🏴 Architect Paul Phipps is associated with Vancouver. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (FRIBA) in 1921.
🇨🇦 Vancouver is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. It is the most populous city in the province. The Greater Vancouver area is the third-largest metropolitan area in Canada.
Vancouver is one of the most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities in Canada: 52% of its residents are not native English speakers, 48.9% are native speakers of neither English nor French, and 50.6% of residents belong to visible minority groups. It has been consistently ranked one of the most livable cities in Canada and in the world. In terms of housing affordability, Vancouver is also one of the most expensive cities in Canada and in the world. Vancouver plans to become the greenest city in the world. Vancouverism is the city's urban planning design philosophy.
Indigenous settlement of Vancouver began more than 10,000 years ago, and included the Squamish, Musqueam, and Tsleil-Waututh (Burrard) peoples. The beginnings of the modern city, which was originally named Gastown, grew around the site of a makeshift tavern on the western edges of Hastings Mill that was built on July 1, 1867, and owned by proprietor Gassy Jack. The original site is marked by the Gastown steam clock. Gastown then formally registered as a townsite dubbed Granville, Burrard Inlet. The city was renamed "Vancouver" in 1886, through a deal with the Canadian Pacific Railway. The Canadian Pacific transcontinental railway was extended to the city by 1887. The city's large natural seaport on the Pacific Ocean became a vital link in the trade between Asia-Pacific, East Asia, Europe, and Eastern Canada.
Vancouver has hosted many international conferences and events, including the 1954 Commonwealth Games, UN Habitat I, Expo 86, APEC Canada 1997, the World Police and Fire Games in 1989 and 2009; several matches of 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup including the finals at BC Place in Downtown Vancouver, and the 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics which were held in Vancouver and Whistler, a resort community 125 km (78 mi) north of the city. In 1969, Greenpeace was founded in Vancouver. The city became the permanent home to TED conferences in 2014.
As of 2016, the Port of Vancouver is the fourth-largest port by tonnage in the Americas, the busiest and largest in Canada, and the most diversified port in North America. While forestry remains its largest industry, Vancouver is well known as an urban centre surrounded by nature, making tourism its second-largest industry. Major film production studios in Vancouver and nearby Burnaby have turned Greater Vancouver and nearby areas into one of the largest film production centres in North America, earning it the nickname "Hollywood North".
1History Archaeological records indicate that Aboriginal people were already living in the Vancouver area from 8,000 to 10,000 years ago. The city is located in the traditional and presently unceded territories of the Squamish, Musqueam, and Tsleil-Waututh (Burrard) peoples of the Coast Salish group. They had villages in various parts of present-day Vancouver, such as Stanley Park, False Creek, Kitsilano, Point Grey and near the mouth of the Fraser River. The region where Vancouver is currently located was referred to in contemporary Halkomelem as Lhq’á:lets, meaning "wide at the bottom/end".
Europeans became acquainted with the area of the future Vancouver when José María Narváez of Spain explored the coast of present-day Point Grey and parts of Burrard Inlet in 1791—although one author contends that Francis Drake may have visited the area in 1579.
The explorer and North West Company trader Simon Fraser and his crew became the first-known Europeans to set foot on the site of the present-day city. In 1808, they travelled from the east down the Fraser River, perhaps as far as Point Grey.
1Early growth The Fraser Gold Rush of 1858 brought over 25,000 men, mainly from California, to nearby New Westminster (founded February 14, 1859) on the Fraser River, on their way to the Fraser Canyon, bypassing what would become Vancouver. Vancouver is among British Columbia's youngest cities; the first European settlement in what is now Vancouver was not until 1862 at McCleery's Farm on the Fraser River, just east of the ancient village of Musqueam in what is now Marpole. A sawmill established at Moodyville (now the City of North Vancouver) in 1863, began the city's long relationship with logging. It was quickly followed by mills owned by Captain Edward Stamp on the south shore of the inlet. Stamp, who had begun logging in the Port Alberni area, first attempted to run a mill at Brockton Point, but difficult currents and reefs forced the relocation of the operation in 1867 to a point near the foot of Dunlevy Street. This mill, known as the Hastings Mill, became the nucleus around which Vancouver formed. The mill's central role in the city waned after the arrival of the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) in the 1880s. It nevertheless remained important to the local economy until it closed in the 1920s. The settlement, which came to be called Gastown, grew quickly around the original makeshift tavern established by Gassy Jack in 1867 on the edge of the Hastings Mill property.
In 1870, the colonial government surveyed the settlement and laid out a townsite, renamed "Granville" in honour of the then–British Secretary of State for the Colonies, Lord Granville. This site, with its natural harbour, was selected in 1884 as the terminus for the Canadian Pacific Railway, to the disappointment of Port Moody, New Westminster and Victoria, all of which had vied to be the railhead. A railway was among the inducements for British Columbia to join the Confederation in 1871 but the Pacific Scandal and arguments over the use of Chinese labour delayed construction until the 1880s.
1Incorporation The City of Vancouver was incorporated on April 6, 1886, the same year that the first transcontinental train arrived. CPR president William Van Horne arrived in Port Moody to establish the CPR terminus recommended by Henry John Cambie, and gave the city its name in honour of George Vancouver. The Great Vancouver Fire on June 13, 1886, razed the entire city. The Vancouver Fire Department was established that year and the city quickly rebuilt. Vancouver's population grew from a settlement of 1,000 people in 1881 to over 20,000 by the turn of the century and 100,000 by 1911.
Vancouver merchants outfitted prospectors bound for the Klondike Gold Rush in 1898. One of those merchants, Charles Woodward, had opened the first Woodward's store at Abbott and Cordova Streets in 1892 and, along with Spencer's and the Hudson's Bay department stores, formed the core of the city's retail sector for decades.
The economy of early Vancouver was dominated by large companies such as the CPR, which fuelled economic activity and led to the rapid development of the new city; in fact, the CPR was the main real estate owner and housing developer in the city. While some manufacturing did develop, including the establishment of the British Columbia Sugar Refinery by Benjamin Tingley Rogers in 1890, natural resources became the basis for Vancouver's economy. The resource sector was initially based on logging and later on exports moving through the seaport, where commercial traffic constituted the largest economic sector in Vancouver by the 1930s.
1The 20th century The dominance of the economy by big business was accompanied by an often militant labour movement. The first major sympathy strike was in 1903 when railway employees struck against the CPR for union recognition. Labour leader Frank Rogers was killed by CPR police while picketing at the docks, becoming the movement's first martyr in British Columbia. The rise of industrial tensions throughout the province led to Canada's first general strike in 1918, at the Cumberland coal mines on Vancouver Island. Following a lull in the 1920s, the strike wave peaked in 1935 when unemployed men flooded the city to protest conditions in the relief camps run by the military in remote areas throughout the province. After two tense months of daily and disruptive protesting, the relief camp strikers decided to take their grievances to the federal government and embarked on the On-to-Ottawa Trek, but their protest was put down by force. The workers were arrested near Mission and interned in work camps for the duration of the Depression.
Other social movements, such as the first-wave feminist, moral reform, and temperance movements were also instrumental in Vancouver's development. Mary Ellen Smith, a Vancouver suffragist and prohibitionist, became the first woman elected to a provincial legislature in Canada in 1918. Alcohol prohibition began in the First World War and lasted until 1921, when the provincial government established control over alcohol sales, a practice still in place today. Canada's first drug law came about following an inquiry conducted by the federal minister of Labour and future prime minister, William Lyon Mackenzie King. King was sent to investigate damages claims resulting from a riot when the Asiatic Exclusion League led a rampage through Chinatown and Japantown. Two of the claimants were opium manufacturers, and after further investigation, King found that white women were reportedly frequenting opium dens as well as Chinese men. A federal law banning the manufacture, sale, and importation of opium for non-medicinal purposes was soon passed based on these revelations. These riots, and the formation of the Asiatic Exclusion League, also act as signs of a growing fear and mistrust towards the Japanese living in Vancouver and throughout BC. These fears were exacerbated by the attack on Pearl Harbor leading to the eventual internment or deportation of all Japanese-Canadians living in the city and the province. After the war, these Japanese-Canadian men and women were not allowed to return to cities like Vancouver causing areas, like the aforementioned Japantown, to cease to be ethnically Japanese areas as the communities never revived.
Amalgamation with Point Grey and South Vancouver gave the city its final boundaries not long before it became the third-largest metropolis in the country.
1Geography Located on the Burrard Peninsula, Vancouver lies between Burrard Inlet to the north and the Fraser River to the south. The Strait of Georgia, to the west, is shielded from the Pacific Ocean by Vancouver Island. The city has an area of 115.18 km² (44.47 sq mi), including both flat and hilly ground and is in the Pacific Time Zone (UTC−8) and the Pacific Maritime Ecozone.
Until the city's naming in 1885, "Vancouver" referred to Vancouver Island and it remains a common misconception that the city is located on the island. The island and the city are both named after Royal Navy Captain George Vancouver (as is the city of Vancouver, Washington, in the United States).
Vancouver has one of the largest urban parks in North America, Stanley Park, which covers 404.9 ha (1,001 acres). The North Shore Mountains dominate the cityscape, and on a clear day, scenic vistas include the snow-capped volcano Mount Baker in the state of Washington to the south-east, Vancouver Island across the Strait of Georgia to the west and south-west, and Bowen Island to the northwest.
1Economy With its location on the Pacific Rim and at the western terminus of Canada's transcontinental highway and rail routes, Vancouver is one of the nation's largest industrial centres. Port Metro Vancouver, Canada's largest and most diversified port, does more than $172 billion in trade with over 160 different trading economies annually. Port activities generate $9.7 billion in gross domestic product and $20.3 billion in economic output. Vancouver is also the headquarters of forest product and mining companies. In recent years, Vancouver has become a centre for software development, biotechnology, aerospace, video game development, animation studios and television production and film industry. Vancouver hosts approximately 65 movies and 55 TV series annually and is the 3rd largest film & TV production centre in North America, supporting 20,000 jobs. The city's strong focus on lifestyle and health culture also makes it a hub for many lifestyle brands with Lululemon, Arc'teryx, Kit and Ace, Mountain Equipment Co-op, Herschel Supply Co., Aritzia, Reigning Champ, and Nature's Path Foods all founded and headquartered in Vancouver. Vancouver was also the birthplace of 1-800-GOT-JUNK? and Western Canada's largest online-only publication, Daily Hive.
Vancouver's scenic location makes it a major tourist destination. Over 10.3 million people visited Vancouver in 2017. Annually, tourism contributes approximately $4.8 billion to the Metro Vancouver economy and supports over 70,000 jobs. Many visit to see the city's gardens, Stanley Park, Queen Elizabeth Park, VanDusen Botanical Garden and the mountains, ocean, forest and parklands which surround the city. Each year over a million people pass through Vancouver on cruise ship vacations, often bound for Alaska.
Vancouver is the most stressed city in the spectrum of affordability of housing in Canada. In 2012, Vancouver was ranked by Demographia as the second-most unaffordable city in the world, rated as even more severely unaffordable in 2012 than in 2011. The city has adopted various strategies to reduce housing costs, including cooperative housing, legalized secondary suites, increased density and smart growth. As of April 2010, the average two-level home in Vancouver sold for a record high of $987,500, compared with the Canadian average of $365,141. A factor explaining the high property prices may be policies by the Canadian government which permit snow washing, which allows foreigners to buy property in Canada while shielding their identities from tax authorities, making real estate transactions an effective way to conduct money laundering.
Since the 1990s, development of high-rise condominia in the downtown peninsula has been financed, in part, by an inflow of capital from Hong Kong immigrants due to the former colony's 1997 handover to China. Such development has clustered in the Yaletown and Coal Harbour districts and around many of the SkyTrain stations to the east of the downtown. The city's selection to co-host the 2010 Winter Olympics was also a major influence on economic development. Concern was expressed that Vancouver's increasing homelessness problem would be exacerbated by the Olympics because owners of single room occupancy hotels, which house many of the city's lowest income residents, converted their properties to attract higher income residents and tourists. Another significant international event held in Vancouver, the 1986 World Exposition, received over 20 million visitors and added $3.7 billion to the Canadian economy. Some still-standing Vancouver landmarks, including the SkyTrain public transit system and Canada Place, were built as part of the exposition.
1Education There are five public universities in the Greater Vancouver area, the largest and most prestigious being the University of British Columbia (UBC) and Simon Fraser University (SFU), with a combined enrolment of more than 90,000 undergraduates, graduates, and professional students in 2008. UBC often ranks among the top 50 best universities in the world and is ranked among the 20 best public universities in Canada. SFU consistently ranks as the top comprehensive university in Canada and is among the 300 best universities in the world. UBC's main campus is located on the tip of Burrard Peninsula, just west of the University Endowment Lands with the city-proper adjacent to the east. SFU's main campus is in Burnaby. Both also maintain campuses in Downtown Vancouver and Surrey.
The other public universities in the metropolitan area around Vancouver are Capilano University in North Vancouver, Emily Carr University of Art and Design, and Kwantlen Polytechnic University whose four campuses are all outside the city proper. Six private institutions also operate in the region: Trinity Western University in Langley, UOPX Canada in Burnaby, and University Canada West, NYIT Canada, Fairleigh Dickinson University, Columbia College, and Sprott Shaw College, all in Vancouver.
Vancouver Community College and Langara College are publicly funded college-level institutions in Vancouver, as is Douglas College with three campuses outside the city. The British Columbia Institute of Technology in Burnaby provides polytechnic education. These are augmented by private and vocational institutions and other colleges in the surrounding areas of Metro Vancouver that provide career, trade, technical, and university-transfer programs, while the Vancouver Film School and InFocus Film School provide one-year programs in film production, animation, and other entertainment arts.
International students and English as a second language (ESL) students have been significant in the enrolment of these public and private institutions. For the 2008–2009 school year, 53 percent of Vancouver School Board's students spoke a language other than English at home.
1Culture: Theatre Prominent theatre companies in Vancouver include the Arts Club Theatre Company on Granville Island, and Bard on the Beach. Smaller companies include Touchstone Theatre, and Studio 58. The Cultch, The Firehall Arts Centre, United Players, Pacific and Metro Theatres, all run continuous theatre seasons. Theatre Under the Stars produces shows in the summer at Malkin Bowl in Stanley Park. Annual festivals that are held in Vancouver include the PuSh International Performing Arts Festival in January and the Vancouver Fringe Festival in September.
The Vancouver Playhouse Theatre Company operated for fifty years, ending in March 2012.
1Dance Vancouver is home to Ballet BC, a ballet company whose principle venue is the Queen Elizabeth Theatre. Ballet BC was founded in 1986 and is currently British Columbia's only ballet company.
The Scotiabank Dance Centre, a converted bank building on the corner of Davie and Granville, functions as a gathering place and performance venue for Vancouver-based dancers and choreographers. Dances for a Small Stage is a semi-annual dance festival.
1Film The Vancouver International Film Festival, which runs for two weeks each September, shows over 350 films and is one of the larger film festivals in North America. The VIFF Centre venue, the Vancity Theatre, runs independent non-commercial films throughout the rest of the year, as do the Pacific Cinémathèque, and the Rio theatres.
1Libraries and museums Libraries in Vancouver include the Vancouver Public Library with its main branch at Library Square, designed by Moshe Safdie. The central branch contains 1.5 million volumes. Altogether there are twenty-two branches containing 2.25 million volumes. The Vancouver Tool Library is Canada's original tool lending library.
The Vancouver Art Gallery has a permanent collection of nearly 10,000 items and is the home of a significant number of works by Emily Carr. However, little or none of the permanent collection is ever on view. Downtown is also home to the Contemporary Art Gallery (Vancouver), which showcases temporary exhibitions by up-and-coming Vancouver artists. The Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery with a small collection of contemporary works is part of the University of British Columbia.
In the Kitsilano district are the Vancouver Maritime Museum, the H. R. MacMillan Space Centre, and the Vancouver Museum, the largest civic museum in Canada. The Museum of Anthropology at UBC is a leading museum of Pacific Northwest Coast First Nations culture. A more interactive museum is Science World at the head of False Creek. The city also features a diverse collection of Public Art.
1Visual art The Vancouver School of conceptual photography (often referred to as photoconceptualism) is a term applied to a grouping of artists from Vancouver who achieved international recognition starting in the 1980s. No formal "school" exists and the grouping remains both informal and often controversial even among the artists themselves, who often resist the term. Artists associated with the term include Jeff Wall, Ian Wallace, Ken Lum, Roy Arden, Stan Douglas and Rodney Graham.
Vancouver is home to 13 of the 190 Artist Run Centres in Canada.
Artwork and cultural artifacts from nations Indigenous to the land on which Vancouver is located are available to view at the Museum of Anthropology at UBC, largely because these artifact were stolen as part of colonization.
1Music and nightlife Musical contributions from Vancouver include performers of classical, folk and popular music. The Vancouver Symphony Orchestra is the professional orchestra based in the city. The Vancouver Opera is a major opera company in the city, and City Opera of Vancouver is the city's professional chamber opera company. The city is home to a number of Canadian composers including Rodney Sharman, Jeffrey Ryan, and Jocelyn Morlock.
The city produced a number of notable punk rock bands, including D.O.A. Other early Vancouver punk bands included the Subhumans, the Young Canadians, the Pointed Sticks, and U-J3RK5. When alternative rock became popular in the 1990s, several Vancouver groups rose to prominence, including 54-40, Odds, Moist, the Matthew Good Band, Sons of Freedom and Econoline Crush. Recent successful Vancouver bands include Gob, Marianas Trench, Theory of a Deadman and Stabilo. Today, Vancouver is home to a number of popular independent bands such as The New Pornographers, Japandroids, Destroyer, In Medias Res, Tegan and Sara, and independent labels including Nettwerk and Mint. Vancouver also produced influential metal band Strapping Young Lad and pioneering electro-industrial bands Skinny Puppy, Numb and Front Line Assembly; the latter's Bill Leeb is better known for founding ambient pop super-group Delerium. Other popular musical artists who made their mark from Vancouver include Carly Rae Jepsen, Bryan Adams, Sarah McLachlan, Heart, Prism, Trooper, Chilliwack, Payolas, Moev, Images in Vogue, Michael Bublé, Stef Lang and Spirit of the West.
Larger musical performances are usually held at venues such as Rogers Arena, Queen Elizabeth Theatre, BC Place Stadium or the Pacific Coliseum, while smaller acts are held at places such as the Commodore Ballroom, the Orpheum Theatre and the Vogue Theatre. The Vancouver Folk Music Festival and the Vancouver International Jazz Festival showcase music in their respective genres from around the world. Vancouver's Hong Kong Chinese population has produced several Cantopop stars across the Hong Kong entertainment industry. Similarly, various Indo-Canadian artists and actors have a profile in Bollywood or other aspects of India's entertainment industry.
Vancouver has a vibrant nightlife scene, whether it be food and dining, or bars and nightclubs. The Granville Entertainment District has the city's highest concentration of bars and nightclubs with closing times of 3 am, in addition to various after-hours clubs open until late morning on weekends. The street can attract large crowds on weekends and is closed to traffic on such nights. Gastown is also a popular area for nightlife with many upscale restaurants and nightclubs, as well as the Davie Village which is centre to the city's LGBT community.
1Media Vancouver is a centre for film and television production. Nicknamed Hollywood North, a distinction it shares with Toronto, the city has been used as a film making location for nearly a century, beginning with the Edison Manufacturing Company. In 2021, $3.6 billion was spent on film production in Vancouver. This ranks Vancouver as the largest production hub in Canada and the 3rd largest in North America, behind Los Angeles and New York City.
A wide mix of local, national, and international newspapers are distributed in the city. The two major English-language daily newspapers are the Vancouver Sun and The Province. Also, there are two national newspapers distributed in the city, including The Globe and Mail, which began publication of a "national edition" in BC in 1983 and recently expanded to include a three-page BC news section, and the National Post which centres on national news. Other local newspapers include 24H (a local free daily), the Vancouver franchise of the national free daily Metro, the twice-a-week Vancouver Courier, and the independent newspaper The Georgia Straight. Three Chinese-language daily newspapers – Ming Pao, Sing Tao and World Journal – cater to the city's large Cantonese- and Mandarin-speaking population. A number of other local and international papers serve other multicultural groups in the Lower Mainland.
Some of the local television stations include CBC, Citytv, CTV and Global BC. OMNI British Columbia produces daily newscasts in Cantonese, Mandarin, Punjabi and Korean, and weekly newscasts in Tagalog, as well as programs aimed at other cultural groups. Fairchild Group also has two television stations: Fairchild TV and Talentvision, serving Cantonese- and Mandarin-speaking audiences, respectively.
Radio stations with news departments include CBC Radio One, CKNW and News 1130. The Franco-Columbian community is served by Radio-Canada outlets CBUFT-DT channel 26 (Ici Radio-Canada Télé), CBUF-FM 97.7 (Première Chaîne) and CBUX-FM 90.9 (Espace musique). The multilingual South Asian community is served by Spice Radio on 1200 AM established in 2014.
Media dominance is a frequently discussed issue in Vancouver as newspapers the Vancouver Sun, The Province, the Vancouver Courier and other local newspapers such as the Surrey Now, the Burnaby Now and the Richmond News, are all owned by Postmedia Network. The concentration of media ownership has spurred alternatives, making Vancouver a centre for independent online media including The Tyee, The Vancouver Observer, and NowPublic, as well as hyperlocal online media, like Daily Hive and Vancouver Is Awesome, which provide coverage of community events and local arts and culture.
1Transport Vancouver's streetcar system began on June 28, 1890, and ran from the (first) Granville Street Bridge to Westminster Avenue (now Main Street and Kingsway). Less than a year later, the Westminster and Vancouver Tramway Company began operating Canada's first interurban line between the two cities (extended to Chilliwack in 1910). Another line (1902), the Vancouver and Lulu Island Railway, was leased by the Canadian Pacific Railway to the British Columbia Electric Railway in 1905 and ran from the Granville Street Bridge to Steveston via Kerrisdale, which encouraged residential neighbourhoods outside the central core to develop. From 1897 the British Columbia Electric Railway (BCER) became the company that operated the urban and interurban rail system, until 1958, when its last vestiges were dismantled in favour of "trackless" trolley and gasoline/diesel buses; in that same year the BCER became the core of the newly created, publicly owned BC Hydro. Vancouver currently has the second-largest trolleybus fleet in North America, after San Francisco.
Successive city councils in the 1970s and 1980s prohibited the construction of freeways as part of a long-term plan. As a result, the only major freeway within city limits is Highway 1, which passes through the north-eastern corner of the city. While the number of cars in Vancouver proper has been steadily rising with population growth, the rate of car ownership and the average distance driven by daily commuters have fallen since the early 1990s. Vancouver is the only major Canadian city with these trends. Despite the fact that the journey time per vehicle has increased by one-third and growing traffic mass, there are 7 percent fewer cars making trips into the downtown core. In 2012, Vancouver had the worst traffic congestion in Canada and the second-highest in North America, behind Los Angeles. As of 2013, Vancouver now has the worst traffic congestion in North America. Residents have been more inclined to live in areas closer to their interests, or use more energy-efficient means of travel, such as mass transit and cycling. This is, in part, the result of a push by city planners for a solution to traffic problems and pro-environment campaigns. Transportation demand management policies have imposed restrictions on drivers making it more difficult and expensive to commute while introducing more benefits for non-drivers.
TransLink is responsible for roads and public transportation within Metro Vancouver (in succession to BC Transit, which had taken over the transit functions of BC Hydro). It provides bus service, including the RapidBus express service, a foot passenger and bicycle ferry service (known as SeaBus), an automated rapid transit service called SkyTrain, and West Coast Express commuter rail. Vancouver's SkyTrain system is currently running on three lines, the Millennium Line, the Expo Line and the Canada Line with a total of 53 stations as of 2017. Only 20 of these stations are within the City of Vancouver borders, with the remainders in the adjacent suburbs. A number of city's biggest tourist attractions, such as English Bay, Stanley Park, the Vancouver Aquarium, University of British Columbia with the Museum of Anthropology, and Kitsilano are not connected by this rapid transit system.
Changes are being made to the regional transportation network as part of Translink's 10-Year Transportation Plan. The Canada Line, opened on August 17, 2009, connects Vancouver International Airport and the neighbouring city of Richmond with the existing SkyTrain system. The Evergreen Extension, which opened on December 2, 2016, links the cities of Coquitlam and Port Moody with the SkyTrain system. As of January 2019, plans to extend the SkyTrain Millennium Line west to UBC as a subway under Broadway have been approved and there are plans for capacity upgrades and an extension to the Expo Line. Several road projects will be completed within the next few years, as part of the Provincial Government's Gateway Program.
Other modes of transport add to the diversity of options available in Vancouver. Inter-city passenger rail service is operated from Pacific Central Station by Via Rail to points east, Amtrak Cascades to Seattle and Portland, and Rocky Mountaineer rail tour routes. Small passenger ferries operating in False Creek provide commuter service to Granville Island, Downtown Vancouver and Kitsilano. Vancouver has a citywide network of bicycle lanes and routes, which supports an active population of cyclists year-round. Cycling has become Vancouver's fastest-growing mode of transportation. The bicycle-sharing system Mobi was introduced to the city in June 2016.
Vancouver is served by Vancouver International Airport (YVR), located on Sea Island in the city of Richmond, immediately south of Vancouver. Vancouver's airport is Canada's second-busiest airport, and the second-largest gateway on the west coast of North America for international passengers. HeliJet and float plane companies operate scheduled air service from Vancouver harbour and YVR south terminal. The city is also served by two BC Ferry terminals. One is to the north-west at Horseshoe Bay in West Vancouver, and the other is to the south, at Tsawwassen in Delta.
1Sports and recreation The mild climate of the city and proximity to ocean, mountains, rivers and lakes make the area a popular destination for outdoor recreation. Vancouver has over 1,298 ha (3,210 acres) of parks, of which Stanley Park, at 404 ha (1,000 acres), is the largest. The city has several large beaches, many adjacent to one another, extending from the shoreline of Stanley Park around False Creek to the south side of English Bay, from Kitsilano to the University Endowment Lands, (which also has beaches that are not part of the city proper). The 18 km (11 mi) of beaches include Second and Third Beaches in Stanley Park, English Bay (First Beach), Sunset, Kitsilano Beach, Jericho, Locarno, Spanish Banks, Spanish Banks Extension, Spanish Banks West, and Wreck Beach. There is also a freshwater beach at Trout Lake in John Hendry Park. The coastline provides for many types of water sport, and the city is a popular destination for boating enthusiasts.
Within a 20- to 30-minute drive from downtown Vancouver are the North Shore Mountains, with three ski areas: Cypress Mountain, Grouse Mountain, and Mount Seymour. Mountain bikers have created world-renowned trails across the North Shore. The Capilano River, Lynn Creek and Seymour River, also on the North Shore, provide opportunities to whitewater enthusiasts during periods of rain and spring melt, though the canyons of those rivers are more utilized for hiking and swimming than whitewater.
Running races include the Vancouver Sun Run (a 10-kilometre (6.2 mi) race) every April; the Vancouver Marathon, held every May; and the Scotiabank Vancouver Half-Marathon held every June. The Grouse Grind is a 2.9-kilometre (1.8 mi) climb up Grouse Mountain open throughout the summer and fall months, including the annual Grouse Grind Mountain Run. Hiking trails include the Baden-Powell Trail, an arduous 42-kilometre-long (26 mi) hike from West Vancouver's Horseshoe Bay to Deep Cove in the District of North Vancouver.
Vancouver is also home to notable cycling races. During most summers since 1973, the Global Relay Gastown Grand Prix has been held on the cobblestone streets of Gastown. This race and the UBC Grand Prix are part of BC Superweek, an annual series of professional cycling races in Metro Vancouver.
The British Columbia Derby is a nine-furlong horse race held at the Hastings Racecourse in the third week of September.
In 2009, Metro Vancouver hosted the World Police and Fire Games. Swangard Stadium, in the neighbouring city of Burnaby, hosted games for the 2007 FIFA U-20 World Cup.
Vancouver, along with Whistler and Richmond, was the host city for the 2010 Winter Olympics and the 2010 Winter Paralympics. On June 12, 2010, it played host to Ultimate Fighting Championship 115 (UFC 115) which was the fourth UFC event to be held in Canada (and the first outside Montreal).
In 2011, Vancouver hosted the Grey Cup, the Canadian Football League (CFL) championship game which is awarded every year to a different city which has a CFL team. The BC Titans of the International Basketball League played their inaugural season in 2009, with home games at the Langley Event Centre. Vancouver is a centre for the fast-growing sport of ultimate. During the summer of 2008 Vancouver hosted the World Ultimate Championships.
The National Basketball Association (NBA) came to town in the form of the Vancouver Grizzlies in 1995. They played their games at Rogers Arena. After six years in Vancouver, the team relocated to Memphis, Tennessee, in 2001.
In 2015, Vancouver was one of six venues for the 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup and hosted the Final game between the United States and Japan. Vancouver is one of two Canadian cities which will host matches during the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
Vancouver is Canada's fittest major city with an obesity rate of only 17.4%, compared to the national average of 24.8%. It is only surpassed by Kelowna, British Columbia with a rate of 17% and followed by Victoria, British Columbia at 19.6%. Overall, the province of British Columbia has the lowest obesity rate in Canada, followed by Quebec at 2nd and Ontario at 3rd.
1Vancouver is rated Beta + by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network (GaWC) which evaluates and ranks the relationships between world cities in the context of globalisation. Beta level cities are cities that link moderate economic regions to the world economy.
Vancouver is the #23 city in the world according to the Global Power City Index (GPCI) which evaluates and ranks the major cities of the world according to their magnetism, or their comprehensive power to attract people, capital, and enterprises from around the world. It does so through measuring six key functions: Economy, Research and Development, Cultural Interaction, Liveability, Environment, and Accessibility.
Vancouver is the #28 city in the world according to the Global Financial Centres Index (GFCI) which evaluates and ranks the competitiveness of the major financial centres of the world according to a wide range of criteria – Human Capital, Business, Finance, Infrastructure and Reputation.
Vancouver is ranked #70 and rated C by the Global Urban Competitiveness Report (GUCR) which evaluates and ranks world cities in the context of economic competitiveness. C cities are international gateway cities. Vancouver was ranked #63 by the Nomad List which evaluates and ranks remote work hubs by cost, internet, fun and safety. Vancouver has a population of over 648,608 people. Vancouver also forms the centre of the wider Vancouver city which has a population of over 2,463,431 people. It is also a part of the larger Greater Vancouver metropolitan area. Vancouver is the #199 hipster city in the world, with a hipster score of 3.4813 according to the Hipster Index which evaluates and ranks the major cities of the world according to the number of vegan eateries, coffee shops, tattoo studios, vintage boutiques, and record stores. Vancouver is ranked #42 for startups with a score of 10.35.
To set up a UBI Lab for Vancouver see: https://www.ubilabnetwork.org Twitter: https://twitter.com/UBILabNetwork
The Climate Emergency means that Vancouver may be at risk of flooding by rising sea levels by 2035
Twin Towns, Sister Cities Vancouver has links with:
🇫🇷 Albertville, France 🏴 Edinburgh, Scotland 🇪🇸 Huelva, Spain 🇺🇸 Indio, USA 🇺🇸 Los Angeles, USA 🇨🇳 Nansha District, China 🇺🇦 Odesa, Ukraine 🇦🇹 Vienna, Austria 🇯🇵 Yokohama, Japan🏴 Architect Paul Phipps is associated with Vancouver. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (FRIBA) in 1921.
🏴 🇺🇸 Architect Gordon Bernie Kaufmann is associated with Vancouver. He is best known for the architectural styling of the Hoover Dam near Boulder, Colorado (1931-36).
🏴 Architect Adrian Gilbert Scott is associated with Vancouver. He served with distinction during World War One and was awarded the Military Cross.
🏴 Landscape Architect/Garden Designer/Town Planner Thomas Hayton Mawson is associated with Vancouver. Most of the gardens he designed were in the Windermere area.
🇨🇦 🏴 Architect Edward Box Wetenhall is associated with Vancouver. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (FRIBA) in 1924.
🏴 🇨🇦 Architect Hugh Dykes Simpson is associated with Vancouver. He taught building construction in Kilmarnock and Irvine between 1897-1901.
🏴 🇭🇰 Architect Terence Stanley Crathern Feltham is associated with Vancouver. He was a founding member of the Hong Kong Institute of Architects in 1956.
🏴 🇨🇦 Architect Gordon Lorimer Wright is associated with Vancouver. He he emigrated to Canada in 1910.
🏴 Architect Harry Reginald Poulter is associated with Vancouver. From 1905 he was in partnership with his brother, Briant Alfred Poulter (1881-1972).
🇩🇪 Zweibrücken 49.25
🇨🇦 Port Coquitlam 49.25
🇨🇿 Strakonice 49.262
🇺🇦 Starobilsk 49.267
🇩🇪 Neumarkt in der Oberpfalz 49.283
🇩🇪 Zweibrücken 49.25
🇨🇦 Port Coquitlam 49.25
🇫🇷 Val de Briey 49.249
🇫🇷 Les Andelys 49.247
🇩🇪 Saarbrücken 49.235
Locations Near: Vancouver -123.1,49.25
🇨🇦 North Vancouver -123.075,49.321 d: 8.1
🇨🇦 Richmond -123.16,49.152 d: 11.7
🇨🇦 Burnaby -122.973,49.245 d: 9.2
🇨🇦 New Westminster -122.9,49.2 d: 15.6
🇨🇦 Coquitlam -122.794,49.285 d: 22.5
🇨🇦 Surrey -122.823,49.105 d: 25.8
🇨🇦 Port Coquitlam -122.767,49.25 d: 24.2
Antipodal to: Vancouver 56.9,-49.25
🇫🇷 Saint-Pierre 55.478,-21.342 d: 16909.3
🇫🇷 Le Tampon 55.515,-21.278 d: 16902.3
🇫🇷 Réunion 55.532,-21.133 d: 16886.3
🇫🇷 Saint-Benoît 55.713,-21.034 d: 16875.8
🇫🇷 Saint-Paul 55.27,-21.01 d: 16871.6
🇫🇷 Saint-Paul 55.279,-21 d: 16870.5
🇫🇷 Saint-Denis 55.457,-20.867 d: 16856.5
🇲🇺 Mahébourg 57.7,-20.407 d: 16807.1
🇲🇺 Curepipe 57.517,-20.317 d: 16797.4
🇲🇺 Vacoas-Phoenix 57.493,-20.3 d: 16795.6