Somebody recently posted this video of downtown Halifax from 1989.
It's pretty interesting, although they frustratingly pan away from some of the spots that are most interesting today.
Barrington overall looks somewhat worse than today. It looks like it had already gone substantially downhill by 1989. The early 90's were a real low point downtown. That's when the NFB building burned and the Barrington and George buildings were torn down. Barrington Gate is one of a very small number of decent 90's buildings in Halifax.
The Cornwallis House corner on Spring Garden Road is shown too. Back when the video was filmed they were tearing down the old wooden Victorian shop buildings in preparation for construction. I've seen pictures of that corner taken around 1890 and it looked basically the same as the 1989 views, except there was a church where the bank building with Rogue's Roost was later constructed.
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