You sunk my battleship!

Bringing the decommissioned USS Vancouver to its namesake town comes up from time to time.

It came up again recently, I heard when chatting with Jan Bader, the city’s program and policy manager, this week.

History and maritime buffs have long dreamed of bringing the 5,463 ton, 552 foot long vessel home for a restoration and resting place.

Otherwise, a story from 2007 said, the Vancouver “will be eventually sunk as a target if nobody claims her.”

The ship, taken out of service in 1992, is in storage in the San Francisco Bay area.

But Bader, while appreciative of the sentiment asked: “Where would we put it? How are we going to pay for it?”

And therein lies the conundrum. Where would the city (which hasn’t got money for its parks department, let alone millions lying around for boat restoration) find the cash?

And, where would we park such a monumental thing?

Well, we’re no help on the cash, but we were thinking one area the USS Vancouver could be parked is right on the washed out section of the Renaissance Trail. It’s not usable anyway, and if we spent just enough to restore its weapons systems, there’s no way scofflaws who are skirting barriers to continue along the trail would keep at it.

Where would you park a battleship?