Description du lieu patrimonial

Queen’s Park is New Westminster's best-known flagship park, a 75 acre (30 ha.) green space bounded by Sixth Avenue, First Street, McBride Boulevard and Royal Avenue in the Queen’s Park neighbourhood.

Valeur patrimoniale

Queen’s Park is significant for its historical, aesthetic, social and natural values.

Established in 1886 as part of Colonel Moody’s plan for a garden city of parks, Queen’s Park is valued for its ongoing tradition of use as a public park, in which many of the city’s important events have taken place. Over the years, the park has evolved and changed to meet the needs of the residents and the styles of the time, and the result is a complex and layered landscape with natural and cultural elements. Sited on a rise of land, the park is a city landmark and destination.

Queen’s Park is important historically as the site of the Royal Agricultural and Industrial Society’s annual Provincial Exhibition, beginning in 1889 with the construction of fine exhibition buildings (which burned down in 1929). It is significant for its civic park tradtion, a combination of built elements, picturesque landscape design, natural landscapes and formal landscapes based on English gardening traditions. As well, annual May Day Celebrations that have taken place in this park since 1870, making it the longest running May Day Celebration in the British Commonwealth.

Aesthetic values in the park include its early and ongoing tradition of creating outstanding public gardens. Originally designed by landscape gardener Peter Latham, the park has acquired an historical horticultural layering through tree planting, the development of individual gardens and planting areas, the establishment of tree-lined roadways and paths, and the conservation of the natural landscape; traces of all of these uses can be seen throughout the park.

The park is important as a place to celebrate significant events in the city’s history through the placement of symbolic features. These include buildings, plaques, totem poles, particularly the Centennial Lodge and Centennial Grove installed in 1960 to celebrate the city’s 100th anniversary.

Queen’s Park is particularly important for its social values, seen in the ongoing tradition of public events including the Bernie Legge Theatre, concerts, and celebrations of public holidays, as well as continuous and everyday use by the public. Its recreational legacy is also important, from the early lacrosse and softball games to the construction of the Arena and Arenex in the 1930s and a fitness circuit in the 1970s.

Natural history values are found in the forested areas of the park, as well as in habitat restoration projects.

Source: City of New Westminster Planning Department

Éléments caractéristiques

Key elements that define the heritage character of Queen's Park include its:

Siting, Context and Landscape
- location in the Queen’s Park neighbourhood of New Westminster
- context at the edge of the neighbourhood

Horticultural features
- remnants of original formally maintained gardens at the Third Avenue entrance
- formal planting at park entrances
- rose garden
- tree planting throughout the park
- Centennial Grove

Recreational Features
- children’s playground
- petting zoo
- recreational complex, including Arena, Arenex, Stadium and playing fields
- recreational trails

Natural Features
- forested areas
- meadow

Built Elements
- Centennial Lodge
- picnic shelters
- caretaker's residence
- band shell

Commemorative plantings, monuments, markers and sculpture throughout the park