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City Living: Doors opened to City of Vancouver’s hidden places

Archives, city hall, VPD tactical training centre among the popular spots

Judging by the popularity of Doors Open Vancouver this past Saturday, Vancouverites are a curious bunch.

Doors Open is the literal name of the day-long city tour where 20 different civic buildings invited everybody into buildings for free tours to learn about services ranging from fire and rescue training to call centres. Some, such as the National Works Yard, are typically closed to the public so the tours satisfied the curiosity of the 10-year-old in everybody while others, such as the unsecretive-in-comparison Vancouver Central Library held hourly architectural tours.

Vancouver City Hall was top of the list for many as more than one thousand people walked through the doors to check out where civic government makes its decisions while there was always a line-up around the False Creek Energy Centre to glimpse the maze of pipes that captures heat from waste water and sewage to supply environmentally friendly heat and hot water to nearby Olympic Village. The centre’s staff counted on the interest as outdoor signs indicated wait times and, while the line moved quickly, it wasn’t quickly enough for those who had to endure a man’s whistling of “La Cucaracha” the whole line-up long.

While Doors Open is a Vancouver first, it runs in other Canadian and American cities. The local version was initiated by the City of Vancouver’s Engaged City Task Force — the same group that started the mobile Pop-Up City Hall program that brought city hall to different communities.

“It was just a fabulous turnout,” said deputy city manager Sadhu Johnston of the event. “Many people use these services and don’t know what happens behind the scenes. Going behind the scenes gets people excited.”

So excited that the tours for the three buildings that required advance sign-up — The Salt Building, Carnegie Community Centre, and the Vancouver Police Department Tactical Training Centre — sold out days before.

Vancouver Archives also was a popular stop as visitors were encouraged to poke through 80-year-old journals of Vancouver residents as well as take a few historical photographs home. Two of the buildings on the tour house animals.

The VPD Mounted Unit opened its stables in Stanley Park while the Vancouver Animal Control Shelter fielded questions about whether or not the dog kennel floors are heated (they are), if they house cats (they don’t but take almost everything else such as a pot-bellied pig that was found roaming the streets of North Vancouver two weeks ago), and how many strays are reunited with owners (the shelter has a 97 per cent return-to-owner rate for licensed pets). They’re the same people who also give out licences and investigate reports of dog bites which is the main difference between them and the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. (Animal control is said to protect people from animals while the SPCA’s mandate is said to be the other way around.)

The shelter also works with small animal rescue groups, some of which were on hand for Saturday’s tour. Brayden Bull showed off his rescued snake Calista while girlfriend Sam Grewal was in the process of adopting another.

“These are super friendly snakes,” he said. “They just want to get into your hair and nestle and make themselves comfortable.”