More accurately, the baby went over to Brooklyn. Brooklyn has what I envisioned Manhattan to have: it feels alive here.

Which raises the question: Given that New Westminster has a fraction of the population, diversity and ferment of Brooklyn, can the city become its own sought-after centre of creative culture (as Brooklyn has), rather than remain mostly a commuterville for Vancouver?

The appeal of New Westminster

All my life living in Vancouver, the words "New Westminster" was Vancouver-speak for "way the hell out there near Surrey."

Like Brooklyn, New Westminster also struggled with its rough-and-tumble reputation. But now, things are changing.

Adam Goss, a local real estate agent who grew up here, tells me that New West's downtown core is on the right track if it wants to attract the younger crowd.

"My belief is community really has to grow and form organically. But, I feel the necessary steps are in the works and form much of the basis for the city's vision moving forward."

That could be an understatement, even coming from a real estate agent. Plaza 88, a huge development at New Westminster SkyTrain Station, has three condo towers as well as a Safeway, Shoppers Drug Mart, two banks, several shops, and a new 10-screen cinema, all within less than one city block. Just a few blocks up Columbia Street are two huge new condominium developments just breaking ground: Salient Group's Trapp and Holbrook incorporating old historic facades into modern living, and Ballenas' Northbank, two blocks away from Columbia SkyTrain Station, just a few blocks from Plaza 88. Northbank, a 21-storey tower with 109 homes including eight townhomes, sold out seven of its eight townhomes before it had even broke ground.

Right next door to Plaza 88, construction is also underway on a $94-million multi-use civic facility project that includes a 350-seat theatre, a Class A LEED gold office tower, an art gallery and studios, conference facilities, the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame, and the new location of the city's museum and archives.

Moreover, like current New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's grand vision to transform Brooklyn's nasty cluster of piers into a new grassy, family-friendly waterfront with bike lanes, I'm witnessing a grassy promenade being built along the Fraser River where old derelict warehouses once sat. Former mayoral candidate James Crosty likes to call it "Wayne's Wharf" in tongue-in-cheek derision of Mayor Wright's expensive plan to redevelop the downtown core, but I'll take grassy riverfront over crumbling industrial foundations any day of the week.

At the end of the new park across from Plaza 88 sits the River Market, the newly renovated New Westminster Quay. After years of neglect, it now boasts a Donald's Market, the second locations of Chinatown's Wild Rice and Gastown's The Network Hub, Vancouver Circus School, Great Wall Tea Company, a gelato café, a pub with a killer patio, and a soon-to-open permanent location of the Re-Up BBQ food cart. The market also fronts a long boardwalk on the mighty Fraser River and neighbours the luxury hotel Inn At The Quay, The Boathouse, and The Keg, one of the most haunted buildings in North America.

Unlike other municipalities surrounding Vancouver, New Westminster seems less thoroughly colonized by the automobile.

"New West has a more progressive parking philosophy than most other municipalities as they have greatly reduced the number of parking stalls needed per unit in newly developed properties," Goss tells me. "The concept behind Plaza 88 and the Azure condos was to create community amenities enough to reduce residents' requirement for a car."

Before my wife and I bought a car last fall to make life easier with a baby, we never really felt we needed one. With the market, numerous pubs and cafes, diverse restaurants, one of my favourite Mexican taquerias up the hill, an old-school butcher shop near Queen's Park, and so on, we have just about everything we need here within walking distance.

Density is good for New West's future, believes Goss.

"[The youth demographic] thrives on the energy of a downtown community," he says. "There needs to be an organic energy and for this there needs to be a more dense population. The critical mass needs to be hit. As more populate the downtown, higher quality business comes in, community grows organically."

The city champions density in an official downtown community plan, predicting that the downtown population will about double in the next 20 years.

Urban issues journalist Frances Bula hears the future in conversations around her Vancouver dinner table.

"I know that my 29-year-old son and his friends, who are artsy and not very rich, often talk about New Westminster as a place they'd consider," Bula tells me. "It has beautiful old buildings, a sense of place and... it's easy to get to by transit."

In fact, she adds, "New West is attractive because it's one of the few areas outside downtown Vancouver with a sense of history. There are a few more areas scattered around the region -- lower Lonsdale, Annieville, Steveston, Fort Langley, Cloverdale.

"But," Bula continues, "New West is closer and not so suburban feeling as North Van. I see it possibly being more like Georgetown in Seattle or Williamsburg in New York."

Imagine how suddenly fused New Westminster and Vancouver could become as a corridor for young creatives if the SkyTrain operated later than 1 a.m. But that's its own story.

The appeal of accessibility and character

Actor and stuntman Patrick Sabongui, who recently appeared in This Means War starring Chris Pine and Tom Hardy, moved here with his wife from Los Angeles four years ago. He runs an acting school called ACT Vancouver which teaches acting classes for children out of the Kids in Motion studio on East Columbia in Sapperton.

Why New West? I ask him.

"It's a more central location," Sabongui tells me over a coffee at Hideout Cafe on Carnarvon Street. To get to Vancouver from many areas, Sabongui explains, you have to drive through neighbourhoods to get to where you need to go, whereas you can quickly get to New Westminster on the SkyTrain, via the Trans-Canada Highway and the Pattullo Bridge, from anywhere else in the region -- including Vancouver.

That ease of accessibility gives New Westminster an advantage that Vancouver doesn't have, Sabongui says.

Another redeeming characteristic is its urban character, he notes. "When the sun goes down, and I look out onto the street, I see all kinds of characters walking around." There's a gritty charm here lacking in Vancouver.

One person's gritty, of course, is another's alarm bell. In December, Maclean's magazine ranked New Westminster Canada's 15th most dangerous city. The city's police department countered that New Westminster's crime rate had decreased in the last 10 years, a rate faster than province-wide in many categories. 
New Westminster's varied edges makes it a natural locale for the movie industry, Sabongui says.

"You can look in one direction and be in New York City. Look in another direction, and you're in Paris."

He's right. The popular TV series Supernatural films here regularly. I've seen TV sets for Fringe and Alcatraz as well, using New Westminster to stand in for Los Angeles, San Francisco and of course, New York City.

Because it's an urban chameleon, Sabongui adds, the city allows its creative individuals to be whoever they want.

"When you're an artist, you're like a plant, a tree. You can't put a tree in a box," says Sabongui, adding that an ideal place to live is one that offers its residents the chance to grow, to explore, to bloom.

Vancouver can be described as already established, Sabongui says. New West, on the other hand, could be seen as just beginning. "It has a creative energy."

A magnetic energy, perhaps, that will draw more young people like myself.

Maybe we'll know that has happened when t-shirts begin selling in New Westminster proudly proclaiming: "Can't afford to be a Vanlover." Luke Brocki, can I sell you one?