The Maritime Museum of B.C. has an ambitious plan to become Canada’s national maritime museum. Creative as the idea is, it lacks a key element: water.
The plan calls for renovating the museum’s former home in Bastion Square and building an annex for additional space. It would accommodate both the museum and a shared arts space for the city.
The museum also plans a partnership with the Songhees First Nation, which has a long history not only with that site, but with the sea. A maritime museum without Indigenous involvement would be missing a vital part of the story.
Selling the idea to the federal government and other donors, however, will run up against the argument that a national maritime museum should be on the ocean. A narrow avenue down to the Wharf Street shoreline won’t cut it.
All attempts to find a suitable waterfront spot have failed, but that doesn’t mean the museum should stop trying and make do with a building that has no historical connection to the sea and is not on the water. A successful maritime museum has to have boats and ships tied up outside.
It also needs lots of display space, but the plan calls for much of the old building, which was long considered too small, to be given over to arts and cultural programming.
Innovative thinking went into this plan, but it is built upon the foundation of a building that is ill-suited to the purpose and was evacuated because it is unsafe.
Desperate for a facility worthy of its outstanding collections, the museum is settling for second-best, instead of pushing for a world-class site.
