People Gotta Move has been a passion project for the Vancouver LEGO Club.
Working with New Westminster Museum curator Oana Capota, the VLC consulted with other groups to develop an overall vision for the project.
“I would conservatively say that hundreds of hours have been put into this display by the individual members and collaboratively,” said VLC member Pierre Chum in an email to the Record. “I wouldn't be surprised if it reached around the 1,000 hour mark with 25 of our members contributing to this display.”
New West resident Dave DeGobbi, project lead, was very passionate about seeing this project through, to represent his city/neighbourhood, as were many others in our club who contributed in many different ways, Chum noted.
If you’ve been among the crowds who have flocked to the exhibit, you may have wondered how the massive exhibit took shape.
“LEGO building tends to be a solitary activity, but this is a massive coordination of a collaborative effort by 25 of our members to deliver what you see. We had many people excited about the architecture styles of the buildings in New Westminster which serve as the backdrop for the greater story or message of People Gotta Move,” Chum said. “The viewing audience has to connect with the fact that this is their city first and then that can start a dialogue on how transportation impacts it. Fortunately, for us we have members, who really love transit and transportation, and contributed greatly to the different modes that you see.”
Chum said People Gotta Move was the first major project for member Kenmore Thompson, who took on a rather large project, 748 Columbia St. and spent many hours recreating the building digitally with LEGO software using selective compression to scale it down to size and that it still recognizable.
“ For other veteran members, like David Gagnon, who besides contributing the SkyTrain station, also helped to unify the main two displays, so that it didn't look like 25 people all working separately and it became one cohesive, living, breathing LEGO city,” he said. “All of our contributing members felt a sense of pride in a job well done, that will be seen by many children and adults over the coming months.”
Just how detailed is the exhibit? There’s a light glowing inside the SkyTrain car included in People Gotta Move.
VLC members built most of the components of People Gotta Move offsite and transported to the New Westminster Museum.
“Some build rather solidly, while others are a little more fragile, in order to achieve a certain look or esthetic,” Chum said. “But with an install lasting about two weeks, all the different buildings and elements arrived and we pulled the assembly all together onsite.”
For more information about the VLC visit www.vlc.ca.
