Quote:
Originally Posted by retro_orange
I have tried pouring through stuff online but can only find small mentions of issues and nothing specific. If i ever make it to the main library downtown ill see if they have a book with info on the hotel.
At the time though it may of been unprofitable for CP to run two large hotels so close to each other, they could of sold the building to be converted to apartments and would have earned them way more money in the short term then a parking lot in the long term. The demolition cost of a building this large would be immense, it must of been one of the largest structures in the province, even by 1948. If you consider that they took it down in the 40's, that would of been before suburbanization would of taken hold in Canada and many people would of still lived close to downtown and the need for housing would of been there.
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You can't find nothing specific because it doesn't exist. All that exists are rumors and innuendo. Most of it starting
after the hotel was already gone.
You're on to something about not running 2 large hotels at then same time. CPR and its competitor CNR (who had come to an agreement to partner in a the new hotel rather than compete with each other) didn't want any other competition for their new hotel so they collectively entered into an agreement with each other & the city to ensure nobody else would be able to operate a hotel on the site.
Regarding converting the building into apartments, remember the rental apartment market was no where even close to what it is today. That building was about 4 times the size of even the largest apartment buildings of the era, and given the slump in the local economy just a few years previous that saw the local n economy come to a screeching halt. Remember the current Hotel Vancouver saw its construction halt and be delayed for almost a decade because of the awful financial conditions in the city after its construction began. The rental market in the 1940's bears little resemblance to the one of today. That building would have been a suitable apartment in Manhattan not Vancouver. The older Hotel Vancouver closed its doors and sat vacant for years. Nobody was about to take on the project of renovating it for apartment use. There was plenty of cheap land available to build and your investment was much safer doing that then trying to reconfigure a giant hotel. The only serious offer for the building came from Timothy Eaton Co.
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