RainCheque: NeighbourMaker Design Jam – October 30 @ 7pm

The VPSN is proud to participate in the following event hosted by MOV and Vancouver Design Nerds (VDN). Join us as we hear from this summer’s NeighbourMaker team as they share stories about some exciting new placemaking projects that promote inclusion and connectivity in Vancouver.

The event features additional presentations on placemaking by Krisztina Kassay (VIVA), Caroline Ballhorn (Tin Can Studio), Ryan Betts (Bazinga!), and Andrew Pask (VPSN), as well as a special VDN Design Jam entitled RainCheque! The Jam will focus on a very timely question: How can we make new social connections in the rain?

Tickets – $11 for MOV members, $15 for non-members. Visit the RainCheque Eventbrite page.

Halloween SkyTrain Party – October 31 @ 8pm

Ladies and gentleman, get your make-up ready. The annual VPSN Halloween SkyTrain Party returns for its ninth installment on Friday, October 31, 2013.

Gather your friends, get your scariest and sassiest costumes together, and get ready to jump on the Canada Line for public transit experience like no other. Your job: help us to transform a regular ol’ train ride into a bit of ghoulish magic!

The night of transit terror includes:

• On-deck action and a spankingly awesome soundtrack courtesy of DJ Rocky Fi$her – Soundcloud)
• Snappy decorations, tasty treats
• An after-party at a nearby public space
• The best-dressed crew of public space loving ghouls and goblins on the continent

IMPORTANT: Please be sure to visit the VPSN website or Facebook Event Page for important information.

Last Candidate Standing – November 2 @ 2pm

Most definitely not your typical election event! Back by popular demand, Last Candidate Standing is a unique political debate that is open to each and every of the 10 candidates running for mayor and 49 candidates for council. This is truly an all candidates forum.

Last Candidate Standing is set up as a ‘mixer.’ It allows incumbents and new nominees, independents and party-affiliated candidates to share the same stage, answer questions from our Panel of Inquisition, and showcase their political chops. To make things even more lively, we add musical guests and other fun throughout.

The 2014 edition of Last Candidate Standing is produced by the Vancouver Public Space Network with the gracious support of SFU’s Vancity Office of Community Engagement, and the Urbanarium Society.

This event is FREE but space is very limited. Pre-register on our Eventbrite page.

For more information, you can also check the event listing on this website, or visit our Facebook event page.

Attention candidates! Nominees for Mayor and Council are asked to confirm their participation in Last Candidate Standing by contacting jessica [at] vancouverpublicspace [dot] ca.

Active Fiction at Riley Park – Coming Soon!

The Active Fiction Project (AFP) is back after a bit of a summer break! Do you like walking through neighbourhoods? Do you like reading things? Do you like choose-your-own-adventure books? The Active Fiction Project creates (very) short fictional stories that take place in a Vancouver neighbourhood. The stories are ‘hidden’ in public spaces for readers to discover as they walk through the story.

The next installation of Active Fiction will take place in Riley Park, starting in late October. Stay tuned for details on where to find the stories! You can follow project updates on the Active Fiction website, or follow us on twitter @activefic and Facebook.

Volunteers Needed

If celebrating transit, enriching local politics, or rolling up your sleeves with other public space projects tickles your fancy, why not lend a hand? Our next regular VPSN volunteer orientation takes place on Monday, October 20 @ 6pm. If you’d like more details, please zip us a note at volunteer@vancouverpublicspace.ca

The following media release was distributed via the City today.

The City of Vancouver’s Mountain View Cemetery will host a series of events that honour the dead through ceremony and celebration with the 9^th annual All Souls which runs October 26 to November 2.

All Souls offers the public an opportunity to remember their dead, whether they are interred at Mountain View Cemetery or not, in a gentle atmosphere of contemplative beauty.

The week of events, curated by artists Paula Jardine and Marina Szijarto, feature music, art, demonstrations and memorial-making workshops.

All Souls launches on October 26 from 6 to 10 pm at the cemetery’s Celebration Hall (Fraser Street at East 39th Avenue). The family-oriented evening will include music and warming fires. The cemetery registry will also be open for locating specific graves on site.

Programming at Mountain View Cemetery throughout the week includes:

• October 27 at 7 pm: The Threshold Choir honour the tradition of bedside singing
• October 30 at 7 pm: Demonstration of the sugar skulls tradition
• October 31 at 7, 8 or 9 pm: The Little Chamber Music Series that Could presents the world premiere of Canadian Nicole Lizée’s latest work
• November 1 from 7 – 9 pm: Display of the artist-created Shrines for Dia de Muertos and traditional Mexican music by El Mariachi

From October 27 to November 1, Celebration Hall will also be open nightly from 6 – 9 pm for memorial making.

For more details on events, visit: vancouver.ca/mountainview.

Racing to get on the 2011 SkyTrain Party – Photo by Lydia Yan

The day has arrived! Time for the 7th annual VPSN Halloween SkyTrain Party!

Don your finest costumes and head down to Waterfront Station for 7:45pm. We’ll be departing shortly thereafter (8pm) on the Canada Line – heading south to Brighouse Station in Richmond.

Our return trip takes us to City Centre Station in Downtown Vancouver, where we’ll disembark and head to a rain-proof after-party in our top-secret public space location. The whole thing will be wrapped up by 11:00pm – leaving you plenty of time to rock out at all the other good parties going on around town.

SOME IMPORTANT THINGS TO KEEP IN MIND:

• The Translink & Canada Line folks have been good to us over the years – let’s keep that fine relationship going! Remember to buy your fare or bring your U-Pass. And if you see a Translink/Canada Line official, be sure to say thanks. If you’re coming as a zombie, please do not bite them.

• Be kind to the nice train that will carry us on our ride. When we get to City Centre station we’ll need to exit the train fairly quickly – please remember to pack out whatever you bring with you. Help us to leave the trains as clean as possible

• Please give the DJ and VPSN crew some space! Our team needs a bit of room to deal with set up and operations. We all want to make sure the sound system can get dialed to 11 – and extra space is especially helpful if there are any unexpected lurches in the train.

• Do not exit the train at Brighouse Station… unless you want to be left in Richmond.

• When you depart at City Centre Station – please head towards the Georgia Street exit – wait for instructions. From there, we’ll take a short walk (3 min or so). It may be rainy, so if you want to pack an umbrella, please do so. (Note that the after-party location will be rain-free).

Finally, a word to the obvious… We’re asking everyone to pitch in to keep the good vibe going, because transit parties like this will only last as long as everyone behaves in a reasonable fashion. So, in other words, if you see someone doing something stupid, tell ‘em to save it for later.

OTHER THINGS TO THINK ABOUT…

If you bring a camera, please send any event related snaps our way – we love getting copies of people’s memories! You can also tag your photos and post them to our Vancouver Public Space Network VPSN Flickr group, or VPSN Facebook page.

You can also do the twitter via #skytrainparty and follow us at @vpsn

FOR MORE INFORMATION

EMAIL: Vancouver Public Space Network at info [at] vancouverpublicspace [dot] ca

FACEBOOK EVENT PAGE: http://www.facebook.com/events/104455739714030/

Our 4th annual Public Transit Halloween Party wrapped up a few hours ago. It was awesome! 

We’ll be posting more images over the next few days… but for the moment you can see some of the initial snaps on our flickr set here and some uploads from others here (kudos to Keith Loh for setting up the photobooth!). Tonight’s iteration of the annual event saw us animate the Seabus for a ride over to North Vancouver, wander over to the amazing new public pier for a dance party, and then return to Vancouver. Two hours of condensed public space excitement for the low price of a single-zone transit ticket. Lots of fun for all… so much so that by the time we dropped Michael Jackson’s thriller into the mix during the ride back our own camera lenses were completely fogged from the heat or all the folks dancing!

A BIG thank you to everyone who came out and made it such a success. And for those that were snapping pictures or video – please consider uploading it to flickr with the “Halloween Seabus 2010″ tag. Or you can send it to us and we’ll upload it to our flickr set with appropriate attribution.

Start your Halloween Weekend off with the best public space party in town. For the fourth year in a row, the Vancouver Public Space Network is hosting a party on public transit. 

After three fine years riding the crazy train, we’re changing things up. This year’s party will take place on the Seabus. We’ll be riding boat to North Vancouver, engaging in a little North Van public space take-over, and then returning. You’ll be back in Van between 9:00 and 10:00 (exact schedule still being determined). 

Time to get inventive with costumes. Show up in your best Halloween finery. There’s no set theme, so get as naughty or nautical as you like. 

Show up at the Seabus Terminal at Waterfront Station at 8:00pm. The Seabus will leave promptly at 8:15. 

Some Things to Keep In Mind:

• The Translink folks have been good to us over the years – let’s keep that fine relationship going! Remember to buy your fare or bring your U-Pass. And if you see a Coast Mountain / Seabus official, be sure to say thanks. 
• Be kind to the Seabus. It’s a fine space for a party, but please remember to pack out whatever you bring with you. 
• Not everyone who will be riding the Seabus with us is there for the party — or at least, they haven’t been forewarned. Help to share the good times. Do not maul, bite, or zombify other passengers unless asked to do so.
• Remember, this is a public space party, not a kegger at your friends place. All the normal rules of good behaviour apply. We’re also a bit selfish in that regard – as we want to make sure we can continue to offer these parties in the future as well. (You can also lend a hand in this regard: if you see someone doing something stupid, tell ‘em to save it for later.)
• We are not running an afterparty ourselves, but if you’ve got one that you want us to promote jet us an email. We’ll post links and details here.

Help us to remember this forever

If you bring a camera, please send any event related snaps our way – we love getting copies of people’s kodak memories! We’ll be posting a flickr group address here shortly and you can also upload your snaps and video to Facebook.

Volunteer

We need a hand with some key volunteer jobs for the party. If you’re able to help out, please contact our Volunteer Coordinator Erin O’Melinn at erin [at] vancouverpublicspace.ca

For more information

:: Contact the Vancouver Public Space Network at info [at] vancouverpublicspace.ca.
:: Main VPSN 2010 Halloween Webpage
:: Halloween Seabus Party Facebook Event Page
:: VPSN – Flickr Set – 2008 Pirates of the Seabus

A couple events to check out in Vancouver parks this October:

1) The Stanley Park Ghost Train is back. This year’s theme is “Alice in Nightmareland.” Rides run now through October 31st.

2) If you’re looking for a more unique Halloween experience, check out Night of All Souls at Mountain View Cemetery on October 30th from 6pm to 10pm.

Luckily, the VPSN has not one but two opportunities for you this evening.

1. Billboards, outdoor advertising and public space corporatization… Help us map out a strategy to deal with the expansion of outdoor advertising in Vancouver.
   
   6:30pm @ Kafka’s Coffee (on Main st., near Broadway). More info – Stephanie [at] vancouverpublicspace.ca
   
2. Halloween transit party planning. Halloween is just over a month away. Time to hunker down and plan this year’s costumed craziness. Lend a hand, come with ideas!6:30pm @ Trees Coffee – on Granville and W. Hastings (450 Granville St.) More info – quinn [at] vancouverpublicspace.ca

… And while you’re at it, don’t forget to register for the City/SFU/VPSN Greenest City Idea Slam – taking place this Friday, Oct 1 @ 7pm. Hosted by Bill Richardson and taking place at SFU’s Woodwards and featuring an all star cast of experts and entertainers. Reservations required at http://websurvey.sfu.ca/survey/64166248