Bell Tower of False Creek

Abstract

I’m looking at an archival photo of Vancouver’s Burrard Bridge taken by James Crookall in 1936. The air is thick on the shore of False Creek and the view is eerily similar to what you might see on any January day after the fog has settled in for one of its regular winter sojourns blotting out the high-rise skyline for which Vancou- ver has come to be known as the City of Glass (Coupland 2009). On days like this it’s easy to imagine slipping into a past filled with the smoke of industry and the clearance of indigenous dwellings. Such hindrances to visibility don’t apply to sound and the 21st Century is well accounted for by the ear. Still, I wonder, what access might the present day soundscape provide to the world that Crookall heard as he focused his lens that day, not long after the bridge opened in the early 1930s?