It simply wasn't part of the original interpreter spec.
Other implementations (including CHIP-48 and SCHIP) didn't put the screen memory (and other stuff) at the same locations. Any program that relies on the screen memory location would only work in that specific interpreter. (Some early CHIP-8 games for the VIP might rely on this.)
In fact, the location of the screen memory changed in the original COSMAC VIP interpreter based on how much memory the computer had, since the interpreter's variables (including the screen memory) was always lcoated at the end of the addressable memory space.