I feel like Vancouver’s recovery has been pretty alright. Especially when comparing to cities like San Francisco, Vancouver’s downtown still has a very respectable amount of people meandering through the streets.
I think the main advantage that Vancouver has over other cities is a really strong focus towards building a shitload of residential towers everywhere. Unlike the financial district in cities like San Francisco (that’s literally made up entirely of office buildings), it feels like Vancouver’s stretches of office buildings are better surrounded by residential properties to prop up downtown activity even when WFH has significantly reduced the number of commuters.
I was in Vancouver for the first time a few weeks ago. It was bustling, had to make reservations at the restaurant’s we wanted to eat at and noted how active Stanley park was. Granville Island was packed.
If it were any busier I wouldn’t have enjoyed it as much.
Yeh, Vancouver doesn’t have much in the way of office towers. My gf’s restaurant is still struggling compared to pre-covid numbers though. The west end is full of tourists again though, at least from my daily perspective.
I think in general the restaurant eating culture has shifted, so I guess that makes sense.
Yet another win for mixed land use, but NIMBYS want their neighbourhoods to remain ghost towns after business hours.
It really doesn’t make sense to me. Residential development is peaceful and productive and helps local businesses flourish. What’s not to like?
Poor people. What they don’t like is the occasional encounter with homeless or any other societal ill. That’s supposed to be swept into poor people’s neighborhoods “as to protect the historical value and do justice to the land owners who invested in this region”.
In other words, egotistical people and conservatism. No amount of number crunching about the likelihood of increased property values with increased urbanism suffices; the way they value their place is by proximity to “undesirable” people.
Was recently in Manhattan. Compared to that, Vancouver is a paradise. Some of the worst streets ther 7 out of 10 places boarded or abandoned. Worst of all. Its only chain places that survived. Part of the appeal of Manhattan is all the places run by locals and the lack of chains everywhere. It got “better” the more expensive the neighborhood was of course. Ultimately a huge win for Capitalism and consolidation of wealth.
I thought Manhattan (and New York in general) was known for having independent bodegas around every corner?
It certainly has been in the past. And it’s mostly the retail places not the bodegas that I see shutdown… but still it was pretty rough.
