The new skateboard and bike park planned for Topaz Park moved a step closer to reality Tuesday after the City of Victoria selected a world-renowned company to design and build the $3-million . . .
VICTORIA The City of Victoria has picked a Vancouver-based team to lead design and construction of a multi-million dollar skate and bike park in Topaz Park. The group, New Line Skateparks, was chosen after the city held a public competition to head the $3 million project. According to the city, New Line has experience building more than 300 park projects across Canada and the world over the past 20 years, including in the U.S., Australia, Europe and Asia. The New Line team is made up of landscape architects, engineers, community outreach specialists, construction professionals and arborists. The city adds that many of the team members are also high-level skateboarders and BMX/mountain biking enthusiasts.
New Greater Victoria Coalition to End Homelessness social enterprise model aims to alleviate youth homelessness
Photo provided.
In late January, the Greater Victoria Coalition to End Homelessness (GVCEH) formally announced the launch of a new social enterprise model that will provide housing, services, and job opportunities for up to 30 unhoused youth living in Greater Victoria. The project is youth-led and represents the culmination of over three years of planning, first by the City of Victoria, and then by GVCEH in partnership with BC Housing.
GVCEH Research Project Manager Jarvis Neglia says that the ball really started rolling in 2016 when Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps saw the significant overrepresentation of youth in the latest Greater Victoria Homelessness Point-In-Time Count. The survey also showed that many of the adult members of the city’s unhoused community had been on and off the streets since they were youth or young adults.
B.C. Housing to reopen Victoria arena as emergency homeless shelter, but not until March
The province of B.C. has signed a lease for the Save-On-Foods Memorial Centre arena in Victoria to be used as temporary housing for the city’s homeless population, but the shelter won’t be open until the worst of winter weather has ended in March.
Social Sharing
Agency says lease starts on Feb. 1, but facility won t start operating until a month later
Posted: Jan 28, 2021 1:24 PM PT | Last Updated: January 28
The Save-On-Foods Memorial Centre in Victoria was first set up as an emergency response centre last summer, using pop-up pods for homeless people.(Twitter/David Eby)