Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Moved Not Demolished


If you look at the far left on the front wall of the building, you can see an address, 111 West 22nd Street, that is in the City of North Vancouver. However, if you pull back and see where the building actually is, you will not see West 22nd Street, you will see Shavington St., also in the City of North Vancouver. How does this large portable school building happen to be somewhere other than the address mounted on its front wall?


This portable school building was originally at 111 West 22nd Street. It was a actually used to augment the space for Lonsdale Elementary School at 2151 Lonsdale Avenue and placed behind the school to the west with its long wall, and hence address, on West 22nd Street. Lonsdale Elementary was closed in 2005 and has since been demolished. Luckily, the portable didn't suffer the same fate.


In the summer of 2009 the 111 West 22nd Street portable was moved to the east, to the old playing field, of the old Cloverley Elementary School at 440 Hendry Avenue. The photo was taken soon after the move, at the beginning of the refitting of Cloverley School building to serve a new school population. And the new school was not going to be Cloverley. Cloverley Elementary School was closed in the early 1980's because of low enrollment. The students coming to the new school were actually from a very old school, Ridgeway Elementary School. The original Ridgeway Elementary School built in 1911-1912 with additions in 1926 at 420 East 8th Street was having a seismic upgrading. For the two years that the process would take, the students would attend the old Cloverley Elementary School. However, since the building was not quite large enough, the portable from the old Lonsdale Elementary School was moved to the playing field to house the additional student.


When the Ridgeway Elementary School students leave in 2011, another school population will move into the old Cloverley Elementary School building. This time it will be the students from Queen Mary Elementary School, built 1914-1915 at 230 West Keith Road in the City of North Vancouver. Again, this school will be closed for two years while it undergoes seismic upgrading. 


Photo: Taken September 11, 2009 by SW.
Book: Heritage Inventory, City of North Vancouver 1994.