When Harry Pride moved to Burnaby in 1954, going to the beach meant going to Vancouver, White Rock or Deep Cove.

But people in the know told him about a local alternative.

It meant an arduous journey navigating train tracks and forging through the bush, but the payoff was fabulous: the shore of Burrard Inlet and sweeping views of the rugged mountains of the North Shore and Indian Arm.

“It was hard to find,” recalled Pride, now 84.

But thanks to the lobbying of residents in the area, in 1971 the city embarked on a huge parkland-purchasing spree that led to the creation of 29 parks, including this gem by the sea, Barnet Marine Park. From 1967 to 1972, Pride was a city parks commissioner, giving him an inside perspective on how Burnaby managed to develop its impressive parks system.

Other parks purchased after a successful parkland referendum in 1971 include what would become the Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, Burnaby Lake Park, Richmond Park and the Burnaby Lake Sports Complex.

Today, Burnaby has the distinction of having a quarter of its land reserved as park, and many residents say all that green space is one reason they choose to live here.

Grand size

While 25 per cent parkland seems a lofty number, it’s not particularly surprising considering the grand size of some of the parks within Burnaby’s boundaries.

Central Park started as a military reserve in the 1860s and in 1891 became B.C.’s first provincial park, said Alekxos Sarter, a parks planner for the City of Burnaby. The first 25 acres of Confederation Park in North Burnaby came to the city in 1922 from landowners who couldn’t pay their taxes.

Burnaby Mountain Conservation Area had its beginnings in the 1930s when city commissioner Richard Bolton actively promoted the idea of city hall buying land for parks.

Since 1965, Sarter said, city hall has bought 53 pieces of property for Deer Lake Park, space that got a big boost when the former Oakalla prison farm lands were turned over to the city with the redevelopment of the prison site.

Sometimes, parks planners have to switch gears when they meet opposition from residents.

In North Burnaby, Sarter said, the city had worked for years to expand West Sells Park to Ingleton Avenue. But landowners were frustrated at the red tape the plan created for their attempts to build infill housing there and lobbied city hall.

So planners set their sights elsewhere in the neighbourhood, and now plan to expand Willingdon Heights Park to Gilmore Avenue where city hall has since been “really successful” at acquiring land.

Pride says the park system owes much thanks to the work of planners in the 1960s who created the town centre plans that still guide city hall’s land-use decisions today.

It was around that time that city staff started identifying formally where parks needed to be to meet the needs of a growing population. An official parkland acquisition program was started and city officials had $25,000 a year to work with.

“In those days that would actually buy you something,” Pride said, noting city hall was fortunate Burnaby still had so much relatively cheap, undeveloped land available then.

Growing green space

In a rapidly-growing city like Burnaby, the demand for more green space grows in lockstep.

The current program of buying land for parks stems from 1976 when Burnaby started requiring developers to pay development cost charges (DCCs) to fund parkland purchases.

Today, the city has a whopping $40 million in that fund, said Burnaby finance director Rick Earle.

That allows city hall to be proactive, notifying property owners in advance that, if they ever want to sell, the city would offer fair market value. It’s an attractive option for many, Earle said, because “it’s an easy sale for them.”

Any buildings on the lands that are worth keeping in the meantime are added to the city’s inventory of rental housing. Earle said Burnaby currently has about 195 properties it rents out, most of them waiting to become parks.

And while every year the city lists $5 million as the budget for purchasing land for parks, if an opportunity came up that would put Burnaby over that figure, city hall would likely find some way to finance it from its capital reserves.

“We’ve never been in that position in 25 years but that’s how committed we are to this inventory,” said Earle. “It’s a pretty high priority for the city.”

Pride sees that focus continuing long into the future.

“I’m confident we’ll continue to have elbow room.”

wchow@burnabynewsleader.com