VANCOUVER — A tiny Vancouver park is at the centre of a monument war, pitting backers of a proposed monument to Irish Canadians against activists who feel its dominant “phallic” nature would violate the integrity of an existing Montreal Massacre memorial.
Vancouver’s Thornton Park is a three-and-a-half acre green space poised at a strategic city juncture. Opposite the old CNR station that welcomed generations of newly arrived immigrants to neighbouring Strathcona, it marks the unofficial beginning of the city’s Downtown Eastside.
