Trinity River Vision to Turn Fort Worth into the Vancouver of the South

That is a view of False Creek in Vancouver, British Columbia. That's in Canada. False Creek is where Vancouver's Expo 86 took place, leaving a renovated old industrial zone in its wake that has become a very successful part of a very successful, beautiful city.

Why in the world is False Creek on my mind? Well, there was a letter to the editor of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, this morning, about the Trinity River Vision, that referenced the project's design being modeled after a similar project in Vancouver.

Well, the first time I read about Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision in the Star-Telegram, that first article actually said that the Trinity River Vision would transform Fort Worth into being the "Vancouver of the South." I am not making this up.

I'd already grown fed up with the Star-Telegram's tendency to hype something ridiculously, but this was a new low, this was worse than when the Star-Telegram claimed over and over and over and over again that an extremely lame, extremely little, now long failed, "market" was modeled after Seattle's Pike Place, and public markets in Europe. And would be the first public market in Texas.

It was called the Santa Fe Rail Market. Not only did it bear no resemblance to Pike Place, not only was it not the first public market in Texas, it wasn't even the first public market in Fort Worth! And even more bizarre, there is a public market in Dallas, the Dallas Farmers Market, that anyone visiting from the Northwest always remarks does remind them of Pike Place! But with much easier parking.

When I first read that the Trinity River Vision was going to turn Fort Worth into the Vancouver of the South I thought to myself has no one from that paper been to Vancouver? Just like I thought has no one from the Star-Telegram been to Pike Place? The only thing I can think of that False Creek and the Trinity River Vision have in common is they both involve water.

Anyway, below is the letter to the editor about the Trinity River Vision from this morning's Star-Telegram.

More details on the TRV, please

City leaders say there is no money to renovate our existing but neglected Heritage Park, touted for its grand view of the historic confluence of the West and Clear forks of our Trinity River. At the same time they eagerly continue to support a nonexistent vision.

The Trinity River Vision proposes to destroy the natural confluence of the Trinity to develop commercial property in its place where canals, bridges and a lake will require massive earth moving by the Army Corps of Engineers to prevent flooding just below the bluff where the Tarrant County Courthouse stands.

Descriptions have been vague, but recently a brochure produced for TRV explained that the canals and bridges are modeled after a project designed in Vancouver, B.C., a part of the hemisphere that has almost nothing in common with Fort Worth in the way of climate, culture and water supply.

The TRV brochure reports two trips by TRV advisors to Vancouver to visit the football field-sized model of the Trinity River Vision Central City project. The bypass channel and flood gates of the model demonstrate protection of more than 2,400 acres of neighborhoods possibly subject to flooding in uptown Fort Worth as a result of the channel and associated levees.

J.D. Granger, executive director of the TRV Authority and son of U.S. Rep. Kay Granger, was quoted in part as saying, “We’ve been able to make minor modifications in the design that will save us millions in erosion maintenance costs.”

Let us please learn more about projected maintenance costs and possible flooding. In times threatening depression and drought, when our president asks us to eliminate earmarks, we must know the facts to act wisely and responsibly.

How much taxpayer money is being spent to fund the Trinity River Vision, and how many millions do we guess it will take to finish and maintain it? Residents of Fort Worth deserve a full and open accounting.

— Betty W. Fay, Fort Worth