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Parks Canada declared the Lions Gate Bridge a national historic site in 2004 but I guess no one got around to writing the plaque until recently. This Sunday afternoon (May 23) Environment Minister Jim Prentice will be at Ambleside unveiling the shiny new plaque commemorating the bridge's historic significance.

The bridge was built during the Depression by a financial consortium organized by engineer A.J.T. Taylor (after whom Taylor Way is named) and backed by the Guinness brewing family. The developers wanted to provide access to the residential lots in the British Properties that they had on the market.

Lions Gate is modelled on another suspension bridge, the Golden Gate in San Francisco. It opened to pedestrians on Nov. 12, 1938 and to vehicles two days later. The province purchased the bridge in 1955 and continued to collect tolls until 1963. The history and construction of the span is detailed in an excellent book, Lions Gate, by Lilia D'Acres and Don Luxton.

There is an online slideshow about the bridge at the website of Montreal's McCord Museum (here).

Labels: HISTORY, LANDMARKS, TRANSPORTATION

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In 1986 the Guinness family, as a gift to Vancouver, purchased decorative lights that make it a distinctive nighttime landmark. In July 2009, the bridge's lighting system was updated with new LED lights to replace this existing system of 100-watt mercury vapour bulbs. The switch to LEDs is expected to reduce power consumption on the bridge by 90 per cent and save the Province about $30,000 a year in energy and maintenance costs.

Aug 18, 2011 at 2:28am