I’ve had a few people post comments about a current court case in New Westminster on unrelated posts on this blog. The City of New West is involved in a case currently before the Supreme Court of B.C. relating to the former owner of the Windsor Hotel’s unsuccessful attempts to relocate a liquor store to 12th St. a few years ago, and the commenters I mention would like us to write about it. (Note: I haven’t approved the comments, as they are off-topic, and also because I am concerned about …

Last year New Westminster had the unfortunate honour of being the Lower Mainland community with the fewest participants in Earth Hour 2009. For one hour, people all around the world turn out their lights in a symbolic gesture to show awareness that there are limits to the Earth’s resources. New West, however, said, “Meh.”

I know some people out there aren’t on board with the City of New Westminster’s decision a while back to purchase the land along the waterfront of the Fraser River. But, like the Olympics, the decision was made, it’s inevitable, and you either have to quietly rage about it or just get on with trying to enjoy it.
Admittedly, I’ve always been one of the supporters of the decision to purchase the land and do something – anything – with it. I can’t stand looking at the wasteland that is that …

For those in the aching, angst filled years between 13-18, weekends are often filled with drinking, driving aimlessly around town, attending house parties, and being silly bored. In my youth, I spent countless hours fundraising for a youth centre, but I never did see the creation of a youth drop in centre while I was the age to enjoy it. So when I heard about the groundbreaking of a youth centre at Moody Park, I was excited to see not only the funds already allocated, but stuff actually happening.

There has been a wave of coverage about New Westminster by Vancouver media, in each case forming judgements about the city’s actions based on little more than a hunch. And frankly, in each case, the issues in New Westminster pale to similar issues in Vancouver itself.

If a New Westminster story is of enough interest to gain regional coverage, then it is also of enough merit for the media outlet to provide the same background checking and balance in coverage that they do for a Vancouver story.

Will’s post on Bill Chu and his organization Canadians For Reconciliation was picked up by the New Westminster Newsleader, and an edited version ran in the paper today as a guest column. Chu has been very successful using the power of the press release to get ink on historical mistreatment of Chinese Canadians in New Westminster, but as Will points out in his post, the other side of the story has been underrepresented in the media. If you’re here from the Newsleader, you may want to read the original, which …

Admittedly, I’m a little biased. I was recently appointed as the market manager for the Royal City Farmers’ Market, but I am so excited about the market’s reopening coming up!
The second incarnation of the Royal City Farmers’ Market is about to kick off June 25th with a special “Welcome to Summer Vacation” market, featuring kids’ activities including toys and crafts, a magician, face painting, and a special appearance by Mayor Wayne Wright who will start the market season off with a bang! The market runs June 25 to October 8 …

I am having a real problem writing this post. I am a white guy and as my ancestors came to New Westminster in 1909. I am one of the very, veeery few New Westminsterites whose oldsters may have actually participated in active or passive discrimination of Chinese Pioneers in this city’s past.
I fully understand my position in this story but as a bleeding heart liberal and as a BC elementary and secondary student whose history education consisted of French Canadians, Aboriginal Canadians, Chinese Canadians and South Asian Canadians to the …

This morning a Canadian astronaut blasted off successfully in the Soyuz spacecraft from Khazahkstan (low res video here, high res video here) as part of a mission called Expedition 20/21. This expedition is a Canadian milestone, as it is the first time a Canadian has taken part in a long term space mission. That Canadian’s name is Dr. Robert Thirsk, and although most of his growing up was elsewhere, Dr. Thirsk was born here in New Westminster. He has been in space before, and is a highly respected member of Canada’s …

New West’s Biggest Little Garden program has attracted attention from the LA Times, which has published an article about the innovative community gardening initiative. The program is the brainchild of Fraserside Living Well Program director Diane Cairns, who had to find a solution to increase local food production in a city where 70% of us live in apartment buildings. She wanted to revive the old ‘Victory Garden’ concept of growing your own fruits and vegetables – and sharing the harvest with your neighbours – but how could it take off …

In my mailbox today, I got a little piece of paper that appears to be junk mail. Upon further inspection, it was a blurb from the Metro Vancouver letting me know they are seeking to amend their solid waste plan, by exporting our garbage to the United States. The Cache Creek landfill, long one of the Lower Mainland’s dumping grounds, is closing down in 2010 and the powers that be apparently went, “Huh. Well. What are we going to do wih all that garbage?”
So they have two proposals they want …

Previously mentioned in Tenth To The Fraser’s guide to “blunch” in the Royal City, Amelia Restaurant on 12th St. is a local greasy spoon phenomenon. Vancouver Sun reporter Shelly Fralic, who I hear is also a New Westie, shared her review yesterday in the Sun:
One of the reasons it’s been a neighbourhood fixture for decades is the All-Day Breakfast Special which, for $3.50, delivers a pile of eggs, bacon/ham or sausage, perfectly crisp home-made pan fries and toast, or, if you’re hungrier than the average bear, a $4.95 Workman’s Special, …

Two of the three police officers who were alleged to have beaten, robbed and racially insulted a delivery man in Vancouver last week will be charged in the assault.
Charges of assault and possession of stolen property are recommended against an officer with the New Westminster police, while a charge of robbery is recommended against an officer with the West Vancouver force, Vancouver Police Chief Jim Chu told reporters Monday.
Chu said there was not enough evidence to recommend charges against a third officer from the Delta police department, who was initially …

A New West police officer was among three off-duty cops who were arrested for allegedly assaulting and robbing a man in Vancouver.
Three off-duty police officers from different suburban departments were arrested Wednesday on allegations they assaulted and robbed a man in Vancouver.
The Vancouver Police Department said the three officers were involved in an altercation with a 47-year-old newspaper delivery driver from Surrey, B.C.
Police declined to provide many details, citing the continuing investigation, but said they responded to a 911 call about a fight outside an upscale hotel in the city’s …

Image via Wikipedia

As we blogged earlier today, a fire has shut down the Pattullo Bridge. Now it seems it will not just be Monday’s commute that will be affected. It looks like the bridge could be shut down for up to six weeks. 
“Because of the severity of the damage, it will certainly be closed for a couple of days, but there is a strong likelihood that it will be closed for an extended period, perhaps as long as four to six weeks,” [TransLink spokesperson Ken Hardie] said.
Source: Pattullo Bridge closed …

If you are one of the 80,000 commuters who cross the Pattullo Bridge to get to work, brace yourself: you may want to plan to work from home, time-shift or take a sick day on Monday. One of the trestles caught fire early this morning, and the bridge is closed to traffic until further notice.
“It’s heavily charred,” [TransLink spokesperson] Ken Hardie said. “When the blaze first broke out … reports were that there were flames shooting up from underneath the bridge on both sides.”
TransLink engineers are assessing the bridge’s structure, …

New Westminster police are putting their snazzy new retro-styled cruisers through their paces. It’s seems like it’s been an unusually busy – and hazardous – week for local law enforcement officers. 
Last Sunday, cops were pepper-sprayed by two youthful ne’er-do-wells near 5th Ave. and 7th St.  The attack happened while arresting the pair, following a call about an attempted theft. One officer was temporarily blinded, but neither teen got away.
On Monday, suspects in a stolen car rammed two police vehicles after the cops trapped them in the McDonald’s drive-thru on McBride. Police …

The City of New West has received a grant from the feds to boost green transportation in the city. We’re already fairly well served by transit, and our small footprint makes New West more walkable than many places. The funds, which will be matched by the city, look like they will target awareness programs. 
The city is receiving a $120,000 grant from the federal government for environmentally-friendly transportation programs to get people out of their cars and encourage walking and cycling to local schools. The funding, matched by the city, also …

If you live near the 800 block of McBride, you may have heard a sound like a gunshot early Monday morning. Canadian Press has the scoop on what happened:
NEW WESTMINSTER, B.C. — A woman is recovering from what police in New Westminster, B.C. are calling a minor injury after she was shot in the shoulder as officers tried to arrest four people in a suspected stolen car.
The incident happened at around 1 a.m. Monday morning when two police cruisers tried to box in the possibly stolen car in the drive-thru …

There’s an ugly “sheen” on the Fraser right now, and a strong smell, caused by a burst pipe at a CN rail yard in Surrey. The spill was contained by cleanup crews from several environmental organizations. The diesel may have made its way downriver as far as Queensborough.
Yoss Leclerc, harbour master with Port Metro Vancouver, said the diesel came from a CN rail yard in Surrey, where a land-based pipe ruptured and spilled diesel into the river. The pipe ruptured Monday afternoon and was stopped within an hour.
“There was a …

Shocking details have come out regarding a recent violent break-in in New West. The victim was an apartment manager – a single mother who was sleeping next to her four-year-old child – when the thugs came in and beat her, demanding the building’s rent money.
A home invasion in New Westminster has left a single mother living in fear and in dire financial straits.
A man and a woman burst into her ground-floor apartment around 12:30 a.m. on Jan. 3, looking for money.
They laid a severe beating on her that required 43 …

A shipment of lacrosse sticks, warm-up jerseys, balls and assorted New Westminster Salmonbellies paraphernalia arrived on the base last month. They got to open it Christmas Eve.
“They were really excited,” said Tracy Brown, a Burnaby resident who got it all started.
“It was the hockey players that got their hands on it first. Some of them had never tried it so they all had the T-shirts on and went out to the rink right away and started playing with it.”
Brown has a friend whose brother, Brent Vanover, is a rabid Salmonbellies …

New Westminster has a winery. I had no idea.
Pacific Breeze Winery, on Stewardson, is a small operation run by a couple of passionate oenophiles who began making wine in their basement with the support of a local wine club.
Here’s how Frank Gregus and Maurice Hamilton describe their work in a recent Province article:
We like to call ourselves a garage winery. We produce big, bold and powerful wines in our commercial warehouse in New Westminster. It’s high-end, high value, unique, handcrafted wine we make in small lots.
 - via Garage winery is …

When the first fluffy flakes fell before Christmas, New Westminster was postcard-pretty and everywhere I went I could hear people humming to themselves “… where the treetops glisten and children listen to hear sleigh bells in the snow … ”
Once Snowmageddon hit in full force, it wasn’t so cute anymore.
A local blogger, Daniel from CityCaucus.com, was one of many of us who felt frustrated by the two-foot snowdrifts that remained on side streets in the days following Snowmageddon 2008:
Admittedly, even by Canadian standards we did receive a lot of snow. …

Shiloh Sixth Avenue church offered a special “Blue Christmas” service yesterday for people coping with loss and grief. Aside from a minor flood in our basement this season due to a burst pipe (eek!) and the occasional family tiff we have not yet been faced with adversity at Christmastime. We have been lucky. I imagine for those who do experience tragedy at this time of year, it must be especially hard because everyone around you seems so happy. Songs of joy and peace, and all that.
Writes the Burnaby Now :
For those …