Make galleries free 1 week a year: Vancouver mayor

(CBC) - Vancouver's mayor has floated the idea of having free admission to public galleries and museums during the Christmas holidays.

Sam Sullivan was speaking to about 500 people attending a one-day conference Monday on the development of a long-term cultural strategy for Vancouver.

Vancouver has an abundant supply of culture, including the Vancouver Art Gallery, a history museum, a museum of anthropology and an aquarium.

But local people don't make the most of those attractions, he said.

Sullivan wants Vancouver to try an innovative idea that he said helped create demand in Paris.

"Every year between Christmas and New Year's when school is out, every museum, gallery and attraction in Paris is free. That's right, free," he said at the conference, called Creative City Conversation.

"I'm told that Parisian families flock to them. I believe we should be seriously looking at whether we should adopt this type of program as a way to support increased demand for the arts and culture sector."

Sullivan said young people would develop a taste for art and history through such a plan.

Sullivan also spoke of the advantages of excluding cars from some parts of the city during cultural festivals.

In San Francisco, when cars were excluded from Golden Gate Park, attendance at cultural events increased by as much as 40 per cent, he said.

Robert Sirman, director of the Canada Council for the Arts; Ronald Burnett, president of the Emily Carr Institute in Vancouver; and Ken Robinson, a British Labour politician who led a U.K. commission on creativity, education and the economy, were also to speak.