness humanely, and allow for their reintegration into the community,” she said.

Wilson said her council has no intention of granting any rezoning of the hospital lands to allow for residential development, and is banking on previous assurances from Coleman that the government will not override Coquitlam’s wishes.

New Democrat MLA Diane Thorne (Coquitlam-Maillardville) said she’s heard the same promises, but doesn’t believe them.

“It’s a done deal, that’s what I’m afraid of,” she said.

Thorne said her concerns about the future of Riverview grew more urgent earlier this month when the government resurrected interest in pursuing a southeastern route for the proposed Evergreen rapid-transit line, with projected annual ridership figures of 33.3 million by 2031.

Those ridership numbers could only be achieved through heavy development of Riverview, said Thorne.

Coquitlam council favours a northeastern route chosen earlier by TransLink for the proposed line. It has projected ridership figures of 31.8 million by 2031.

Councillors openly questioned the province’s projections for the southeastern route at a meeting Monday.

“That’s basically Riverview being developed,” Coun. Fin Donnelly said of the southeastern route.

Coun. Lou Sekora said it could only mean the development of 10,000 or more housing units at Riverview, adding “I wouldn’t support that.”

Thorne said her heart sank again when Tuesday’s throne speech referred to plans to build a new facility to house mentally ill patients at the site of the former Willingdon youth detention centre in Burnaby.

She worried that could spell a future downsizing of psychiatric services at Riverview.

“There are just too many things happening here,” she said.

Health Minister George Abbott said the plans for Willingdon will add to the province’s existing mental health services.

The proposed 100-bed facility will specifically serve patients who suffer from both mental illness and drug and alcohol addictions.

© The Vancouver Sun 2008

 

Miro Cernetig
Sun

A walk through the lush, rolling grounds of the Riverview psychiatric hospital is still an unsettling trip down memory lane, evoking a darker age in the care of the mentally ill.

It’s a welcome brush stroke of pastoral green in Metro Vancouver’s suburban sprawl, with large lawns and a world-renowned collection of temperate-climate trees known as the arboretum. On that level, it’s idyllic.

But the eye is inevitably drawn to the crumbling buildings, massive examples of faux-Victorian institutionalism that dominate the grounds.

They are dark and dank, full of asbestos and disturbing memories that bring to mind the hellish asylum in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.

On a cold, grey day, I almost thought I glimpsed Nurse Ratched doing her rounds behind the iron-barred windows, clutching a ring of keys for doors leading into — but rarely out of — the asylum.

That’s the sort of image — one that was accurate not so long ago for how society dealt with the mentally ill — that nobody wants for the new Riverview.

We all want to treat the mentally ill with humanity and give them the hope the Victorian-era asylums smothered.

But in the age Nimbyism, when even small group homes often encounter the Not-In-My-Backyard reflex, it’s easier said than done to remake a massive old asylum. That’s why the provincial government is keeping the lid on what will be an entirely new approach to this social policy conundrum.

The idea the province has been quietly developing in private — plans have been circulating within the government — is modelled after what was done with an old asylum, similar to Riverview, in London, England.

Known today as Springfield Hospital, it initially opened in 1841 as the Surrey County Pauper Lunatic Asylum. The name said it all. Not unlike Riverview in its darkest years, it became notorious for the lock-them-in-and-throw-away-the-key philosophy to treating the mentally ill. Patients were in essence excluded from the rest of us. No wonder these buildings still seem to radiate bad karma.

But a heartening new approach was taken at Springfield. Why not bring the community into the asylum?

So the old Victorian buildings were redeveloped, a residential community of condos and apartments was built on — and around — the old asylum grounds. And the profits were used to build a modern psychiatric facility weaved into a real-world community. Patients’ neighbours will be more than just the dreaded Nurse Ratched.

“Historically, Springfield Hospital‘s purpose was to facilitate the exclusion of the mentally ill [from society], and that was defined very broadly,” Andrew Simpson, an official at the facility, has explained to The Journal of Addiction and Mental Health. “Now . . . we are historically reclaiming the asylum. We are quite deliberately building a new bit of London around the asylum, reversing the process of exclusion.”

It’s a marvelous and humane concept. Rich Coleman, the B.C. minister spearheading this project, deserves kudos for making the bold and progressive move to improve the lives of our most vulnerable. But there may be real questions of scale to deal with. Is the minister thinking too big?

The draft of the plans for Riverview obtained by The Vancouver Sun indicates Coleman is intent on a super-sized version of the Springfield model.

The heritage principles are there. There’s going to be complete preservation of the arboretum, and refits of many of the landmark buildings. But there’s also a multi-billion-dollar, multi-year building plan. There will be phalanxes of 20-plus-storey apartment towers, and dozens of smaller ones. My understanding is Coleman is even seeking higher density than on the draft obtained by The Sun, to maximize the taxpayers’ profit from the real-estate development.

What we’re talking about is something in the neighbourhood of 10,000 residences. That means 20,000 to 30,000 new residents for Coquitlam. Updated numbers floating around the government suggest about 2,000 of the residences would be for the mentally ill. They would live in the revamped institution, either as patients or benefitting from low-rise assisted-living lodges that would be scattered around the condos, a village square with retail store and even a school.

The government appears to be calling this Coquitlam Commons, a nice title that suggests the quaint British village model. But this, let’s face it, will virtually be a new town in the middle of what is now a sprawl of suburban homes. A new town, it should be added, with a sizeable part of British Columbia‘s mentally ill.

That will inevitably raise questions about security.

London‘s Springfield is justifiably hailed as a triumph, but there have been serious problems. Last year, the hospital was criticized for giving “too much liberty” to a patient who walked out of the ward and murdered a 50-year-old banker cycling in a park. In 2006, a fitness instructor was murdered by another of the hospital’s patients.

When it comes to marketing Riverview as a place to live, buyers are going to want assurances that won’t happen here.

There are also major urban planning issues. This massive makeover of Riverview raises the question of increased traffic congestion. Don’t be surprised if we see the creation of a SkyTrain stop in the new Riverview, once the new Evergreen commuter rail line gets built. I’ll bet that will be one of the deal-breaking demands of Coquitlam’s council if they embrace — or are forced by the province to accept — this plan.

In his old life, Coleman, B.C.’s minister in charge of social housing, used to work in the real estate business. As a cabinet minister, however, he’s now carving out deals on a scale he probably never imagined.

In fact, Coleman is probably only getting started. Riverview is probably just our first taste of how much this man might remake the urban landscape. What most people don’t know is that one of Coleman’s jobs is overseeing billions of dollars worth of provincial social-housing assets, many of them handed to the province by the federal government.

Once, when I asked him what he had planned for that property, he said two words: “More density.”

And that — along with the prospect of a cutting-edge psychiatric hospital — is what he’s aiming to deliver.

© The Vancouver Sun 2008

 

Derrick Penner
Sun

Ivanhoe waits for Mongolian decision

Company a buy but valuation cut, analyst says

For Ivanhoe Mines Ltd. and Mongolian Prime Minister Sanjaa Bayar, it is not a question of if, but rather a question of when the Mongolian government will approve an investment agreement for the Vancouver-based mining firm’s massive Oyu Tolgoi copper mine.

However, that question of when — and whether parliamentary elections in Mongolia will mean further delays — prompted analysts at the Canadian branch of investment bank UBS on Tuesday to decrease their valuation of the company.

UBS analyst Tony Lesiak still rates Ivanhoe a “buy”, but cut his valuation of Ivanhoe to $15.19 a share, and UBS’ target price to $15 from $19 because of the possibility approval of the agreement with the Mongolian government may be delayed, pushing the timeline for Ivanhoe to build Oyu Tolgoi and put it into production out to mid-2011 from early 2010.

Ivanhoe Mines shares declined 44 cents to close at $9.72 in trading Tuesday on the Toronto Stock Exchange. The 52-week high was $17.48, achieved last July 9, its low was $8.50 on Jan. 21.

The company points to a December letter to Bayar and Rio Tinto, Ivanhoe’s partner in developing the mine, that states that completing the long-awaited agreement with Ivanhoe before the election is one of the prime minister’s priorities.

However, in his report Lesiak said news reports from Mongolia indicate there is uncertainty over whether a draft agreement drawn up last June has been pulled back, and how much work still needs to be done to bring it to conclusion.

Lesiak said he doubts an agreement can be finalized before the election, although investment analysts who cover Ivanhoe are of divided opinions on that question.

On Jan. 30, BMO analyst Craig Miller upgraded his recommendation on the stock to a speculative outperform based on “a high probability that the Oyu Tolgoi investment agreement gets ratified” during the first-half of this year.

He valued Ivanhoe at $16.56 per share in his Jan. 30 note.

However, regardless of the lack of consensus, analysts do not disagree that Oyu Tolgoi is an extremely valuable asset that the Mongolian government wants to see developed.

Lesiak called the mine “a very scarce asset” in his report.

“Oyu Tolgoi is one of the largest and most lucrative mining development projects in the world,” Lesiak wrote.

According to data from Bloomberg, three of five analysts that cover Ivanhoe rated it a “buy”, one rated it a “hold”, and one as a “sell.”

The outlook for copper, at least in the medium term, is for strong prices because continued growth of the Chinese economy is expected to outweigh the decline of copper consumption in the U.S., where the possibility of a recession is growing.

“Consumption of copper in China is probably double what it is in the U.S. in terms of its share of world consumption,” said Patricia Mohr, vice-president of industry and commodities research at Scotiabank.

And China still has big investments in copper-intensive infrastructure projects, she added. Spending on consumer products is also still rising in China, which will require the use of more copper.

Don Lindsay, CEO of Vancouver-based miner Teck Cominco, said during a conference call on Tuesday that a drop in U.S. consumption hasn’t phased world markets.

“We have a significant slowdown in the U.S., probably a recession, which historically would have a major effect on metal prices,” he said.

“But so far, at least in copper and the outlook in metallurgical coal related to steel, it doesn’t seem to be having much effect.”

© The Vancouver Sun 2008