231 – 261  Twelfth Street
Heritage Inventory:  Yes.
Heritage Designation:  No.
Why Endangered:  Inertia.  Demolition blocked.  Development pressure.

There is more than one heritage site with this tale to tell.  The demolition has been halted.  The report has been commissioned, and concludes that the property in question has heritage merit and would serve many good uses.  Then – nothing.  No further action is taken.  There may be complications, such as complexities around jurisdiction, clean up costs, or foot dragging.  This heritage is endangered by inertia – recognized and valued, but no further steps have been taken to preserve and make use of the property as a heritage property.  The New Westminster Gas Company Building is in this category. 

Lower 12th Street is in need of a vital public space as the area looks to renewal, and what better space than a one acre site with a historic brick building?  In fact, the 1886 Gas Works building is the city’s oldest remaining industrial building, and one of the last chances for the city to preserve its early industrial heritage.  Built at what was then the great cost of $65,000, the buildings on the site were later purchased by the B.C. Electric Railway Company.  Architect George W. Grant also designed the city’s old Court House building and Holy Trinity Cathedral. 

The former coal gasification plant used to provide some of the gas for the street lights of the city.  Its owner, the provincial government in the form of Land and Water British Columbia recently offered the site to the city, but the city balked at the requirement to assume costs for soil contamination and clean up, and only that part of the site with the Gas Works building was being offered, the rest to be developed through subdivision.  A 1997 report to City Council by McGinn Engineering Preservation Ltd. rated the site highly, the building as having “fair to high integrity,” and estimated a cost of less than $500,000 to upgrade the site, including the cost of seismic upgrading, and to prepare it for use as a community facility.

One of only two gasification buildings left in the entire province, the building features excellent detailed cornices, rounded arches, corbelled gables with round vents, and a general Romanesque influence, and remains assessed as being a good candidate for recovery and upgrading at a relatively modest cost.  The cost of soil clean up has become the stuff of gossip and legend, but at the time of planned demolition in 1997, the province believed that it could recover costs on soil remediation and still make a healthy profit through 3-story housing.  A report on the cost of soil remediation without demolishing the existing building was never released by the province, while the province attempted to continue to convince the city to allow demolition. 

Without a proactive resolution, this property will likely continue to languish finally facing demolition and private development.