Vancouver - Vancouver iis the largest metropolitan area in Western Canada, and third largest in Canada, with a population of 2.6 million. Located at the southwestern corner of the coastal province of British Columbia, it is well known for its majestic natural beauty, as it is nestled between the Coast Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. It is frequently ranked as one of the "best cities to live in" and is certainly a beautiful destination to visit. Details |
Kitsilano - Kitsilano /kɪtsɪˈlænoʊ/ is a neighbourhood in the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Known colloquially as "Kits", the neighbourhood is named after Squamish chief August Jack Khatsahlano. Kitsilano is located in Vancouver's West Side along the south shore of English Bay, between the neighbourhoods of West Point Grey and Fairview. With a population of 40,595 people as of 2006, the area is mostly residential with two main commercial areas, West 4th Avenue and West Broadway, known for their retail stores, restaurants and organic food markets. Notable landmarks in Kitsilano include the Burrard Bridge, Kitsilano Beach, and the Museum of Vancouver/H. R. MacMillan Space Centre. The neighbourhood has played host to a number of annual events such as the Vancouver International Children's Festival, the Bard on the Beach outdoor Shakespeare festival, and the Celebration of Light fireworks competition. Kitsilano is the current or former home of a number of notable residents including environmentalist David Suzuki, writers William Gibson and Philip K. Dick, actors Ryan Reynolds, Jason Priestley, and Joshua Jackson, ice hockey players Trevor Linden and Ryan Kesler, and comedian Brent Butt. Details |
Fraser River - On June 14, 1792, the Spanish explorers Dionisio Alcalá Galiano and Cayetano Valdés entered and anchored in the North Arm of the Fraser River, becoming the first Europeans to find and enter it. The existence of the river, but not its location, had been deduced during the 1791 voyage of José María Narváez, under Francisco de Eliza. The upper reaches of the Fraser River were first explored by Sir Alexander Mackenzie in 1793, and fully traced by Simon Fraser in 1808, who confirmed that it was not connected with the Columbia River. In 1828 George Simpson visited the river, mainly to examine Fort Langley and determine whether it would be suitable as the Hudson's Bay Company's main Pacific depot. Simpson had believed the Fraser River might be navigable throughout its length, even though Simon Fraser had described it as non-navigable. Simpson journeyed down the river and through the Fraser Canyon and afterwords wrote "I should consider the passage down, to be certain Death, in nine attempts out of Ten. I shall therefore no longer talk about it as a navigable stream". His trip down the river convinced him that Fort Langley could not replace Fort Vancouver as the company's main depot on the Pacific coast. Much of British Columbia's history has been bound to the Fraser, partly because it was the essential route between the Interior and the Lower Coast after the loss of the lands south of the 49th Parallel with the Oregon Treaty of 1846. It was the site of its first recorded settlements of Aboriginal people (see Musqueam, Sto:lo, St'at'imc, Secwepemc and Nlaka'pamux), the route of multitudes of prospectors during the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush and the main vehicle of the province's early commerce and industry. In 1998, the river was designated as a Canadian Heritage River for its natural and human heritage. It remains the longest river with that designation. Details |
Kerrisdale - Kerrisdale is a neighbourhood in the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Kerrisdale is a neighbourhood located in Vancouver's west side. It features a mix of newer houses and older bungalows as well as various low and mid-rise rental and condo apartment buildings in its northern section. The neighbourhood is an ethnic mix of Caucasian and Asian Canadians. It features a shopping district running generally along West 41st Avenue between Larch and Maple Streets and West Boulevard between 37th and 47th Avenues. Although the city officially defines Kerrisdale as being south of 41st Ave (north of 41st is called Arbutus Ridge), the majority of the area's residents consider the area's boundaries to be West 33rd Avenue to the north, Granville Street to the east, West 57th Avenue to the south, and Blenheim Street to the west. The northern part of Marpole is also generally thought of as part of Kerrisdale, thus some refer to the area as Kerrisdale-Marpole. The southwestern part of Kerrisdale is known as Southlands, due to its location in relation to the city. Southlands is known for its horse stables and rural feel and is located on the floodplain of the North Arm of the Fraser River. Details |
Marpole - Marpole, originally a Musqueam village named c̓əsnaʔəm, is a mostly residential neighbourhood of 23,832 in 2011, located on the southern edge of the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, immediately northeast of Vancouver International Airport. It is approximately bordered by Granville Street to the west, 64th Avenue to the north, Cambie Street to the east and the Fraser River to the south. It has undergone many changes in the 20th century, with the influx of traffic and development associated with the construction of the Oak Street Bridge (which leads to Highway 99 leading to the southern suburbs) and the Arthur Laing Bridge (which leads to Vancouver International Airport). Details |
Main Street - The north end of Main Street is located just west of the historic site of Hastings Mill, the nucleus around which Granville, later Vancouver, grew. In its earliest days, the intersection of Main and Hastings Streets was the centre of downtown Vancouver, boasting the city's central public library (now the Carnegie Centre) and — a few blocks away — the old City Hall. The intersection of Main and Hastings is now a local byword for the poverty, addictions, homelessness, and prostitution often associated with the Downtown Eastside. The thoroughfare was originally named "Westminster Avenue", since it connects to New Westminster Road (now Kingsway). It received its present name in 1910 at the behest of local merchants, who thought that it bestowed a more cosmopolitan air to the neighbourhood. Main Street was previously separated into two segments by False Creek, with a bascule bridge linking the two. The two segments were joined together after the eastern section of False Creek was reclaimed for railway lands in the 1910s and 1920s. Details |
Knighty Street - Knight Street is a major north-south roadway in Vancouver and Richmond, British Columbia, Canada. It is a four-to-six lane freeway from Westminster Highway in Richmond to Marine Drive in Vancouver, thus serving as an alternate way to exit Vancouver southbound, rather than the Granville Street/Oak Street corridor. Upon entering Vancouver, Knight Street provides major access routes to East Vancouver; at 14th Avenue, the road turns into Clark Drive, and runs northbound until it reaches the Port of Vancouver at Burrard Inlet. It is the busiest truck route in Vancouver, and a key link between Vancouver and its neighbours to the south. The freeway section of Knight Street crosses the Fraser River via the Knight Street Bridge, connecting Vancouver to Mitchell Island and Richmond. This is the only officially designated freeway in Metro Vancouver that is not also designated as a provincial highway. However, the whole length of Knight Street is part of TransLink's Major Road Network: the agency owns the Knight Street Bridge, and provides funding to the cities of Vancouver and Richmond for maintenance and major projects on the rest of the street. The street has become a favourite for street racers in the Vancouver area probably because of its long straight bridge, though the police presence has recently improved to thwart this activity.[5][6] The intersection of Knight Street and Southeast Marine Drive, at the northern end of Knight Street Bridge, ranked among the top ten motor-vehicle crash sites in all of British Columbia in 2008. The street (formerly known as Knight Road) was named after Robert Knight, a property owner in South Vancouver in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Details |
False Creek - False Creek is a short inlet in the heart of Vancouver. It separates downtown from the rest of the city. It was named by George Henry Richards during his Hydrographic survey of 1856-63. Science World is located at its eastern end, with the Granville, Cambie, and the Burrard (which is furthest west) Street bridges crossing False Creek. The Canada Line tunnel crosses underneath False Creek just west of the Cambie Bridge. It is one of the four major bodies of water bordering Vancouver along with English Bay, Burrard Inlet and the Fraser River. In 1986 it was the location of the Expo 86 World's Fair. Details |
Fairview - Vancouver-Fairview is a provincial electoral district for the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia, Canada. Fairview refers to the city's neighbourhood on its south shore, made up of two rectangles, one bounded by Granville Street to the East, 16th Avenue to the South, Arbutus Street to the West and 4th Avenue to the North and a second area bounded on the east by Main Street, on the west by Granville Street, to the south by 33rd Avenue and the north end boundary is formed by the West 4th-West 6th-West 2nd Avenue road. Details |
Olympic Village - The Vancouver Olympic Village (VVL), is an Olympic Village built by Millennium Development Group for the 2010 Winter Olympics and 2010 Winter Paralympics hosted in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. There are over a thousand units, ranging over a million square feet, that was able to accommodate over 2,800 athletes, coaches, and officials for the 2010 Winter Olympics. The site, a former industrial area which mostly consisted of parking lots, is located on the shoreline at the southeast corner of False Creek, north of Second Avenue between Quebec and Manitoba Streets. Just south of Science World, its waterfront is part of the False Creek Seawall promenade and bike route, and is adjacent to the stations of the Granville Island Heritage Railway, the Spyglass Place pedestrian ferry wharf (served by Aquabus and False Creek Ferries), the Science World pedestrian ferry wharf (normally served by Aquabus and False Creek Ferries but closed temporarily from 25 January 2010 to 24 March 2010) and the Main Street and Olympic Village SkyTrain stations. Details |
Grandview - Grandview–Woodland, also commonly known as Grandview–Woodlands, is a neighbourhood in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada to the east of the downtown area, stretching south from the shores of Burrard Inlet and encompassing portions of the popular Commercial Drive area. It is a mature neighbourhood in Vancouver that is a vibrant mixture of commercial, industrial, single-family and multi-family residential with a rich ethnic history and features. A central part of the Vancouver area, Grandview–Woodland runs from the south shore of busy Burrard Inlet south to Broadway, one of the city's major east–west roads. The western border of the neighbourhood is Clark Drive, the eastern Nanaimo Street. It is a busy area for transportation, with Hastings Street and First Avenue both cutting through the neighbourhood, while Victoria Drive and Commercial Drive both run north–south through the area. Much of the neighbourhood is built on the rise that stretches east–west through the eastern portion of Vancouver, making for views across the city proper and the inlet. Details |
Downtown - Downtown Vancouver is the southeastern portion of the peninsula in the north-central part of the City of Vancouver. It is the business, commercial, cultural, financial, and entertainment centre of the city and the Metro Vancouver and Lower Mainland regions. The downtown area is generally considered to be bounded by Burrard Inlet to the north, Stanley Park and the West End to the west, False Creek to the south, and the Downtown Eastside to the east. Most sources include the full downtown peninsula (adding the West End neighbourhood and Stanley Park) as downtown Vancouver, but the City of Vancouver defines them as separate neighbourhoods. Besides the readily identifiable office towers of the financial and central business districts, Downtown Vancouver also includes residential neighbourhoods in the form of high-rise apartment and condominiums, in Yaletown and Coal Harbour. Other downtown neighbourhoods include the Granville Mall and Entertainment District, Downtown's South, Gastown, Japantown, and Chinatown. Details |