After 11 years of bringing you local reporting, the team behind the Vancouver Observer has moved on to Canada's National Observer. You can follow Vancouver culture reporting over there from now on. Thank you for all your support over the years!

gentrification

Impossible Tom Cruise stunts, teen life in Eighth Grade and real journalism in Shock & Awe

Plus class and race issues in Blindspotting, three good ones at the VanCity, and, for the kids, Teen Titans playing around with the movies

How B.C.'s small businesses could be champions for $15 minimum wage

If the Province wants small businesses on-side for $15 minimum wage, it should take seriously the crisis of affordability facing small businesses caused by real estate speculation
Vancouver's Chinatown seen from Keefer and Carrall Streets

Vancouver's Chinatown grapples with growing pains of affordability, development

The transformation of Vancouver's Chinatown, fuelled by a changing population, crisis of affordability and ripe potential for new development, has left some locals calling it either a dying...

Jacobs and Florida and Gehl oh my! Who really influences our local politicians?

Still undecided about who to vote for? Second guessing yourself? Who really influences and inspires those candidates who are running for a seat in Vancouver's City Hall?

DTES Local Area Plan pleases, and enrages, everyone

As the saga of our several community plans continues to unfold in Vancouver the DTES Plan proves to be perhaps the most complex and innovative, but surprisingly not the most controversial.

A brief history of Vancouver gentrification: The drama of urban development

Vancouver has a history of power imbalance, which has fueled gentrification.

Will taxes be the death of small businesses in Vancouver?

Vacant storefronts plague some areas of Vancouver, current tax policies play a major role argue local businesses

Gentrification: Fight the system, not your neighbours

A recent op-ed piece by Sid Chow Tan, long-time Downtown Eastside (DTES) activist, captured nicely the current false dichotomy of self-interested gentrifying businesses vs. attention-loving, if...

Squeezing Strathcona: Chinatown development and endangered neighbourhoods

Chinatown is getting high-rises soon, and Strathcona will be next.

Gentrification killing off low-income rooms in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside

Report shows development driving up rents, reducing number of welfare-level rooming houses.