What Ever Happened to the McBarge?
’ been there: enjoying a family pack of chicken nuggets after a hard day at the oce (get it, girl!), elbow deep in sweet-and-sour dipping sauce, wondering why, in this day and age, are we not able to have this sort of fullling fast-food experience…at sea?!
It’s frustrating, because though today we’re forced to consume our all-beef patties landlocked like
idiots, McDonald’s was once at the forefront of ocean-burger technology. During Expo 86, the fast-food giant opened up a state-of-the-art ¢oating bistro in Vancouver: at 187 feet long, the grand dame McBarge—a.k.a. the Friendship 500—proudly hosted 12,000 people a day, none of whom were me, thanks to a cruel twist of fate in which I was not alive yet. Sta¥ allegedly described the food experience as “performance art,” which is not the kind of pride I see today from the stoned teens messing up my hangover-breakfast or- der. (I said a McMun with a hashbrown instead of sausage and then two more hashbrowns instead of the English mun! Idon’t see what’s so hard about this!)
After Expo, the restaurant was towed to Burrard Inlet, where it languished for decades, to the disappointment of sea-legged McDLT fans but to the delight of mischievous rowboat owners. Suggestions for repurposing this waterlogged architectural wonder have bubbled to
the surface throughout the years—maybe it could be ahomeless shelter, or a new Capilano campus, or a house for me and all my friends on areality show called Boat Buds:
OceanCommotion— but the McBarge’s future lies with its current owner, maverick businessman Howard Meakin. In 2015, he towed it to Maple Ridge, and now he is currently attempting to raise $4.5 million to convert it into a deep-sea discovery centre, a museum celebrating Canada’s advancements in undersea technology. Want to support this sadly nonnugget-themed endeavour? Contribute to Meakin’s crowdfunding campaign and receive rewards like “McBarge mementos,” which presumably are just calcied Filet-O-Fish sandwiches: a little piece of Vancouver history to call your own.
Today we’re forced to consume our allbeef patties landlocked like idiots.