Saturday, April 20, Surrey, British Columbia was the place to be for over 200,000 people attending the 12th annual Vaisakhi Parade. Vancouver, wasn't much to anyone in particular, until the evening, perhaps, when the Vancouver Canucks beat the visiting Detroit Redwings.
I spoke to two fellows who fairly gushed at how wonderful the parade was; how it was an entire day of every kind of free food; how people came from around the world; how there were "two million people" in attendance. ... Okay, they got that last bit wrong, but the rest was apparently bang-on. It's a big, fun, family-oriented event which thousands mark on their calendar and attend every year. Vancouver, the 800-pound gorilla of British Columbia, has a hugely-attended Pride Parade, but Surrey has one of those also. Vancouver now only leads Surrey in semi-annual hockey riots.
The City of Surrey is Canada's largest municipality, and it looks to compete with Vancouver to become B.C.'s centre of gravity in the near future, fuelled in part by a steady influx of immigrants, who continue to make Surrey their home as they make a new life in Canada. Surrey's popular mayor, Diane Watts, appears to be successfully re-branding and reshaping Surrey. Image-wise, it is now officially referred to as "the city of Surrey," with the slogan, "The future lives here," rather than "that sprawling suburb, where people keep cars up on blocks in their front yard." To back up the claim to city-hood, the Watts administration has adjusted zoning to encourage the development of dense urban cores; they have also tackled the reality and perception of Surrey as a crime capitol.
Vancouver's earnest mayor, Gregor Roberson, who gets a mixed report card for his eviro-friendly agenda to make Vancouver a "green" city, may be a bit green with envy the way his regional peer Watts has gone from success to success as she works to pull Surrey out from under the shadow of Vancouver.
The 2010 Winter Olympics surely helped Vancouver shake it's reputation as "no-fun city," earned for a decade of squashing large scale public events, but it's also true that Vancouver got to "host" the games which were, for the most part, not actually staged there, because Vancouver had the best-known, and most marketable, brand name in the Lower Mainland. The City of Surrey is clearly working to change that; their Vaisakhi Parade, which is the largest outside of India, is one more piece in successful campaign to make Surrey a world-class destination in its own right.
I spoke to two fellows who fairly gushed at how wonderful the parade was; how it was an entire day of every kind of free food; how people came from around the world; how there were "two million people" in attendance. ... Okay, they got that last bit wrong, but the rest was apparently bang-on. It's a big, fun, family-oriented event which thousands mark on their calendar and attend every year. Vancouver, the 800-pound gorilla of British Columbia, has a hugely-attended Pride Parade, but Surrey has one of those also. Vancouver now only leads Surrey in semi-annual hockey riots.
The City of Surrey is Canada's largest municipality, and it looks to compete with Vancouver to become B.C.'s centre of gravity in the near future, fuelled in part by a steady influx of immigrants, who continue to make Surrey their home as they make a new life in Canada. Surrey's popular mayor, Diane Watts, appears to be successfully re-branding and reshaping Surrey. Image-wise, it is now officially referred to as "the city of Surrey," with the slogan, "The future lives here," rather than "that sprawling suburb, where people keep cars up on blocks in their front yard." To back up the claim to city-hood, the Watts administration has adjusted zoning to encourage the development of dense urban cores; they have also tackled the reality and perception of Surrey as a crime capitol.
Vancouver's earnest mayor, Gregor Roberson, who gets a mixed report card for his eviro-friendly agenda to make Vancouver a "green" city, may be a bit green with envy the way his regional peer Watts has gone from success to success as she works to pull Surrey out from under the shadow of Vancouver.
The 2010 Winter Olympics surely helped Vancouver shake it's reputation as "no-fun city," earned for a decade of squashing large scale public events, but it's also true that Vancouver got to "host" the games which were, for the most part, not actually staged there, because Vancouver had the best-known, and most marketable, brand name in the Lower Mainland. The City of Surrey is clearly working to change that; their Vaisakhi Parade, which is the largest outside of India, is one more piece in successful campaign to make Surrey a world-class destination in its own right.
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