Topic · 1887–2017
People of the bridge
Published
Who built the Lions Gate Bridge?
The project was driven by A.J.T. Taylor, an engineering contractor born in Victoria in 1887. Three sons of the 1st Earl of Iveagh, Rupert, Arthur Ernest and Walter Guinness, put up the money through British Pacific Properties and the First Narrows Bridge Company. The Montreal firm Monsarrat & Pratley designed the bridge, and Philip Pratley is named as its design engineer.
Stories on this topic
4 November 2026
Who paid for the Lions Gate Bridge? The Guinness brothers and the mountainside behind it
Private British money led by three Guinness brothers paid for the Lions Gate Bridge, the road to their West Vancouver land. The province bought it in 1955.
The record
A.J.T. Taylor
Promoter of the bridge. Born in Victoria on 4 August 1887; in December 1930 the Taylor group took control of the First Narrows Bridge Company.
Rupert, Arthur Ernest and Walter Guinness
Three sons of the 1st Earl of Iveagh. They financed British Pacific Properties and the bridge company.
Philip Pratley
Design engineer, with the Montreal firm Monsarrat & Pratley. Canada named him a National Historic Person in 2005.
Charles Marega
Sculptor of the two lions at the south end of the bridge.
Ian Hayward
Electrical engineer who designed and installed the 1986 lights on the main cables.
Sources
- S101 Taylor, Alfred James Towle (Encyclopedia of British Columbia) · KnowBC / Harbour Publishing, 2000
- S102 Taylor, A. J. T. (Alfred James Towle), 1887-1945 (personography) · Dartmouth College Library, n.d.
- S221 Taylor Made (blog post on A.J.T. Taylor) · Anne-Marie Lawrence, North Shore Heritage Preservation Society, 2024
- S223 North Shore News special supplement on British Properties (1996-07-28) · North Shore News (via NSDL), 1996
- S105 Our story / history · British Properties (formerly British Pacific Properties), 2025
- S113 Philip Louis Pratley (article) · Wikipedia, 2026
- S003 Lions' Gate Bridge - National Historic Civil Engineering Site plaque · Canadian Society for Civil Engineering (CSCE), 2006
- S112 Charles Monsarrat (article) · Wikipedia, 2026
- S109 Lions Gate Bridge (article, wikitext as of 2026-10-23) · Wikipedia, 2026
- S106 Charles Marega (Chuck Davis History of Metropolitan Vancouver) · Chuck Davis / Harbour Publishing, n.d.
- S111 Charles Marega (article) · Wikipedia, 2026
- S107 Major Ian Aubrey Hayward, P.Eng. (Ret'd) - obituary · Canadian Military Engineers Association, 2017