Dan Fumano: The decades-long dream of a multi-venue 'cultural precinct' in downtown Vancouver is inching ahead, just as the Vancouver Art Gallery's budget for a new building spikes by 50 per cent

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In the half-century that Leila Getz has been active in Vancouver’s cultural scene, there has always been talk about the need for new performing arts venues.

Proponents tried to advance different versions of a multi-venue “cultural precinct” for the city. Designs were even drawn up, and some big names were involved. But nothing came to fruition.

But Getz, founder and artistic director of the Vancouver Recital Society, says she’s feeling more optimistic now about the cultural precinct idea than ever before. And, she says, that’s even after this week’s news about Vancouver’s other cultural mega-project, the new art gallery, being forced to change plans and delay construction.

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The cultural precinct’s proponents envision a concert hall and “opera/ballet hall” with about 1,800 seats each, and a roughly 800-seat recital hall, ideally assembled in a single location in downtown Vancouver.

Getz said she feels confident this project has momentum now that Vancouver’s cultural institutions are getting together behind it, and after the recent hiring of Toronto-headquartered architecture firm Diamond Schmitt to complete a feasibility study.

Of course, in a multimillion-dollar, multi year project — just like in musical or dance performance — timing is crucial.

And when the Vancouver Concert Hall and Theatre Society, the non-profit group advancing the cultural precinct, recently........

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