Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Canadian pride hit fever pitch during the men's gold medal hockey game, when the
host nation beat the US with a dream-like last-gasp goal. For many Vancouverites, this
moment was the best thing that's ever happened in the city's short modern history.
For decades a neon-lit 'W' stood atop the old Woodward's department store. But when
the building was redeveloped it was found to be severely corroded. A new one was
created in its place, while the old one was preserved in a glass case at ground level.
Gentrification
After the Olympics, a new wave of development took hold in the city, especially in
those areas that had traditionally seen little change in decades past. One such controver-
sial neighborhood in particular was suddenly part of these new plans.
Long-blighted by drugs, prostitution and a concentration of mentally ill residents, the
Downtown Eastside - centered on Main and Hastings Sts - had been a no-go skid row
for many years. While nearby Gastown was the historic genesis of the city, the key
streets of the Downtown Eastside were also once lined with the banks, shops and bust-
ling commercial enterprises of the region's main business district. When new develop-
ment shifted the city center across to the Robson and Granville Sts area of downtown in
the 1940s, though, this old 'hood began a graceless decline. City and provincial policies
that concentrated services for the poor and homeless in the area didn't help, with squal-
id rooming houses and dodgy pubs soon becoming standard fixtures.
Politicians have made regular pronouncements about solving the area's problems
since the 1990s. Current mayor Gregor Robinson has claimed he will end homelessness
across the city by 2015, and a new wave of gentrification is finally changing the neigh-
borhood. The opening of a large, new housing, shops and university-campus complex
on the old Woodward's department-store site in 2009 was the catalyst for change, with
new businesses recolonizing the area's paint-peeled storefronts for the first time in dec-
ades.
The gentrification drive is not without controversy, though. While city hipsters move
into pricey loft apartments and populate exposed-brick coffee shops, the residents who
have called this area home for the last few decades are feeling threatened and increas-
ingly marginalized. In 2013 antigentrification protesters began picketing new restaur-
ants in the area and appealing for more social housing to be part of all future plans.
Finding the right balance between rampant development and support for the people
