Can the Granville Strip Be Saved?

I used to work out of an office on the Granville Strip, and the thing I remember most isn’t the way that my employer gave the second-floor space a So-Cal living-room vibe (so chic). It’s also not the office’s proximity to stores like Sephora (take my money!) and Nordstrom (RIP). It’s not even all the smoothies I bought from Vitasave (read: many). It’s the robberies.

One morning, my laptop was mysteriously missing from my desk. Others’ were too. We were a little spooked, but we got over it.

Until, that is, it happened again a month later. And again the month after that. And the one after that. Each time, we upped our security—and each time, the thieves found a way in.

For decades, the Granville Strip was the beating heart of Vancouver. Starting in the middle of the 20th century, this downtown stretch of Granville Street was where people went to be entertained: first it was the rise of live theatre, then the onset of the moving picture and, finally, the proliferation of bars and clubs. I look back fondly on my early 20s, when every weekend revolved around which spots we were going to hit up on the Strip. Sure, it had a layer of grime to it even then, but it was still the most exciting place in the city to be on a Saturday night.

These days, it’s no secret that the Granville Strip is a shell of its former self, with one Reddit user referring to it as an “absolute disaster.” (That post got 700 comments.) Many storefronts sit boarded up and empty. Martin Moriarty, senior managing director for commercial leasing and sales company Marcus and Millichap, says Granville Street is currently operating at about a 30 percent vacancy rate, compared to an average of five to seven percent in other key shopping areas, like Alberni and Robson.

“Generally speaking,” he says to me, “there’s definitively more vacancy on this section of Granville than other parts of the downtown core.”

The shops that are still there, meanwhile, are subjected to frequent break-ins and vandalism. Some businesses, like luxury consignment store Mine and Yours, left the area altogether because of the near-constant crime.

Hospitality traffic is also reportedly down 60 percent, with local business owners suggesting that the area is in record-poor shape. Alan Goodall has seen this firsthand. The owner of Granville’s Aura Nightclub is constantly dealing with expensive damage caused by the single-room occupancy (SRO) project that sits above his business.

“I’ve dealt with well over 200 floods,” he tells me. “As many as four times on a weekend within a 36-hour period. Just within the last month, I’ve had my ceiling caved in three different times.”

Still, when I talk to Goodall, there’s an air of hope in his voice. On June 12, city hall announced that it would be moving three supportive housing projects—including the one above Aura—out of the Granville Strip. “The city is going to be relocating them elsewhere,” Goodall says, “with proper amenities for the residents.”

It’s a move that has been celebrated not just by business owners but also by the city’s police officers and firefighters—who have responded to thousands of calls to only a handful of SROs. The relocation plan involves providing city-owned property to build purpose-driven supportive housing projects, which will be capped at 40 units—allowing for better amenities and better mental health care.

The news came hot on the heels of city council’s June 4  approval of the Granville Street Plan: a 20-year revitalization project with the goal of transforming Granville into a “safer, more vibrant destination.” Among the priorities are adding new hotel and residential developments, creating incentives for new and existing entertainment businesses and improving transit offerings.

“Heritage is important, and we should preserve as much heritage as possible, but a street can’t be a time capsule,” says Chris Fair, president and CEO of Resonance, a placemaking consultancy that released a report on the future of Granville Street in 2021. “It’s kind of what’s happened to Granville Street. So the first step, and this is being addressed in the new Granville Plan, is allowing for increased density and redevelopment to happen behind and above some of these heritage, historical buildings.”

He thinks the plan has good bones, but is hesitant about the intention to completely remove vehicles from the area. “I’m not sure that pedestrian-only is the right move to support redevelopment based on the way we’re living in cities today,” he says.

For one thing, DoorDash and Amazon deliveries are the new normal. Another factor, Goodall notes, is safety: people leaving the neighbourhood’s nightclubs late at night (especially women) should be able to hop directly into an Uber or taxi. But while it might not be perfect—and while it probably should have been started a decade sooner—the overall sentiment for the Granville Street Plan is one of hope.

“Absolutely,” Moriarty says when I ask him if Granville can be saved. “This is a step in the right direction. It is late, but I’m fully supportive that change needs to happen.”

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Even with the plan years away from being completed, anchor tenants are slowly coming back to the area. The Rec Room—Cineplex’s popular game-bar concept—opened on Granville in December of last year. For Kevin Watts, Cineplex’s executive vice-president of exhibition and location-based entertainment, the location was a no-brainer.

“Bringing the Rec Room to Granville Street in downtown Vancouver was really attractive to us,” he says. “We believe that the Rec Room concept is really a great downtown concept. It provides a lot of space and a lot of opportunity for people to gather—particularly people who may be living in the downtown area who don’t have big places to go into.”

He says that the reception has been incredibly warm—from both residents and nearby businesses.

“We’ve had a great reception from other venues along the Strip,” says Watts. “Everyone’s been coming over to welcome us, and is really excited about us all working together to have this great entertainment destination for people in the Greater Vancouver area to come to.”