Ocean Construction Supplies Limited, one of Lehigh Cement Company's ready-mix operations doing business in Vancouver, British Columbia, takes advantage of the unique geographical situation of one of its facilities to promote good community relations. The Ocean plant at Granville Island hosts an annual open house that welcomes neighbors and visitors and grows more popular every year. Granville Island is a 38-acre island created from a sand bar to provide an industrial area for the growing city of Vancouver. Ocean has resided there since 1917, occupying approximately three acres. The island remained largely industrial until the late 1970's. At that time the novel idea was developed of creating an urban waterfront neighborhood that would foster diverse cultural, educational and commercial enterprises, with a focus of maintaining the Island's historic industrial character. Most of the purely industrial businesses left over the next ten years and were replaced with a public market, art college, live theatre, microbrewery, arts and crafts shops, restaurants and other businesses that cater to tourists and local shoppers. What developed is possibly the most successful urban redevelopment in North America, and Ocean is part of it. The Island attracts 11 million visitors a year-about the same amount as Disneyland-and is the second most popular tourist destination in Vancouver after Stanley Park. Perhaps the most obvious questions are: "Why did Ocean choose to stay?" and "Why would the cultural neighborhood allow Ocean to stay?" Firstly, Granville Island is an excellent location for a concrete plant. Concrete is a perishable product. The Codes of Practice allow for between 90 minutes and 2 hours from time of production until placement, so time is of the essence. The location allows Ocean to be the dominant supplier in the downtown Vancouver area, an area that has and will continue to be a great market. Granville Island is a little over a mile from the city center, with the next closest plant being approximately 8 miles away. The Island is also on a navigable waterway that allows Ocean to bring all aggregate in by water. With this in mind, Ocean knew that this location was important to the long term success of the Business Unit. Instead of leaving along with its industrial neighbors as change took place, Ocean decided to adapt to the change. Over the last ten years the plant and its relationships with the community have been transformed. This was due in part to the long-term lease having an expiry date of December 2003. The first change was to make the operation environmentally sound. This was done, and the operation is a multiple winner of the National Ready Mixed Concrete Association's Environmental Excellence Award for North American Concrete Plants. Ocean also developed Enviroguard, a truck chute washout system, so that the trucks leave no environmental liabilities at the jobsite.
Staffed totally with volunteers, the event is fun for everyone. Thousands of balloons are blown up and given away. Guests can sit in three different trucks or on a loader and blow the air horns, which delights both young and old.. There are industry displays on concrete, insulated concrete form (ICF) home construction, admixtures, a model of a cement kiln and tours of a tugboat. Concrete pumps, brake safety, and cement bulkers are all on display. Every half hour site tours are given. One of the biggest attractions for the children is the big sand pile equipped with lots of Tonka construction equipment and a slide made from a pipe by Ocean's Pipe Division. The Grand Prize for the kids is the Ultimate Show and Tell. Ocean takes a mixer truck to the winner's school for show and tell. The driver makes concrete in the classroom, talks about how it is made at the plant and where it is used, emphasizes truck safety, and then lets all the kids climb into the truck and blow the horn. For this year's event the plant looked a little different. Ocean's lease extension was signed last year until 2047, fifty years from when the negotiations began in 1997. With their long term existence on Granville Island secured, Ocean undertook some major projects to put the plant in an excellent position to produce concrete for the long term. These included recladding the plant and painting the silos, and replacing the main aggregate feed conveyors, which were more than forty years old. Although the concrete plant is not the main attraction on Granville Island, Ocean and its employees have found a way to fit in to this immensely popular tourist destination in a positive way. They are proud to be totally accepted by the community in which they work. Archives
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Negotiations for a lease extension began in 1997. They were cautious, but positive from the start. In 1998, Ocean painted the drum of one of its trucks to promote the public market. Granville Island's 20th Anniversary was in 1999. To promote this event they painted another truck drum and had the first open house. Ocean thought they might get a few hundred people to visit- they were shocked when 2,000 showed up. The event has grown in stature since then, and once a year, on a sunny Saturday on the last weekend in April, the plant attracts about 4,000 people.
