A heavy concrete panel fell only a meter from a person sleeping in Pigeon Park Wednesday morning, from a decrepit building that is owned by one of the biggest developers in the city.
Pieces of the Merchants Bank, at 1 W. Hastings Street, could be seen littering the ground where a number of Downtown Eastside residents usually gather.
City of Vancouver staff fenced off the area, posting “do not occupy” signs, and said engineers would be called in to inspect the park area and the building.
The city says it is too early to know what the investigation will uncover, and too early to know what it will mean for the future of the building.
At the time the three-storey stone building was built, in 1913, it sat at the crossroads for downtown Vancouver business and commerce, which catered heavily to the logging industry.
The façade once looked out onto a CP Rail spur line that ran diagonal to other downtown streets, and part of which became Pioneer Park, later named Pigeon Park, when the line was removed in the 1930s.
Agencies/Canadajournal
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