Neglected Bowring Park bridge ‘as significant as Cabot Tower’
City seeks partnership with design firm to fund restoration
On Saturday, Bowring Park was abuzz with children, families, dog-walkers, snowshoers, couples in love, young and old.
They all strolled past a structure of significant architectural and engineering importance without so much as a glance in its direction.
The Cantilever Bridge.
Like an elephant’s trunk, the grey concrete curves out over what used to be the CN Railway track.
Built in 1959, the pedestrian bridge once served the purpose of connecting the old and new sections of the park.
Today, it’s smothered in snow, obscured by bushes, and groped with graffiti.
Its treatment has Jim Ronan “miffed.”
The past general manager of the Bowring Park Foundation said the bridge is as significant in St. John’s as Cabot Tower.
“And nobody looks at that bridge. They walk past it, and they don’t give it a second glance. They look over at the Fighting Newfoundlander, they look up at the Bungalow, they turn and look back, but nobody even looks at it because I don’t think they even know what it is.”
DESIGNED BY SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE ENGINEER
Ironically, while many in St. John’s largely ignore the bridge, architects in Toronto are busy creating miniature versions of it.
The mini mock-ups are sitting in a lab owned by Arup Group.
The design firm is studying its foundations, trying to get a better understanding of it.
The architects were able to proportion the miniatures precisely because they have the design calculations that were originally mapped out by their company’s founder, Sir Ove Arup — the “philosopher engineer” who designed the bridge just a couple years after he engineered the hightech Sydney Opera House.
The prominence of Sir Ove Arup (1895-1988) in the engineering world cannot be overstated. He was considered one of the foremost architectural structural engineers of his time. He worked with Winston Churchill in designing the Mulberry temporary harbours used during the D-day landings. He designed the Kingsgate Bridge in England.
Yet he’s reportedly called the Cantilever Bridge his favourite work, right up there with the Sydney Opera House.
“It goes all the way back quite a long way in the firm,” Arup Canada group leader Craig Forrest told The Telegram by phone from Montreal.
In Arup Group’s job archives, the Cantilever Bridge is job number 1,274. Current job numbers are in the millions.
Forrest heads up the international company’s Canadian operations. He joined the Canadian arm of the design firm in April last year, but it was just before Christmas when he learned about the Cantilever Bridge.
“To find out that we had a bridge in St. John’s was a bit like Antiques Roadshow, and finding out you had something in the attic,” he laughed.
WOMAN ARCHITECT BEHIND BRIDGE
Sir Ove Arup isn’t the only prominent individual involved with the bridge’s construction.
In fact, he was hired by Blanche Lemco van Ginkel — a giant in the Canadian architecture world. Van Ginkel is both an architect and city planner who was hired by the city in the 1950s to create a new master plan for Bowring Park, steering the park’s growth from a quaint 50 acres to the giant 168-acre gem it is today.
She’s perhaps best known for planning Expo 67, and spearheading the preservation of Old Montreal. She is the first woman to head a faculty of architecture in Canada and be awarded a fellowship by the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada.
“In her own right, she’s a very eminent individual,” said Forrest.
“It’s quite an interesting collaboration between these (two). So, as well as it being a lovely little park, and a quaint little bridge, it’s been designed and developed in the vision of two very eminent individuals both in the fields of architecture and engineering.”
HERITAGE DESIGNATION RECOMMENDED
The bridge has at least one champion at city hall.
Deputy Mayor Sheilagh O’leary has been advocating to spruce it up for several years.
“I’ve been trying to get it bumped up on the priority list for our rehabilitation for bridges, but unfortunately it’s low on the priority list. But it has such incredible heritage significance, and it’s really a beautiful thing, and I think that as an asset we really need to figure out how to get it restored.”
To that end, O’leary has recently been speaking with Forrest, trying to encourage Arup Group to partner with the city to restore the bridge.
“I think there’s an opportunity for them to put a feather in their hat, and for the city, obviously, to have some recognition over this bridge.”
Forrest wouldn’t confirm any commitment, but he did say the company would “love to be involved in it in some capacity.”
He said O’leary has sent him the structural surveys so the company can have a better idea of what kind of work is needed on the bridge, which is why they’ve done the miniature mockups in Toronto.
“We’re still at the Antiques Roadshow part where we’ve just found something in the attic, so we need to work out what it is we’ve found in the attic,” he said.
O’leary said the concrete needs some work, the graffiti should be removed and the brush needs to be cut back.
The city already has a storyboard designed for the bridge, but it’s yet to be erected.
“Nobody really knows the story, and we need to get better at telling our own stories at the city when we have these wonderful assets,” said O’leary.
In November, the city’s built heritage experts panel recommended heritage designation of the bridge.
Heritage Foundation of Newfoundland and Labrador executive director Jerry Dick said the bridge would likely qualify as a registered heritage structure, and there’s a chance it could be considered a landmark, depending on how it scores in an evaluation process.
Designation would make it eligible for funding to contribute to restoration and for ongoing maintenance.